Page:Life Amongst the Modocs.djvu/385

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ng across these mountains in the days when they were only marked by narrow trails, and everything was trans ported on the backs of these patient little animals.

My guide, sent along by the ranchero to take care of the mules and return them, was a singular Indian. His name was u Limber Jim." I should have known his name was Limber Jim before I heard it. Out here things take their names just as they impress you. Once a six-foot desperado said to a man with a freckled face, who had wedged himself into a party as they were lifting glasses, "What is your name?"

"P. Archibald Brown."

"P. Archibald Hell! your name is Ginger."

A Californian desperado is not a fool; he is oftener a genius. "P. Archibald Brown" was never heard of after that. Down in Arizona is now a board at the head of a little sandy hillock marked "GINGER."

When Limber Jim moved, every limb and muscle was in motion. When he opened his mouth he also opened his hands, and when he opened his hands he would helplessly open his mouth. After we had forded the Sacramento and climbed the long and rugged trail on the other side, we rested in the shade and I asked the creature his history. His short and simple annals were to the effect that he was an Indian lad in good standing with the whites while they were at war with his fathers, and was a great pet among them. But one morning after a pack train had disappeared a rancheria was surrounded and all the men and boys taken to the camp for