Then quite an amusing incident occurred, which I must relate, though the joke was upon myself, or my friend, Mr. G——. Seeing a tall young squaw standing in front of her tent, I said, "Let us go and see what she is doing." She had made her morning toilet, and was very prettily dressed in gay colors, with a long red shawl on, coming down to her feet. I should say the entrance to the tepees or tents is through a hole hidden by a round hoop, covered with deer-skin, hanging by a string only, so as to be thrust aside easily when one wants to enter.

I said to her, "Me wa-se-na-cha-wa-kon!" That is to say, I am a medicine-man, or minister of the Great Spirit. "Wa-kon" means Great Spirit. Looking first at me, then at Mr. G——, she raised her finger and said, "Me no want." Then she turned and rushed into her tent,—shot in like a prairie-dog into his hole,—leaving us to feel rather silly by being so suddenly "cut" by a young beauty on the plains. I said, "Mr. G——, she evidently don't like your good looks or mine," and we walked off quite mortified. The interpreter explained her conduct, saying she was not "sick," and therefore did not want any "charm" to make her well.

Here I saw an Indian child, five years old, dressed in a most elegant suit of buckskin, embroidered with beads and horse-hair of various colors. The frock came below the knees, with a handsome fringe at the bottom, and underneath the little fellow wore leggins and moccasins. I never saw any child dressed so beautiful or looking like a little prince, as he was, of the tribe. I would have given fifty dollars for the "outfit," if I had a child to wear it. How is it that these rude children of nature can do such beautiful bead-work,—all of the figures as regular as if laid out by geometrical rule,—or as perfect as any lady could make the figures of an afghan?

This station of the Union Pacific Railroad is just beyond the crossing of the Platte River, of half a mile in width.

It is an important little place of a few hundred people, on account of the machine-shops and round-house for locomotives, and as one of the main points where Indians cross from Dakota to the Republican River when on hunting expeditions. Hence a company of soldiers are stationed here to protect the railroad and the long bridge just east of the town. All along the road, at each station, are troops also for protection, who usually "turn out," range in file, and "present arms" as the train approaches.

Here we met a white man named Pratt,—that is to say, if he were washed in the river he would look white,—who said that he had lived with the tribe for sixteen years, and had nine (half-breed) children, and they were more filthy and squalid than those of any other lodge.

A squaw had died here, and was buried as usual, by elevating the body upon upright poles. A stock of food was left with her at night, to eat on the way to the other country. But lo! in the morning she came down and ate it all up, saying to her friends, "She wanted to see her aunt before departing." She lived a week longer, and died, as it was supposed, again. It is said that her friends got tired of such fooling, and being determined to end the matter, adopted the white man's mode of covering her up in the ground! Again she rose up and preferred some new request; but thinking the old enchantress had stayed long enough this side the hunting grounds, they forced her down and laid sufficient turf upon her to keep her quiet for a long last sleep.

Among the Pawnees at Columbus, on the reservation near the railroad, an Indian trader makes a good thing out of the poor fellows in this way:

For instance, the Indian Bureau pays off the tribe twice a year. In the spring, blankets, etc.; these are worth at least three dollars each. The Indians sell these blankets for a double handful of coffee and sugar. Then they buy them back in the fall with money and buffalo meat, which they sell to the trader at six cents the pound. He then cures the meat and sells it back to them for twenty-five cents the pound; thus making nine per cent. on it. Some one, it is said, complained to the government about it, and they sent a new agent to them; but the Pawnees had confidence in the old agent or trader named Platt, and they stoutly refused to trade with the new man!



ACROSS THE PLAINS.

When Vice-President Colfax and Horace Greeley, and Governor Bross of Illinois, made the journey overland to California, about twelve years since, they went all the way by stage from the Missouri River to Denver, Colorado, to Salt Lake, etc., through the mountains of the Sierra Nevada. It took them about thirty days to go. Mr. Greeley said he "could think of these plains (called in your maps the 'Great American Desert') as fit for nothing but to fill up between commercial cities!" But he was partly mistaken, as his friends are now planting a colony (named Greeley) of intelligent settlers on the Cach-le-pow-dre Creek, south of Cheyenne, fifty-five miles toward Denver, where ninety thousand acres of land have been secured for tillage, and where saw-mills and stores and dwellings are to be erected. The success of this enterprise has led to another one. The railroad has projected civilization one hundred years ahead, opening up a highway for commerce from New York to the "Golden Gate," to Asia, Africa, and China, which will astonish the world and divert the course of trade to the Pacific coast.

