Time passed away till I and my companions were heartily tired of our inactivity:  besides, I was home-sick, and I had left articles of great value at the settlement, about which I was rather fidgety.  So one day we determined that we would start alone, and return to the settlement by a different road.  We left Santa Fe and rode towards the north, and it was not until we had passed Taos, the last Mexican settlement, that we became ourselves again and recovered our good spirits.  Gabriel knew the road; our number was too small not to find plenty to eat, and as to the hostile Indians, it was a chance we were willing enough to encounter.  A few days after we had quitted Santa Fe, and when In the neighbourhood of the Spanish Peaks and about thirty degrees north latitude, we fell in with a numerous party of the Comanches.

It was the first time we had seen them in a body, and it was a grand sight.  Gallant horsemen they were and well mounted.  They were out upon an expedition against the Pawnee[15] Loups, and they behaved to us with the greatest kindness and hospitality.  The chief knew Gabriel, and invited us to go in company with them to their place of encampment.  The chief was a tall, fine fellow, and with beautiful symmetry of figure.  He spoke Spanish well, and the conversation was carried on in that tongue until the evening, when I addressed him in Shoshone, which beautiful dialect is common to the Comanches, Apaches, and Arrapahoes, and related to him the circumstances of our captivity on the shores of the Colorado of the West.  As I told my story the chief was mute with astonishment, until at last, throwing aside the usual Indian decorum, he grasped me firmly by the hand.  He knew I was neither a Yankee nor a Mexican, and swore that for my sake every Canadian or Frenchman falling in their power should be treated as a friend.  After our meal we sat comfortably round the fires, and listened to several speeches and traditions of the warriors.

[Footnote 15:  The word Pawnee signifies “exiled;” therefore it does not follow that the three tribes bearing the same name belong to the same nation.

The Grand Pawnees, the tribe among whom Mr. Murray resided, are of Dahcotah origin, and live along the shores of the river Platte; the Pawnee Loups are of the Algonquin race, speaking quite another language, and occupying the country situated between the northern forks of the same river.  Both tribes are known among the trappers to be the “Crows of the East;” that is to say, thieves and treacherous.  They cut their hair short except on the scalp, as is usual among the nations which they have sprung from.

The third tribe of that name is called Pawnee Pict; these are of Comanche origin and Shoshone race, wearing their hair long, and speaking the same language as all the western great prairie tribes.  They live upon the Red River, which forms the boundary betwixt North Texas and the Western American boundary, and have been visited by Mr. Catlin, who mentions them in his work.  The Picts are constantly at war with the two other tribes of Pawnees; and though their villages are nearly one thousand miles distant from those of their enemy, their war-parties are continually scouring the country of the “Exiles of the East”—­“Pa-wah-nejs.”]