After the task of the arrest of Fox was thus successfully undertaken and consummated, by his being securely lodged in jail and placed under suitable guard, Kit Carson returned to Rayado, where he spent the winter in a very quiet manner.  We use the term quiet manner:  it should be qualified with the phrase, quiet manner for him.  He found plenty of employment in looking after his animals, besides spending a large share of his time in hunting.  This, however, although always attended with paying practical results, he did as much for pleasure as from necessity.  He always found a large number of hungry mouths ready to relieve him from any superabundance of game; and, as his hospitality to all classes is unbounded, he took especial delight in feeding and liberally bestowing his bounties upon his poor Mexican neighbors, to whom powder and lead were more of a desideratum than to himself, and with whom his experience and skill as a hunter, were a source of support which they could only wish for.

Early the next summer Kit Carson, in charge of a train of wagons belonging to himself and his friend Maxwell, set out for the United States.  After an unusually pleasant journey, he reached the Missouri River, and proceeded down it, in a steamboat, to St. Louis.  Here he purchased a large stock of goods.  With this freight, he returned to Kansas, where he had left his caravan, into which, on his arrival, he transferred his merchandise.  He then started on his return trip to New Mexico.  In order that his animals might take advantage of the fine grass to be found there, he chose the route, known to all traders on the plains, as well as to the reader, as the road by Bent’s Fort.  He was progressing on his journey quite happily, when unfortunately, at a point that is located about fifteen miles above the fording of the Arkansas, he fell in with a village of Cheyenne Indians who were just at that time violently hostile towards the whites and were waiting an opportunity to wreak their vengeance on them.  This state of feeling had been brought about only a few days previous, and was due to an officer who was attached to a command of recruits that some ten days before Kit Carson’s arrival had passed by.  He had flogged a warrior for some liberty which the fellow had taken while he was in the camp of the soldiers.  These Cheyennes are very fond of dress and show; but, as a body, they are as noble and athletic looking men as tread this earth.  Singular though the contrast may appear, a greater set of rascals never went unhung; yet, they are Indians, and, as such, they ought to command sympathy and forbearance.