But the master of the frontier
school wore out several armfuls of hazel switches in a vain effort to
interest me in the "three R's."
I kept thinking of my short but adventurous past. And as soon as
another opportunity offered to return to it I seized it eagerly.
That spring my former boss, Lew Simpson, was busily organizing a
"lightning bull team" for his employers, Russell, Majors & Waddell.
Albert Sidney Johnston's soldiers, then moving West, needed supplies,
and needed them in a hurry. Thus far the mule was the reindeer of draft
animals, and mule trains were forming to hurry the needful supplies to
the soldiers.
But Simpson had great faith in the bull. A picked bull train, he
allowed, could beat a mule train all hollow on a long haul. All he
wanted was a chance to prove it.
His employers gave him the chance. For several weeks he had been
picking his animals for the outfit. And now he was to begin what is
perhaps the most remarkable race ever made across the Plains.
A mule train was to start a week after Simpson's lightning bulls began
their westward course. Whichever outfit got to Fort Laramie first would
be the winner. No more excitement could have been occasioned had the
contestants been a reindeer and a jack-rabbit. To my infinite delight
Simpson let me join his party.
My thousand-mile tramp over the Plains had cured me of the walking
habit and I was glad to find that this time I was to have a horse to
ride--part of the way, anyhow.
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