In relating the adventures of “The Boys of Crawford’s Basin,” the author has endeavored to depict the life of the ranchman in the mountains of Colorado as he knew it towards the end of the “seventies” of the century just past.
At that date, the railroads, after their long climb from the Missouri River to the foot of the Rocky Mountains, were still seeking a practicable passage westward over that formidable barrier, and in consequence, the mountain ranchman – who, by the way, was also sometimes a prospector and frequently a hunter – having no means of shipping his produce to the outside world, depended for his market upon one or another of the many little silver-mining camps scattered over the State.
That infant State was but just learning to walk without leading-strings; and it has been the aim of the author to show how two stout young fellows, prone to honesty and not afraid of hard work, were able to do their share in advancing the prosperity of the growing Commonwealth in which their lot was cast.
It may not be out of place, perhaps, to mention that, besides having had considerable experience in ranching, the author was, about the date of the story, himself prospecting for silver and working as a miner. He would add, too, that several of the incidents related therein, and those in his opinion the most remarkable, are drawn from actual facts.
CHAPTER I
Big Reuben’s Raid
“Wake up, boys! Wake up! Tumble out, there! Quick! Big Reuben’s into the pig-pen again!”
Our bedroom door was banged wide open, and my father stood before us – a startling apparition – dressed only in his night-shirt and a pair of boots, carrying a stable-lantern in one hand and a rifle in the other.
“What is it?” cried Joe, as he bounced out of bed; and, “Where is it?” cried I, both of us half dazed by the sudden awakening.
“It’s Big Reuben raiding the pig-pen again! Can’t you hear ’em squealing? Come on at once! Bring the eight-bore, Joe; and you, Phil, get the torch and the revolver. Quick; or he’ll kill every hog in the pen!”
Big Reuben was not a two-legged thief, as one might suppose from his name. He was a grizzly bear, a notorious old criminal, who, for the past two or three years, had done much harm to the ranchmen of our neighborhood, killing calves and colts and pigs – especially pigs.
Like a robber-baron of old, he laid tribute on the whole community, raiding all the ranches in turn, traveling great distances during the night, but always retreating to his lair among the rocks before morning. This had gone on for a long time, when one day, in broad daylight, while Ole Johnson, the Swede, was plowing his upper potato-patch, the grizzly jumped down from a ledge of rocks and with one blow of his paw broke the back of Ole’s best work-steer; Ole himself, frightened half to death, flying for refuge to his stable, where he shut himself up in the hay-loft for the rest of the day.
This outrage had the effect of waking up the county commissioners, who, understanding at last that we had been terrorized long enough, now offered a reward of one hundred dollars for bruin’s scalp – an offer which stimulated all the hunters round about to run the marauder to his lair.
But Big Reuben was as crafty as he was bold. His home was up in one of the rocky gorges of Mount Lincoln to the west of us, where it would be useless to try to trail him; and after Jed Smith had been almost torn to pieces, and his partner, Baldy Atkins, had spent two nights and a day up a tree, the enthusiasm of the hunters had suddenly waned and Big Reuben’s closer acquaintance had been shunned by all alike. Thereafter, the bear had continued his depredations unchecked.
Among his many other pieces of mischief, he had killed a valuable calf for us once, once before he had raided the pig-pen, and now here he was again.
Without waiting to put on any extra clothing, Joe and I followed my father through the kitchen, I grabbing a revolver from its nail in the wall, and Joe snatching down the great eight-bore duck-gun and slipping into it two cartridges prepared for this very contingency, each cartridge containing twelve buck-shot and a big spherical bullet – a terrific charge for close quarters. Once outside the kitchen-door, I ran to the wood-shed and seized the torch which, like the cartridges, had been made ready for this emergency. It consisted of a broom-handle with a great wad of waste, soaked in kerosene, bound with wire to one end of it.
Lighting the torch, I held it high and followed two paces behind the others as they advanced towards the pig-pen. We had not progressed twenty yards, however – luckily for us, as it turned out – when there issued through the roof of the pen a great dark body, dimly seen by the light of the torch.
“There he is!” cried my father, as the bear dropped out of sight behind the corral fence. “Look out, now! We’ll get a shot at him as he runs up the hill!”
But Big Reuben had no intention whatever of running up the hill; he feared neither man nor beast, and the next moment he appeared round the corner of the corral, charging full upon us, open-mouthed.
