But for him the trail was near its end. This was the last time he

ever came to light. He sleeps somewhere in the wilderness about us, but where, no one knows.

I am glad that my own father met him once at Fort Mitchell in 1850, when he made his first journey to California. For it was from Reuleau that father learned much that was of value regarding Indian strategy, and the dangers of the trail and mountains.

One bright moonlight night at old Fort Mitchell, when my father and party were camped outside the Palisades, Reuleau and my father fell to conversation, and Reuleau asked if he had ever seen the beaver and otter play. Father replied in the negative and Reuleau volunteered to pilot him to a spot where he could "watch them slide."

He took him north about two and a half miles, where the beaver had built a dam between the shore and an island. This place is now off the shore between the Johnny Boyle ranch and Chris Kronberg's. Approaching warily they hid in the brush and timber near at hand. After a time, they saw beaver come out upon the bank, and slide down in a manner similar to boys at the old swimming hole.

Their number grew until there were a half dozen or more at play, chasing each other down the slide, and swimming away sputtering, and slapping as they went about it.

Then an otter appeared, and he quietly ascended the bank, to the top of the slide. He would take the slide in the manner that the beaver did, but upon striking the water, would go under and remain for a distance of forty or fifty feet, before the ripples would show his rising to the surface.