340
of the Utes clarifi ed them
sharply for the committee
when he went on to describe
some of Colorow's antics
in settlers' kitchens.' Meeker:
`I wonder if Byers knew
that Colorow was in fact
a Comanche ... which did not
keep Colorow from charging
repeatedly that Ouray
was no true Ute; well, in fact,
Ouray was half-Apache,
half-Ute. And reared by Spaniards,
as a Roman Catholic....
You recall what Byers said
in a rare refl ective mood:
what the Ute character was
(part wild, part civilized,
and really neither) was hard
to make out -- a composite.
Like almost everything. Like
the causes of all those fi res.
Sunlight came copper-colored
through the smoke, and I well knew
Utes never hesitated
to fi re a forest, to drive
the game out -- it was their harvest
method, so to speak -- to them
timber was no more useful
than the boulders in a creek
they came to drink from.' He smiles,
`I'm growing circumstantial.'
A meditative silence
comes over him and I say,
`I saw, in the museum
at Meeker, under the glass