And now kind reader, begging your pardon, I would say that I have been two years making up my mind to allow my life to go down in history to be read by the public, as notoriety is something I never cared for.  One reason, perhaps, is that I was brought up by noble and generous-hearted Kit Carson, who very much disliked notoriety, and I do not believe that there ever was a son who thought more of his father than I did of that high-minded and excellent man.

I have had many opportunities to have the history of my life written up, but would never consent to anything of the kind.  Finally, however, I decided to write it myself, and while it is written in very rude and unpolished language, by an old frontiersman who never went to school a day in his life, all he knows he picked up himself, yet it is the true history of the most striking events, trials, troubles, tribulations, hardships, pleasures and satisfactions of a long life of strange adventure among wild scenes and wilder people, and in telling the story I hope I have interested the reader.

It is not strange that in the wilderness, where all nature sings, from the fairy tinkle of the falling snow to the boom of a storm-swept canyon; and from the warbling of the birds to the roaring growl of mad grizzlies; and from the whispers of lost breezes to thunder of thousands of stampeding hoofs—­it is not strange that among all that, even a worn and illiterate old hunter should try to sing, if nothing more than the same sort of a song that the dying sachem sings.  So I beg you bear with

The old Scout’s lament.

    Come all of you, my brother scouts,
     And join me in my song;
     Come, let us sing together,
     Though the shadows fall so long.

    Of all the old frontiersmen,
     That used to scour the plain,
     There are but very few of them
     That with us yet remain.

    Day after day, they’re dropping off;
     They are going, one by one;
     Our clan is fast decreasing;
     Our race is almost run.

    There were many of our number
     That never wore the blue,
     But, faithfully, they did their part,
     As brave men, tried and true.

    They never joined the army,
     But had other work to do
     In piloting the coming folks,
     To help them safely through.

    But brothers, we are failing;
     Our race is almost run;
     The days of elk and buffalo,
     And beaver traps, are gone.

    Oh, the days of elk and buffalo,
     It fills my heart with pain
     To know those days are passed and gone,
     To never come again.

    We fought the red-skin rascals
     Over valley, hill and plain,
     We fought him in the mountain top,
     And fought him down again.

    Those fighting days are over;
     The Indian yell resounds
     No more along the border,
     Peace sends far sweeter sounds