The Last Frontier

Handful of hunters caught

buffalo and deer

Back when the west was young

At the last frontier

Snake bites, Indian fights

plagued the pioneer

The pioneer

We're all at the last frontier

The last frontier

Back when the law was

the law of the open spaces

The folks out there were fair and square

They paid every debt

by the sweat of their honest faces

Snow, heat, little meat

famine almost near

And still they struggled on

hiding every tear

Stout hearts played their parts

in that bygone year

Back there at the last frontier

The last frontier

Did you ever see so many smiling faces?

I wonder what's bothering them?

Ask them, Mungo.

Let them talk first.

I'm getting hungry. Let's make camp here.

I guess this is as good a place as any.

- You got any salt, Jed?

- I ate the last speck day before yesterday.

Mungo?

I sure miss a sprinkle of salt on me meat.

Right now I'd give a whole silver dollar...

for just enough to sting

the edge of me tongue.

You're a mighty free spender

with silver dollars you ain't got, Gus?

I'm a big spender, I am.

You just wait till we trade in these skins...

and I'll show you how fast

I can shed my share.

What you gonna do

with your share, Mungo?

Whiskey.

Dollars?

Right now that appeals to me.

Don't get up, just keep eating.

He wants our rifles.

Give them to him.

He wants more.

- Not one more thing.

- Shut up, Jed.

- Give him the horses.

- Not the horses, Gus.

There's a year's work tied up in those packs.

A year of freezing, starving, and slaving.

I know. I've got more than a year's work

tied up in me...

and I've no mind to lose it

for some tired horses and a pack of furs.

Give them the horses, Mungo.

Red Cloud says we're no longer welcome.

We're not to shoot, fish,

or set traps in the forest anymore.

We must go back beyond the river.

- If we return, we die.

- Why?

We ain't never done him any harm.

There's plenty here for all of us.

- It's the bluecoats.

- Soldiers.

- When did they come?

- In the spring.

- They chop down many trees. Build fort.

- Where?

Paha Saba.

Red Cloud says they all die

before snow falls...

and so will any white man

who sets foot in these woods.

We never fished

nor killed any more than we could eat.

And we're no bluecoats.

Why is he taking it out on us?

- Civilization.

- Civilization?

Civilization is creeping up on us, lads.

The bluecoats ain't satisfied...

with gobbling up all the land

east of Mississippi.

They won't stop till they've pushed us over

the Rockies and into the Pacific Ocean.

It's a drowning fate awaits us all.

These are calamitous times

we're living in, Jed.

Calamitous times.

They ain't pushing me

off the face of this earth.

I'm going down to that fort...

and collect every single thing

that Red Cloud took from us.

Are you?

Me big bull buffalo.

You never tangled with men

like these before, Jed.

You don't know them like I do.

They talk with forked tongues.

Once you set foot inside that fort...

they'll snare you.

And how'll they snare me?

They got wondrous ways. No.

We'll go north to Canada.

We'll get a stake from the Bay Company.

Then we'll strike out for fresh country.

You can go north, Gus.

But them bluecoats owe us for them skins

and I'm collecting it.

- If you want to wait for me here, you wait.

- No, I'd better go with you.

- Somebody's got to do the thinking.

- All right.

You do the thinking,

but I'm doing the talking.

Halt!

Halt, or I'll fire!

See, what did I tell you.

Right away they want to shoot us.

- We go to Canada.

- Not until we get paid.

It's all right, sentry. They're unarmed.

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