But you are interested mainly, I see, in reading about the incidents which attended the opening up of this great national highway.

The dangers attending the building of the road were sometimes very great, as the Indians saw very plainly that it was the white man's encroachment on his hunting-grounds. And when even the telegraph-poles were being put up, long before, the Indians imagined that the government was thus putting them up to fence off their hunting-grounds, so they could not get any more buffalo! And once, after I came to Fort Sedgwick, the wires were said to be "down," and no communication could be had with other posts in the upper country. It was feared that the Indians had been tampering with the wires, and torn them down. But the operators went out under an escort of soldiers to see what the difficulty was. They came back again in a couple of days, and reported that the Indians had not meddled with the wires at all. But it seemed that some buffaloes in a large drove had taken the privilege of scratching their rumps against the poles, and thus tore them down; and getting their horns entangled in the wires, the wild creatures had carried off about four miles of telegraph-wire!



WHY DOES NOT THE INDIAN MEDDLE WITH THE TELEGRAPH?

It is said that the pioneer company over the plains got together several chiefs and explained as well as they could the modus operandi of obtaining electricity from the clouds, and making it useful in conveying intelligence to great distances. This was hard for them to believe, because they are superstitious, and attribute all phenomena they do not fully understand to conjuration or charms, such as their medicine-man practices. However, they concluded to put the matter to a test.

So it was that two principal Indians, about one hundred miles apart, agreed to send a message over the lines on a given day, and then they would travel toward each other as fast as they could to see if the message (known only to themselves and the operator) should be correct. Of course it proved as we would expect, and they were satisfied. This intelligence has spread from one tribe to another, and they, believing that it is somehow (as it is in truth) connected with the Great Spirit who controls the winds and the storms; hence they do not meddle with it.



PLUM CREEK MASSACRE.

But it is not to be supposed that the Indians quietly submitted to the building of the railroad through their country.

The most formidable obstacle which was met with in building the road occurred in 1866, by the throwing off the track a train of cars at Plum Creek, near the Platte River, two hundred and thirty miles west of Omaha.

The Indians were led on by a half-breed, and probably one or more scalawag whites were engaged in this diabolical act, as one was found among the killed with his face painted black and wearing Indian clothing. Some one having a fertile imagination made a picture of this scene, and I saw it copied in Philadelphia for some wall-paper to ornament hotel dining-rooms. Speaking to some ladies there about the delightful trip to California over the Pacific Railroad, one exclaimed, "I would like to visit California, but oh, my! I never could venture on the danger. Just look at the picture in the window, corner Chestnut Street and Broad. The horrid Indians have thrown the cars off the track, and killing all the passengers!" I explained to her that it was a fancy sketch entirely, gotten up for a bar-room wall-paper, and that it was ridiculous and false; for the picture was made to show the locomotive off the rail, and the Indians riding round the cars in white shirt sleeves and bright-red, flaring neckties, like gay cavaliers or brigands!



PAWNEE INDIANS—YELLOW SUN AND BLUE HAWK.

Both these Indians declare themselves innocent of the crime of murder. I visited Omaha in the fall of 1869, where they were lodged in jail awaiting their trial. Just before I came one of them had escaped, and gone back to the Pawnee reservation, near Columbus. Here the sheriff and soldiers found him with his squaw, decked out in all their style of paint and ornament, ready for the sacrifice. He was ready and willing to be slain among his own people, but to go back and suffer the ignominy of being hung up by the neck till dead was more than he could bear. If the Indian dies in this way, all believe they cannot enter into the happy hunting-grounds.

They were supposed to have murdered Edward McMurty, near Grand Island, Nebraska, in June, 1868.

