ordained that both shall be "rubbed out" from the face of nature at one and the same time-"that arrows and bullets are not more fatal to the buffalo than the small-pox and fire-water to them, and that, before many winters' snows have disappeared, the Red men will only be remembered by their bones which will strew the plains."

Alas, poor Indians! Driven by the force of circumstances from this earth, they look forward to another world where peace and happiness are confined within the narrow circles of their own experiences. After a long journey, they will, they say, reach "the happy hunting-grounds," where buffalo will once more blacken the prairies; where the pale faces dare not come to disturb them; where no winter snows cover the ground; and where the buffalo are always plentiful and fat. What a contrast does the Paradise of the Red man present to that of the luxurious Mohammedan ?

Many are the strange stories we have read of those stalwart hunters, and daring, indefatigable, enduring men, whose main business, that of trapping beaver in the streamlets that flow from the far off rocky mountains, has given to them their name. Often have we pictured to ourselves their long-neglected hair, faces browned by exposure, their sharp, keen examining look, their hunting-frocks of buckskin with long fringes down the seams, with pantaloons similarly ornamented, and with moccasins of Indian make. But never have we seen the race whose occupation will depart with beaver, buffalo, and Indians, so strikingly portrayed as in the pages of poor George Frederick Ruxton's posthumous volume. It will probably be one of the last of its kind, as it is one of the best.*

No more daring mountaineers than Killbuck and La Bonté ever trapped a beaver, and we are at first introduced to these braves when on their way from the north fork of Platte River, to wintering-ground in the more southern valley of the Arkansas. The two leaders were encamped with a small party for the moment on a creek called Bijou, when one stormy night Killbuck roused the remainder of the party by a single word.

"Injuns !"

Scarcely was the word out of Killbuck's lips, when, above the howling of the furious wind, and the pattering of the rain, a hundred savage yells broke suddenly upon their ears from all directions round the camp; a score of rifleshots rattled from the thicket, and a cloud of arrows whistled through the air, whilst a crowd of Indians charged upon the picketed animals. "Owgh, owgh -owgh-owgh-g-h-h." "A foot, by gor!" shouted Killbuck, "and the old mule gone at that. On 'em, boys, for old Kentuck!" And he rushed towards his mule, which jumped and snorted mad with fright, as a naked Indian strove to fasten a lariat round her nose, having already cut the rope which fastened her to the picket-pin.

"Quit that, you cussed devil!" roared the trapper, as he jumped upon the savage, and without raising his rifle to his shoulder, made a deliberate thrust with the muzzle at his naked breast, striking him full, and at the same time pulling the trigger, actually driving the Indian two paces backwards with the shock, when he fell in a heap, and dead. But at the same moment, an Indian, sweeping his club round his head, brought it with fatal force down upon Killbuck; for a moment the hunter staggered, threw out his arms wildly into the air, and fell headlong to the ground.

"Life in the Far West," by George Frederick Ruxton, author of "Travels in Mexico," &c., &c. Blackwood and Sons.

"Owgh! owgh, owgh-h-h!" cried the Rapaho, and, striding over the prostrate body, he seized with his left hand the middle lock of the trapper's long hair, and drew his knife round the head to separate the scalp from the skull. As he bent over to his work, the trapper named La Bonté saw his companion's peril, rushed quick as thought at the Indian, and buried his knife to the hilt between his shoulders. With a gasping shudder, the Rapaho fell dead upon the prostrate body of his foe.

The attack, however, lasted but a few seconds. The dash at the animals had been entirely successful, and, driving them before them, with loud cries, the Indians disappeared quickly in the darkness. Without waiting for daylight, two of the three trappers who alone were to be seen, and who had been within the shanties at the time of attack, without a moment's delay commenced packing two horses, which having been fastened to the shanties had escaped the Indians, and placing their squaws upon them, showering curses and imprecations on their enemies, left the camp, fearful of another onset, and resolved to retreat and câche themselves until the danger was over. Not so La Bonté, who, stout and true, had done his best in the fight, and now sought the body of his old comrade, from which, before he could examine the wounds, he had first to remove the corpse of the Indian he had slain. Killbuck still breathed. He had been stunned; but, revived by the cold rain beating upon his face, he soon opened his eyes, and recognised his trusty friend, who, sitting down, lifted his head into his lap, and wiped away the blood that streamed from the wounded scalp.

"Is the top-knot gone, boy?" asked Killbuck, "for my head feels queersome, I tell you."

"Thar's the Injun as felt like lifting it," answered the other, kicking the dead body with his foot.

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Wagh! boy, you've struck a coup; so scalp the nigger right off, and then fetch me a drink."

With the break of morning the trappers found that most of their companions had been slain in the onslaught, and, as a necessary sequence, scalped; but, nothing daunted by this catastrophe, they resolved upon taking the Indian trail and getting back their mules. "I feel like taking hair," said the old hunter, "and some Rapahos has to go under' for this night's work." And they actually carried out the daring project, successfully tracking the Indians, abiding their time and opportunity, making a descent, killing and scalping several Red men, and recovering their horses and mules. It is not always so easy, however, to kill the Red man; his tenacity of life is something extraordinary, and an instance of this kind is related which occurred upon an occasion when a number of hostile Indians had, upon making signs of peace, been admitted into the camp of the trappers, which is horrible enough to make the hair stand on end.

