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For even the passengers went well armed in those days and were entirely willing to make a hard fight of it before they knuckled under; as witness the encounter at Stein's Pass, where old Cochise and Mangus Colorado got the stage cornered on a bare hilltop with six passengers aboard one afternoon.

And while that fight went on, Cochise, aflame with hatred, outraged by this violation of the sacred custom of conference, believing now every word that had been spoken to him by Mangus Colorado and the other war-chiefs, whipped out his knife.

Simon E. Allen, William Almy, Eber Blanchard, Heman S. Brown, Shuman Belding, Lester A. Berry, George Bennett, George Brown, John Cryderman, Edward H. Cook, William B. Clark, James H. Corwin, Eugene C. Croff, William W. Croff, Randall S. Compton, Manley Conkrite, William H. Compton, Seth Carey, Marion Case, Amaron Decker, Daniel Draper, Rinehart Dikeman, Thomas Dickinson, Orrin W. Daniels, Matthias Easter, Francis N. Friend, Ira Green, James Gray, George I. Goodale, Eli Halladay, Luther Hart, Elias Hogle, George E. Halladay, Robert Hempstead, Edmond R. Hallock, Henry M. Harrison, Warren Hopkins, John J. Hammel, Miles E. Hutchinson, Luther Johnson, Searight C. Koutz, Louis Kepfort, Archibald Lamberton, Martin Lerg, David Minthorn, Solomon Mangus, Andrew J. Miller, Jedediah D. Osborn, Timothy J. Mosher, Gershom W. Mattoon, Moses C. Nestell, George W. Marchant, Edwin Olds, Walter E. Pratt, Albert M. Parker, George W. Rall, Frederick Smith, Jesse Stewart, Josiah R. Stevens, David S. Starks, Orlando V.R. Showerman, David Stowell, James O. Sliter, Jonathan C. Smith, Meverick Smith, Samuel J. Smith, Josiah Thompson, William Toynton, John Tunks, Mortimer Trim, Albert Truax, Oliver L. VanTassel, Byron A. Vosburg, John VanWagoner, Sidney VanWagoner, Erastus J. Wall, Charles Wyman, Harvey C. Wilder, Israel Wall, Lewis H. Yeoman.

The writer has given that story in detail elsewhere, but it is worth mentioning here that it took Cochise and Mangus Colorado and their five hundred warriors three long days to kill off the Free Thompson party whose members managed to take more than one hundred and fifty Apaches along with them when they left this life.

The Chiracahua Apaches were already riding toward their mountains where Mangus Colorado and the renegade members of their tribe were biding on the heights, like eagles resting on the rocky peaks before they take their next flight. Like roosting eagles the warriors of Mangus Colorado scanned the wide plains beneath the mountains. Their eyes went to the ragged summits of the ranges beyond.

But sometimes they were forced to watch the enemy go whooping away with the stampeded stock from the corral. And now and again there was a massacre. Under Mangus Colorado, whom historians account their greatest war-chief, the Apaches were busy in New Mexico and Arizona.

Stage-driver and shotgun messenger usually saw plenty of perilous adventures during the days of Mangus Colorado, Cochise, Victorio, Nachez, and Geronimo; but if one was hungry for Indian-fighting in those times he wanted to be a mule-skinner.

One afternoon Mangus Colorado and Cochise were in the neighborhood with six hundred Apache warriors, when a smoke signal from distant scouts told them that the overland stage was approaching without an armed escort. The two chieftains posted their naked followers behind the rocks and awaited the arrival of their victims.

These meetings were generally well attended but sometimes it was difficult to induce anybody to volunteer. Once, two of us drove sixteen miles and after a fine, patriotic address of an hour, were about to return without results, when one stalwart young man arose and announced his willingness to "jine the cavalry." His name was Solomon Mangus and he proved to be a most excellent soldier.

All of this was very comfortable and to his taste, and because he liked it he held a firm stand against the suasions of warring chiefs from his and other tribes. He even came to cool terms with his relative Mangus Colorado, the greatest leader the Apaches had ever known.