After being shut up in a filthy jail about two years, they were acquitted. This was a sample of the way we dispense justice in our courts of law.



A TRIP TO FORT LARAMIE.

This post was established a great many years since by the American Fur Company, to trade with the Indians, buying furs and peltries of them in return for various articles of merchandise, such as tobacco, sugar, coffee, blankets, calico, beads, etc. Mr. John Jacob Astor, the millionaire of New York, made his great wealth by dealing in furs with the Indians.

It is related of an agent of the company that while weighing the furs, he would place his foot on the scales and call it a pound! Of course he could keep it on as long as he chose, and the Indians would be none the wiser. It is a good story, but in nowise related to Mr. Astor, who was reputed to be honest, and at one time very poor.

It was full of curiosity that I started from Fort Russell with the paymaster, Major Burbank, Inspector-General Sweitzer, Medical Director J. B. Brown, and others, on the last of May, 1870, with an escort of a dozen cavalry, to pay a few days' visit to Laramie, ninety-five miles north-east of our post. Leaving at noon in procession, with three ambulances and as many army wagons, scaling the bluffs, bare of everything like trees or shrubs, and only covered with grass and wild flowers, and now and then sage-bush and prickly-pear cactus, which are very troublesome to the horses' feet. The roads were, as usual, very hard and fine, so that up hill and down dale we made six miles to the hour all the way. Our first station was Horse Creek, twenty-five miles, where we camped on a fine stream of water for the night. When a party thus camps out, the wagons are corraled, as it is called,—i.e. a circle is made of them and the horses are tethered inside or lariated with a rope long enough to let them feed, and this is held by an iron stake or pin driven into the ground. Then the tents are put up in a line, and at once begins the work of gathering brush and sticks (or buffalo-chips), with which to cook a savory supper of bacon, potatoes, and hot coffee. This is the time for cracking jokes, telling stories of pioneer life,—and the colored boys are full of fun. We had one from the South named Tom Williams, belonging to Colonel Mason, of the 5th Cavalry. After enjoying our evening meal and getting ready to lie down in our tents, spread on the grass, as the evening approached, the sun was sinking behind Laramie Peak,—a mountain far away in the Black Hills, towering up eight thousand feet,—and all nature was hushed into repose, and each one with his lungs full of the light air, and his body weary with a long ride, just dropping off to sleep,—all at once there was a yell and halloo outside, which caused me to jump up and look out to see if any red-skins had broke through the guard and invaded our peaceful circle. Instead of scalping Sioux, there was nothing the matter but the return of a drove of large beef-cattle we had passed grazing on the Chugwater, and which sought our camping-ground on account of a bare place where they could lie down and be warm for the night. Our Tom was racing up and down among them, yelling "Hi, hi!" and shaking his blanket in all directions to stampede the poor cattle, who had as good a right as we to the soil.

Pickets were stationed all around us, and, save the snoring of some tired sleeper and the occasional braying of a mule or two, we slept soundly, with no fear of Indians. Here we met a white man and his wife, a squaw, and several others, who were waiting for Red Cloud and his chiefs, who were on their way to Washington from Fort Fetterman. They were related to John Reichaud, a half-breed belonging to Red Cloud's party. This Reichaud had lived about Laramie and Fetterman for many years, and, by raising stock and trading, had accumulated, it is said, about two hundred thousand dollars. During last winter, while drunk, he quarreled with a soldier, and a little while after, in passing some barracks at Fetterman, he aimed his revolver at a soldier, who was sitting in front of his quarters, named Kernan, and killed him, supposing it was the same soldier he had just before been quarreling with. Finding out his mistake, he fled away up to Red Cloud's camp, and while there incited the Indians to make war upon the whites. At the time we were going up, General John E. Smith was journeying towards us with Red Cloud and his band of warriors, and having Reichaud as the chief's prisoner. It was said he expected to get the President to pardon him and allow him to establish a trading-post for the Ogallallas. The feeling against this outlaw was such as to make General Smith fear that some one at Cheyenne would shoot him, and so the party turned off to Pine Bluff Station, about forty-three miles east of that town. We thus missed seeing them. But there were other objects of interest in our journey, and we went on to the mail station, called the Chug, a place not of much note,—for beside a company of cavalry, there were not a dozen ranches there on the beautiful stream, along whose banks were growing willow-trees, and the cottonwood also. Besides, there were half a dozen tepees filled with half-breeds, who are herders and wood-choppers in the mountains.

