Show THE STORY OF THE LOST JOSEPHINE BY CY WARMAN Copyright 1896 by S S McClure Co They tell a tale an th Tickaboo Beyond the snowy range A story if it be not true Is surely wondrous strange Very many years ago the Spaniards lived on the Colorado river and the Navajos Na-vajos claim that their foreIndians used to work as slaves in the once famous Josephine mine and that their I grandmothers rocked the oradles ofj the Spainiards and washed gold by the banks of the big water A Spaniard Span-iard wrote to a friend in Spain that there was wealth enough in the Josephine Jo-sephine to make the Catholic world independently in-dependently rich A smart old chief enlisted the services of a number of tribes and made war on the Spaniards who were driven from the big water and compelled to give up their slaves One of the stipulations of the treaty was that the Spaniards should coverall cover-all l traces of the mine and leave it forever I Same fifty years ago two Mormon boys were sent to live with these Indians In-dians on the Colorado the main object of the elders was to have the boys learn the language and ways of the red man that they might be used in the work of Christianizing the tribes in accordance of course with the book of Mormon For a time the children suffered greatly but in the course of a few years they became as hardy as the red man Old Tickaboo the Ute chief was very kind to the pale children in many ways in time of war he hid them away in the hills and in times of peace herod he-rod with them in the Utah vales and taught their young ideas how to shoot The Indians were extremely I jealous of the white boys but as the years went by and the boys grew to be i y 1 THERE WAS A FLASH A PUFF OF SMOKE AND TICKABOOS PIPE VE > T TO PiECES men they began to be regarded as real Indians and only the older warriors war-riors who remembered how tenderly they were cared for by the chief looked upon them wish a jealous eye One of the boys Shirtz by name wa a special favorite of Tickaboo who was now a very old Indian Many times he had told his white friend the story of the lost mine how his mother I and his mothers mother had worked there as slaves Often Shirtz urged tihe old man to show him where the mine was buried but the superstitious Indian In-dian said that the ghosts of dead braves were there and that they must not be disturbed Shirtz was a bearded man and there were streaks of silver in his soft black hair when at last Tickaboo promised to show him the grave of Josephine It was in the early autumn when the two men with a trusty Indian cook and a white friend elf Shirtz set out in search of the long lost mine Miles and miles of these sandstone moun taine along the Colorado river are entirely en-tirely barren of vegetation and water is equally scarce This little band of explorers endured en-dured many hardships and rut one time after traveling two whole days without with-out water the old chief laid down to die The Indian eye of Shirtz found a narrow trail made by mountain sheep going down to drink After following this trail for an hour he came to a pool of pure water standing in a basin shaped sand > rock they are called tanks in that country and that one is known to the cowboys as Tickaboo tank To this pool they carried the almost helpless iform of the old chief and nursed him back to life They had been in camp nearly a nelc waiting for the old man to get strong enough to resume the journey in search of the hidden treasure when one afternoon Tickaboo climbed to the ton of the canyon wall and stood looking with shaded eyes toward to-ward the setting sun Then he beckoned Shirtz and Shirtz went up and stood by the old chief and gazed over the wasteof windswept rock I Just in front of them a little to the north of the sunset they saw the snowy Summit of the Henry mountains S moun-tains Yonder said the old chief pointing point-ing to the west lies the Josephine S lost among the twisted hills There are the graves of my people and the white peaks are the monuments put there by the Great Father to marie the place One more sleep my son and Tickaboo will show you the great mine When the two men came down to camp Shirtz related to his white friend all that the cftd man had said and they were in high spirits The old r Indian cook was unable to account for the hilarity of the camp that evening for he was kept in ignorance of the purpose of the trip After supper Tiekaboo called for his pipe and the smart young mam filled it partly with gunpowder and partly with L tobacco The aged chief was restless He was idiotically superstitious and as he began to pull at his pipe he mused Ion I-on what he was about to do For a half century he had held this great secret se-cret sacredly in his heart At last his love for his white friend had tempted I him standing as he was now on the edge of the grave to show him the i ruins of the old mine Jtf it is right said he we shall L find itIf it is wrong there will be some tokenmaybe so my mothers ghost will come to me tonight and tell me what to do More blanket son Waugh how the fire spits Shirts wrapped the old chief warmly in an extra blanket and the two sat apart from the others and conversed softly If a prowling lion snapped a twig the Indian started up and looked fur his grandmothers ghost A lone cayote stood upon the canyon wall and wailed precisely where the two men stood that afternoon and the chief said that it was the voice of a dead brave warning him not to show the lost mine to the white man I1 am afraid > said thefiged Indian the hero of a hundred battles shakes like a squaw Tickaboo the brave is walking backward in the night and he Shall fall and his bones shall lie by the trail to frighten the kayuse of the pale face These hills will swarm with the Hosteen peso > lakJ as he ant hills swarm with ants and like lean badgers they will grub in the graves of my people peo-ple You were wicked not to let me die yesterday when I could die in peace with this great secret locked in up my cold breast Did not your father Bullface the brave give this secret to your keep t tJ J o > 1 ti ing said Shirtz and can you not trust your son But you are not ofmy blood much as I love you I can see the face of the White man and he is my enemy You think you love me now but when you have seen the face of your own father Tlcaboo will be no more to you i Yes it is sothe lambs go with the sheep the calves with the cattle and you will forget me when I am gone Tick boo has lived long time and has seen all his people die but has never been so troubled as he is tonight The fire burns low the yellow moon is ashamed to shinethe lean cayote I keeps his Place on the rocks above there is much meaning my son in all I this Tick boo the brave is no morel I more-l Tickaboo is a squaw tonight the child j of a white man stands above him and i his people Again the cayote howled on the hill I there was a flasha puff of smoke and I I Tlckaboos pipe went to pieces In vain I did the two white endeavor to men persuade I per-suade the old Indian that it was only j I a joke and that Shirtz fdend i had put I powder in the pipe It was a tokena warning the old man said and they would go no further fur-ther All night the old chief sat wrapped in thought and blankets gazing into the flickering fire and at the dawn of day the little band began the journey back to the village ell the Utes The little joke of the white man had cost him and his friend a fortune for Tickaboo could doubtless have found the lost mine but he alone held the secret I |