(For those who care to know, the exact location was where the spring house is now situated, just southeast of the big spring.)

Last, but not least, there was old "Buckskin Charley" White, the intrepid government scout.

From these, and partly through the kindly offices of Perry Braziel, Runey Campbell and John Peters, I am able to patch together an interesting tale, which otherwise would likely have remained in obscurity, and forever lost. The story I feel is so nearly correct, that it can be vouched for as to accuracy, comparable with most history.

"When wilderness was king" hereabout, the great center of commerce for mountain and plain was St. Louis.

When Mallet Brothers penetrated the Scottsbluff country, this was claimed as French territory. Cardinal Fluery, who was responsible for the Mallet expedition, died in 1742, and the prime minister of France who succeeded him, had less conception, or inspiration perhaps it should be called, of the coming empire.

In 1748, Count Germain, one of the mysterious characters of French history appeared. Who he was, where he came from, and how he obtained admittance to the exclusive French Court of the time, no history reveals. He claimed to be an alchemist, avowing to have discovered formulas for defying the ravages of time and age, and also of turning baser metals to gold. He said he was born 300 B. C. and expected to live forever. He was not an adventurer, for he had independent means, although the sources thereof were unknown. He was wonderfully informed, and talked intelligently of conversations he claimed to have had with Christ, the Apostles, Pliny, Nero, and other people of the past.