in the category of troo crime.  This ediot offishul reaches for the relative of Cochise; an’ as the latter—­bein’ a savage an’ tharfore plumb afraid of captivity—­leaps back’ard like he’s met up with a rattlesnake, the marshal puts his gun on him an’ plugs him so good that he cashes in right thar.  The marshal says later in explanation of his game that Cochise’s brother turns hostile an’ drops his hand on his knife.  Most likely he does; a gent’s hands—­even a Apache’s—­has done got to be some’ers.

“‘But the killin’ overturns the peaceful programmes built up between the Grey Fox an’ Cochise.  When the old chief hears of his brother bein’ downed, he paints himse’f black an’ red an’ sends a bundle of arrows tied with a rattlesnake skin to the Grey Fox with a message to count his people an’ look out for himse’f.  The Grey Fox, who realises that the day of peace has ended an’ the sun gone down to rise on a mornin’ of trouble, fills the rattlesnake skin with cartridges an’ sends ’em back with a word to Cochise to turn himse’f loose.  From that moment the war-jig which is to last for years is on.  After Cochise comes Geronimo, an’ after Geronimo comes Nana; an’ one an’ all, they adds a heap of spice to life in Arizona.  It’s no exaggeration to put the number of palefaces who lose their ha’r as the direct result of that fool marshal layin’ for Cochise’s brother an’ that Injun’s consequent cuttin’ off, at a round ten thousand.  Shore! thar’s scores an’ scores who’s been stood up an’ killed in the hills whereof we never gets a whisper.  I, myse’f, in goin’ through the teepees of a Apache outfit, after we done wipes ’em off the footstool, sees the long ha’r of seven white women who couldn’t have been no time dead.

“‘Who be they?  Folks onknown who’s got shot into while romancin’ along among the hills with schemes no doubt of settlement in Californy.

“’With what we saveys of the crooelties of the Apaches, thar’s likewise a sperit of what book-sharps calls chivalry goes with ’em an’ albeit on one ha’r-hung o’casion I profits mightily tharby, I’m onable to give it a reason.  You wouldn’t track up on no sim’lar weaknesses among the palefaces an’ you-all can put down a stack on that.

“‘It’s when I’m paymaster,’ says the Gen’ral, reachin’ for the canteen, ‘an’ I starts fo’th from Fort Apache on a expedition to pay off the nearby troops.  I’ve got six waggons an’ a escort of twenty men.  For myse’f, at the r’ar of the procession, I journeys proudly in a amb’lance.  Our first camp is goin’ to be on top of the mesa out a handful of miles from the Fort.

“‘The word goes along the line to observe a heap of caution an’ not straggle or go rummagin’ about permiscus, for the mountains is alive with hostiles.  It’s five for one that a frownin’ cloud of ’em is hangin’ on our flanks from the moment we breaks into the foothills.  No, they’d be afoot; the Apaches ain’t hoss-back Injuns an’ only fond of steeds as food.  He never