The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1903-10-18
IN FALL OF 1853


eat. / eat whenever 1 feel like it, any
time of day or night, and in any quantity
or can fast for couple of days if cir
cumstances happen so.
The above IS all fact. very hastily writ
| ten. and only small part OF my ex-
perence along the lines have attempted
to illustrate. If you should see fit to
publish any part of this I should be
pleased to receive a copy. If not, would
| you be so Kind as to return this paper,
as do not often take notion ia write
of my experiences. Very truly,
/ J. r. MEAD.
| Mr.. Tilden says:
| I take pleasure IN publishing Mr..
! Mead's letter. He is perfectly reliable,
as any old westerner will attest. His
experience in out-of-door life proves what
have always contended. namely, that
wild meat is ideal food; that it is almost
| impossible to eat too much of a monoto-
nous diet; that hunger famed into ex-
istence by hard work with a life in the
| open air can be INDUCED to the limit.
| Mr.. Mead haze the blending of four tenn
peraments-biious, sanguine, vital and
mental. He is exceptionally endowed by
nature. He has been so well balanced in
the scale of ideal manhood that there
! has been no tendency to run off into i'm
moral excuses. Perhaps he himself has
not quite understood why the pitfalls of
other men have not caught him. His
/ life on the plains was indeed strenuous.
| He has given us but one sIde-the eat
ing side-with one isolated glimpse of the
feats of physical endurance
When but a beardless boy he went to
one Of the wholesale houses that was
Quitting the frontier merchants and
! told the firm that he wanted a stock of
goods. without reference and without Sc
| curity. protected with a plain note OF
| hand, given by the boy, and insisted on
being given by the boy himself: these
! Wholesale people sold to him $4,000 worth
of goods The day before the note fell
due young Mead, the young Hercules
merchant of the plains, was on hand with
| his train loaded with frrs enough to
pay the note, and the amount over / can
not trust my memory to say. but quite
enough SO that our young merchant
needed no more credit
I hope no reader viii imagine that
western cyclone OF such dimensions can
be side-stepPed by all the wild meat
and coffee he can get.
I remember another story told Of this
redoubtable buffalo hunter. This. incl
dent occurred when the game was get
tins scarce, he came. in 10 camp where
! there were thirteen hunters closed in
around on fire. short on food. and COM
planning, that they could find no buffalo.
: hey not only could not kill game but they
were thoroughly CONVINCED that the ex-
( pert hunter Mead himself. could not
Mr. Mead. full OF energy, pluck and cour-
| age. born Of faith in self that knows
no failure. remarked, and 1 imagine with
a twinkle in the eve. that he thought he
s-could find some mat in the morning,
/ All the country was shut n by a snow
land the weather too cold. 90 degrees be-
low zeroI for hunters TO be oct unless
compelled 10 be Our dauatlezs hunter
struck our the next morning or track
! less, snow-bound country. and was gone
shoat two hours when he rode BY the
I camp Of his thirteen hungry hunters. on
F his Way 70 hls own camp, and tossed
them THIRTEEN ,haSaio Tongues. he said
he killed thirteen. not beca5se he wanted
/ TO, but to prove that there vas same
/ IN Kansas far n man who knew how 70
hunt. Some e ihege men went u the
Mead camp ard asked II they could have
f the buffalo he had killed that morning
and of course were given al they de-
sired
!. Net many men would haxe killed a
(. lsGffaIo that morning Tor II cost 100 much
. -
he IVES eerupeisea to ESt. down tn the
STOW ard crawl 20 the szrtr1zls after Re
. had siskte1 them. and The SHOW gsacksse
Z II hts sleeves, and hts hands were -
chilled that II VAS almost impossible II
I handle his suz. bar he uas ds.ssrrssis-sa 70
I get some buffalo. Such = Vii as that
backed by the physical strength required
/ % ea-Ty IL OFT vi aegaE ba bothered