I told him that she was not for
sale. He offered me a hundred dollars for her. I hated to part
with her, but a hundred dollars was more money than I had ever had
before at one time, and looked like a big lot to me, so I accepted
his offer, and in less than twenty-four hours I was very sorry,
for during the time I stayed in Santa Fe, every time that I would
pass in sight of her she would cry as pitifully as any child ever
heard. Five hundred dollars would not have bought her from Mr.
Mace, as he had purchased her with the intention of taking her to
England.
Mr. Roubidoux and Joe Favor employed Uncle Kit to go out and trade
for buffalo robes with the Comanche and Kiowa Indians. I
accompanied him on this trip, and we were out two months, during
which time we did not see a white man.
This was the first shipment of buffalo robes that had ever been
made from this region, consequently we were able to get them
almost at our own price.
As soon as Uncle Kit got out there with his little stock of goods
that had been furnished him to trade on, and which consisted of
beads and rings and a very few blankets, and the Indians had
learned that he would trade for robes, the squaws all fell to
dressing them. Among the Indians it was considered disgraceful for
men to do such work.
In a very short time there were plenty of dressed buffalo robes,
and some very nice ones, and I have seen Uncle Kit trade a string
of beads a foot and a half long for a first-class robe, and for a
red blanket he could get almost as many robes as he had a mind to
ask.
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