The Dog Crusoe and His Master A Story of Adventure in the Western Prairies

Excerpt

CHAPTER I.

The backwoods settlement--Crusoe's parentage, and early
history--The agonizing pains and sorrows of his puppyhood,
and other interesting matters.

The dog Crusoe was once a pup. Now do not,
courteous reader, toss your head contemptuously,
and exclaim, "Of course he was; I could have told you
that." You know very well that you have often seen a
man above six feet high, broad and powerful as a lion,
with a bronzed shaggy visage and the stern glance of an
eagle, of whom you have said, or thought, or heard others
say, "It is scarcely possible to believe that such a man
was once a squalling baby." If you had seen our hero
in all the strength and majesty of full-grown doghood,
you would have experienced a vague sort of surprise
had we told you--as we now repeat--that the dog
Crusoe was once a pup--a soft, round, sprawling,
squeaking pup, as fat as a tallow candle, and as blind
as a bat.

But we draw particular attention to the fact of
Crusoe's having once been a pup, because in connection
with the days of his puppyhood there hangs a tale.

This peculiar dog may thus be said to have had two
tails--one in connection with his body, the other with
his career. This tale, though short, is very harrowing,
and as it is intimately connected with Crusoe's subsequent
history we will relate it here. But before doing
so we must beg our reader to accompany us beyond the
civilized portions of the United States of America--beyond
the frontier settlements of the "far west," into
those wild prairies which are watered by the great
Missouri River--the Father of Waters--and his numerous
tributaries.

Here dwell the Pawnees, the Sioux, the Delawarers,
the Crows, the Blackfeet, and many other tribes of Red
Indians, who are gradually retreating step by step towards
the Rocky Mountains as the advancing white
man cuts down their trees and ploughs up their prairies.
Here, too, dwell the wild horse and the wild ass, the
deer, the buffalo, and the badger; all, men and brutes
alike, wild as the power of untamed and ungovernable
passion can make them, and free as the wind that
sweeps over their mighty plains.

There is a romantic and exquisitely beautiful spot on
the banks of one of the tributaries above referred
to--long stretch of mingled woodland and meadow, with
a magnificent lake lying like a gem in its green bosom--which
goes by the name of the Mustang Valley.
This remote vale, even at the present day, is but thinly
peopled by white men, and is still a frontier settlement
round which the wolf and the bear prowl curiously,
and from which the startled deer bounds terrified away.
At the period of which we write the valley had just
been taken possession of by several families of squatters,
who, tired of the turmoil and the squabbles of the then
frontier settlements, had pushed boldly into the far
west to seek a new home for themselves, where they
could have "elbow room," regardless alike of the
dangers they might encounter in unknown lands and of
the Redskins who dwelt there.

The squatters were well armed with axes, rifles, and
ammunition....