The trappers were all sitting at their suppers over the fires, the Indians looking gravely on, when it was remarked that now would be a good opportunity to retaliate upon them for the trouble their incessant attacks had entailed upon the camp. The suggestion was highly approved of, and instantly acted upon. Springing to their feet, the trappers seized their rifles, and commenced the slaughter. The Indians, panic-struck, fled without resistance, and numbers fell before the death-dealing rifles of the mountaineers. A chief, who had been sitting on a rock near the fire where the leader of the trappers sat, had been singled out by the latter as the first mark for his rifle.

Placing the muzzle to his heart, he pulled the trigger, but the Indian, with extraordinary tenacity of life, rose and grappled with his assailant. The white was a tall powerful man, but, notwithstanding the deadly wound the

Indian had received, he had his equal in strength to contend against. The naked form of the Indian twisted and writhed in his grasp, as he sought to avoid the trapper's uplifted knife. Many of the latter's companions advanced to administer the coup-de-grâce to the savage, but the trapper cried to keep off: "If he couldn't whip the Injun," he said, "he'd go under."

At length he succeeded in throwing him, and, plunging his knife no less than seven times into his body, he tore off his scalp, and went in pursuit of the flying savages. In the course of an hour or two, all the party returned, and sitting by the fires, resumed their suppers, which had been interrupted in the manner just described. Walker, the captain of the band, sat down by the fire where he had been engaged in the struggle with the Indian chief, whose body was lying within a few paces of it. He was in the act of fighting the battle over again to one of his companions, and was saying that the Indian had as much life in him as a buffalo bull, when, to the horror of all present, the savage, who had received wounds sufficient for twenty deaths, suddenly rose to a sitting posture, the fire shedding a glowing light upon the horrid spectacle. The face was a mass of clotted blood, which flowed from the lacerated scalp, whilst gouts of blood streamed from eight gaping wounds in

the naked breast.

Slowly this frightful figure rose to a sitting posture, and, bending slowly forward to the fire, the mouth was seen to open wide, and a hollow gurgling -owg-h-h-broke from it.

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"H-!" exclaimed the trapper-and jumping up, he placed a pistol to the ghastly head, the eyes of which sternly fixed themselves on his, and pulling the trigger, blew the poor wretch's skull to atoms.

These terrible trappers have, it appears, sometimes, but rarely, their sentimental moods to soften their stern manners and fierce modes of life. La Bonté took it into his head to marry a Snake squaw, with whom he crossed the mountains and proceeded to the Platte through the Bayou Salade, where he purchased of the Yutas a commodious lodge, with the necessary poles, &c., and being now "rich" in mules, and horses, and in all things necessary for otium cum dignitate, he took unto himself another wife, as by mountain law allowed; and thus equipped with both his better halves, attired in all the glory of fofarraw, he went his way rejoicing. A cloud, however, was soon destined to break and dispel this temporary state of bliss.

In a snug little valley lying under the shadow of the mountains, watered by Vermilion Creek, and in which abundance of buffalo, elk, deer, and antelope fed and fattened on the rich grass, La Bonté raised his lodge, employing himself in hunting, and fully occupying his wives' time in dressing the skins of the many animals he killed. Here he enjoyed himself amazingly until the commencement of winter, when he determined to cross to the North Fork and trade his skins, of which he had now as many packs as his animals could carry. It happened that he one day left his camp, to spend a couple of days hunting buffalo in the mountains, whither the bulls were now resorting, intending to "put out" for Platte on his return. His hunt, however, led him further into the mountains than he anticipated, and it was only on the third day that sundown saw him enter the little valley where his camp was situated.

Crossing the creek, he was not a little disturbed at seeing fresh Indian sign on the opposite side, which led in the direction of his lodge; and his worst fears were realised when, on coming within sight of the little plateau where the conical top of his white lodge had always met his view, he saw nothing but a blackened mass strewing the ground, and the burnt ends of the poles which had once supported it.

Squaws, animals, and peltry, all were gone-an Arapaho moccasin lying on the ground told him where. He neither fumed nor fretted, but throwing the

meat off his pack animal, and the saddle from his horse, he collected the blackened ends of the lodge poles and made a fire-led his beasts to water and hobbled them, threw a piece of buffalo meat upon the coals, squatted down before the fire, and lit his pipe. La Bonté was a true philosopher. Notwithstanding that his house, his squaws, his peltries, were gone "at one fell swoop," the loss scarcely disturbed his equanimity; and before the tobacco in his pipe was half smoked out, he had ceased to think of his misfortune. Certes, as he turned his apolla of tender loin, he sighed as he thought of the delicate manipulations with which his Shoshone squaw, Sah-qua-manish, was wont to beat to tenderness the toughest bull meat-and missed the tending care of Yute Chil-co-the, or the "reed that bends," in patching the holes worn in his neatly fitting moccasins, the work of her nimble fingers. However, he ate and smoked, and smoked and ate, and slept none the worse for his mishap; thought, before he closed his eyes, a little of his lost wives, and more perhaps of the "Bending Reed" than of Sah-qua-manish, or "she who runs with the stream," drew his blanket tightly round him, felt his rifle handy to his grasp, and was speedily asleep.

