The Paper • Page 10 • August 7, 2014
‘James Beckwourth-II’ Cont. from Page 9
‘Kirk’s Column’ Cont. from Page 8
the drafting of the plans away from themselves and their planning professionals.
While this measure is not being driven by the requirements of Escondido’s infamous Proposition S, the philosophy behind the move is essentially the same: people who are not familiar with the intricacies of government and land planning will be asked to decide what is best for the community rather than trusting the judgment of those they elected and the professional staff they employ.
The underlying premise is that the people we elect cannot be trusted to make the right decisions on our behalf, so therefore we need to do it. Huh? If the electorate is too ignorant or disengaged in the process to elect the right people to represent their wishes, how can they be expected to make the right ones on such complex issues as
land use?
The great fear on the part of homeowners in the Country Club area is that voters will not be sympathetic to their plight or not be interested enough in the whole thing, succumbing to the campaign efforts of the developer. This issue should never have been put in the hands of voters, regardless of the outcome. That’s called kicking the can down the road. A process bringing all the stakeholders to the table to do what is best for all parties? That’s called leadership.
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size, flowing four or five miles distant, and on its banks I observed acres of land covered with moving masses of buffalo. I hailed this as a perfect Godsend, and was overjoyed with the feeling of security infused by my opportune discovery. However, fatigued and weak; I accelerated my return to the camp, and communicated my success to my companions. Their faces brightened up at the intelligence, and all were impatient to be at them.
The general, on learning my intelligence, desired us to move forward to the river with what horses we had left, and each man to carry a pack on his back of the goods that remained after loading the cattle. He farther desired us to roll up snow to provide him with a shelter, and to return the next day to see if he survived. The men, in their eagerness to get to the river (which is now called Green River), loaded themselves so heavily that three or four were left with nothing but their rifles to carry.
The anxiety of the general to remain with us prevented his giving utterance to the least complaint, and we all arrived in good season on the banks of Green River. We were rejoiced to find that our companions who preceded us had killed a fine buffalo, and we abandoned ourselves that evening to a general spirit of rejoicing. Our leader, in a few days, entirely recovered, and we were thus, by my forethought in bringing him with us, spared the labor of a return journey. We all feasted ourselves to our hearts' content upon the delicious, coarse-grained flesh of the buffalo, of which there was an unlimited supply. There were, besides, plenty of wild geese and teal ducks on the river — the latter, however, I very seldom ventured to kill.
One day several of us were out hunting buffalo, the general, who, by the way, was a very good shot, being among the number. The snow had blown from the level prairie, and the wind had drifted it in deep masses over the margins of the small hills, through which the buffalo had made trails just wide enough to admit one at a time. These snow-trails had become quite deep — like all snow-trails in the spring of the year — thus affording us a fine opportunity for lurking in one trail, and shooting a buffalo in another. The general had wounded a bull, which, smarting with pain, made a furious plunge at his assailant, burying him in the snow with a thrust from his savage-looking head and horns. I, seeing the danger in which he was placed, sent a ball into the beast just behind the shoulder, instantly dropping him dead. The general was rescued from almost certain death, having received only a few scratches in the adventure. After remaining in camp four or five days, the general resolved upon dividing our party into detachments of four or five men each, and sending them upon different routes, in order the better to accomplish the object of our perilous journey, which was the collecting all the beaver-skins possible while the fur was yet valuable. Accordingly, we constructed several boats of buffalo hides for the purpose of descending the river and proceeding along any of its tributaries that might lie in our way.
One of our boats being finished and launched, the general sprang into it to test its capacity. The boat was made fast by a slender string, which snapping with the sudden jerk, the boat was drawn into the current and drifted away, general and all, in the direction of the opposite shore. It will be necessary, before I
‘James Beckwourth-II’ Cont. on Page 11
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