We camped near their village that night.  After supper Carson and I went over to this village, at the same time taking a lot of butcher knives and cheap jewelry with us that he had brought along to trade with the Indians.  When we got into their camp, Carson inquired where the chief’s wigwam, was.  The Indians could all speak Spanish; therefore we had no trouble in finding the chief.  When we went into the chief’s wigwam, after shaking hands with the old chief and his squaw, Carson pulled some of the jewelry out of his pocket and told the chief that he wanted to trade for furs.  The old chief stepped to the entrance of the wigwam and made a peculiar noise between a whistle and a hollo, and in a few minutes there were hundreds of Indians there, both bucks and squaws.

The old chief made a little talk to them that I did not understand; he then turned to Carson and said, “Indian heap like white man.”

Carson then spoke out loud so they could all hear him, at the same time holding up some jewelry in one hand and a butcher knife in the other, telling them that he wanted to trade these things for their furs.

The Indians answered, it seemed to me by the hundreds, saying, “Iyah oyah iyah,” which means “All right.”  Carson then told them to bring their furs over to his camp the next morning, and he would then trade with them.  He was speaking in Spanish all this time.  On our way back to our camp Carson said to me, “Now Willie, if I trade for those furs in the morning I want you and the other two boys to take the furs and go back to Taos; I know that you will have a long and lonesome trip, but I will try and get three or four of these Indians to go with you back to the head of the Blue, and be very careful, and when you make a camp always put out all of your fire as soon as you get your meal cooked.  Then the Indians can not see your camp.”

The next morning we were up and had an early breakfast.  By that time the squaws had commenced coming in with their furs.  Uncle Kit took a pack of jewelry and knives and got off to one side where the Indians could get all around him.  In a very short time I think there must have been a hundred squaws there with their furs.

They brought from one to a dozen Beaver skins each, and then the Bucks began coming in and then the trading began.  Carson would hold up a finger ring or a knife and call out in Spanish, “I’ll give this for so many Beaver skins!”

It really was amusing to see the Indians run over each other to see who should get the ring or knife first.

This trading did not last over half an hour because Carson’s stock of goods was exhausted.  Carson then said to the Indians, “No more trade no more knives, no more rings, all gone.”

Of course a great many of the Indians were disappointed, but they soon left us.  As soon as they were gone Freemont came to Carson and said, “What in the name of common sense are you going to do with all those furs?”