Whilst the tired mountaineer breathes heavily in his dream, careless and unconscious that a living soul is near, his mule on a sudden pricks her ears and stares into the gloom, whence a figure soon emerges, and with noiseless steps draws near the sleeping hunter. Taking one look at the slumbering form, the same figure approaches the fire and adds a log to the pile; which done, it quietly seats itself at the feet of the sleeper, and remains motionless as a statue. Towards morning the hunter awoke, and, rubbing his eyes, was astonished to feel the glowing warmth of the fire striking on his naked feet, which, in Indian fashion, were stretched towards it; as by this time, he knew, the fire he left burning must long since have expired. Lazily raising himself on his elbow, he saw a figure sitting near it, with the back turned to him, which, although his exclamatory wagh was loud enough in all conscience, remained perfectly motionless, until the trapper, rising, placed his hand upon the shoulder: then, turning up its face, the features displayed to his wondering eye were those of Chilco-the, his Yuta wife. Yes, indeed, the "reed that bends" had escaped from her Arapaho captors, and made her way back to her white husband, fasting and alone.

Dr. Brooks has given some curious illustrations of the propensity of the Indians for gambling as exhibited in California, but Mr. Ruxton relates an instance which leaves all others previously published far behind it, in as much as the value of the stakes is concerned. A Sioux chieftain, after staking his bow, his club, and his robe, staked his scalp. He played and lost. The victor drew his knife and quickly removed his bloody prize. He had but one more stake of value to offer; but he did not hesitate. He offered his life against the other's winnings. This time the Sioux won, and, plunging his knife into his adversary's heart, he returned to his village, scalpless but revenged.

Sad results of social conditions without law, without morals, without true religion. It is to be hoped that, with the progress of Anglo-American enterprise, which will be so much hastened by the Californian emigra tion, that better times are in store for Red men and for trappers, and for their half-caste progeny. The Red man's prospects are darkened by his love of gambling and fire-water, but in the Hudson Bay Company territories much has been done towards eradicating these vices, and for such as survive the beaver and the buffalo, it is to be hoped a better destiny yet remains than even peaceful hunting-grounds or fat cattle.

NEW ZEALAND COOKERY-BOOK.

CHAPTER I.

PUBLIC attention, of late, has particularly directed to New Zealand; and various accounts have been published of the manners and customs of its inhabitants; it is, indeed, a country interesting alike to the philanthropist and to the anthropophagist.

But in all the books which have been written no mention has been made of their literature; this omission a happy accident has enabled us to supply.

The value of a work, as has been very judiciously observed by a sagacious critic, does not consist in its length; valuable commodities are packed in small parcels; two-and-forty sixpences go to a guinea ;-the literature of a nation is not to be estimated by the quantity of its books, but their quality. In this respect the literature of New Zealand stands alone; there has been only one work written in that language; but that one is on the most important subject, as is admitted by the universal assent of Europe, that can engage the intellectual faculties of mankind in its civilised state.

The proof of this lies in a cocoa-nut shell:

What is it that distinguishes man from all other animals?

The received distinctive characteristic of the animal man is, that he is "a cooking animal."

The French philosopher who hit on that felicitous definition was, without question, a writer of great taste and discernment; but we are aware, that, there are some who prefer the description of a more modern observer who defines man as "an animal who has debts :"-but we will not dwell on the latter point, as possibly it might give rise to disagreeable reminiscences-especially when we take into account that Christmas festivities, (surgit amari aliquid), are usually accompanied by Christmas bills.

We pass on, therefore, willingly, to the subject of New Zealand literature, and to the opinion of the giant of literature of our own countryon the importance of the art of cookery to man.

The Great Sage expressed an opinion (which immediately became law) in his own axiomatic way, that, "A man, sir, who neglects his belly will neglect everything else;"-meaning thereby, his religious and moral as well as his social duties; a dictum which another doctor hardly less eminent for his dictionary of dishes than the great lexicographer for his dictionary of phrases-and whose name of Kitchener is especially appropriate to the present subject has confirmed and illustrated in his celebrated work on the science of gustation.

The natives of New Zealand have considered the matter in the same light; and the reader will, doubtless, smack his lips with anticipatory delectation when he learns that the work which they have thought most worthy of their first literary effort is a "Cookery-Book."

It must be confessed that the sorts of viands on which this antipodean production treats are not such as are suited to European tastes; but, de gustibus non disputandum, &c.

There is one circumstance, however, in considering this most interesting subject that must not be lost sight of; it is partly practical, partly April.-VOL. LXXXV. NO. CCCXL.

2 G