Beadle's New York Dime Library, No. 59

This 1878 Beadle's Dime Library issue presents "The Outlaws of Arkansas" by Albert W. Aiken, a Western romance adventure. The narrative opens with Missouri C. Smith, a beautiful young woman and sole heir to Smithville's founding family, riding along the Arkansas River near Catfish Bayou. While lost in melancholic reflection about a former lover killed during the Civil War, the riverbank beneath her collapses. She plunges into the rising floodwaters but manages to cling to a floating cottonwood tree. A mysterious horseman—a striking figure in red blanket-coat and dual revolvers, apparently from Texas—appears on the river road. Missouri initially finds him noble, then ridicules him when he smiles at her predicament, then reconsiders as he attempts a rescue using a Mexican lasso. The narrative emphasizes physical descriptions and emotional reactions amid frontier danger and romantic tension.