My mother was a badger, my father was a griz, I can out shoot, out fight, out cuss, and out drink any man. I have the fastest horse, the sharpest knife, and the finest rifle in the mountains. Hear my challenge echo in the valleys for any man of any nation to try to lift my top knot. I will fight to the death for my right to be a free man, to trap the beaver and to hunt the elk, to drink from cool streams, and to sleep under the stars. I have no road to follow, I make my own. I have no man to answer to except myself. I fear no creature on God's green earth, for I am a Mountain Man!
J. F. Ballard