While the paymaster was dispensing the greenbacks to Uncle Sam's boys, the doctor and I sallied out with a guide in search of those much admired



MOSS AGATES,

which are here found in great abundance, even quarried out of a bluff and carried off by the wagon-load. The guide had been there but once, and somehow or other he could not locate it exactly, and we had a ride out of six miles and back without finding the spot. Still, we picked up a few on the way. As these are now so much the fashion for jewelry, I will describe them. First, I should say that most suppose they contain real moss, or fern-leaves, so distinct are they seen in a clear agate to resemble them. Thus you see imitations of pine-trees, vines, a deer's head, and sprigs of various kinds; but it is through iron solutions penetrating them when in a soluble state. If you take a pen and drop some ink into a tumbler of water, it will scatter and form for the moment an appearance like a moss agate. These agates, when found on bluffs or dry places, are coated over with a white covering of lime or alkali. Those in the beds of rivers found along the line of the Pacific Railroad, are smooth and transparent. They are called the "Cheyenne brown agate," "Granger water agate," "Church Buttes light-blue agate," and the "Sweet-water agate."

There are great quantities of them near Church Butte and Granger stations, nearly nine hundred miles west of Missouri River. You have to poke among cobble-stones, etc. to find them, and when a person comes upon a handsome specimen, he will shout, as did a minister from Chicago, one day, with me, when he picked up a nice one as large as an egg,—"Glory hallelujah!"

It is like searching for gold and silver,—very exciting, and far more pleasurable than fishing or hunting. A friend here has about sixty pounds of agates, for which he was offered by a lapidary in New York five dollars a pound. A handsome stone for a ring or pin is worth, when cut into shape, from three to five dollars. The lapidary cuts them with a steel wheel, about eight inches in diameter, using oil and diamond-dust in cutting and polishing.



A YOUNG BRAVE.

At Chug Station I met a frontiersman named Phillips, of long experience, who told me in his new adobe house of an old chief who had lost five sons, and when the first was slain he cut off a piece of his thumb, next of his forefinger, and so on, till five told of his boys killed. The last was a brave, and supposed no ball could hit him, wearing, he supposed, "a charmed life." He came to the "Chug" and dared them to shoot. As he and three or four more had killed a white man and wounded others, the people all turned out, and Phillips shot the bold young fellow, and wounded the rest of the party so that they died. The body of the young Indian lay by the roadside for several weeks, till the wolves and ravens had picked his bones, and I picked up his skull, pierced through with several balls, to bring back and present to the post-surgeon.

This grinning skull was lying on the grass which covered the roadside, and almost beneath towering monuments or bluffs of sandstone, which jut out at several points on the road, running along for great distances, and towering up several hundred feet high. We passed soon after several of these projections, which look like fortifications and baronial castles of some knights of the olden time. "Chimney Rock" is well known to travelers as a series of fluted columns, and standing solitary, as sentinels in the desert, they look solemn, lonely, and sublime. Old George, the stage-driver, has passed them twice a week for many years, and the wonder is he has not lost his scalp.

Sometimes the chiefs and old Indians will cut slits in their cheeks and rub ashes in them, sitting over the fire and bemoaning the loss of their dead children. They present a horrid appearance to one who looks at their pagan mode of bewailing the departed.

Arrived at Fort Laramie on the third day, we were courteously welcomed by Colonel F. F. Flint, of the 4th Infantry, commandant of the post. Delicacy dictates that we forbear to speak of the charming family which surrounds him; but the rarity of Christian households in the army made our visit there like to an oasis in the desert.

To visit the Indian graves surrounding the post was a prominent object before us in going. Lieutenant Theodore F. True, with an orderly, two mules, and a horse saddled, found us fording the Laramie River to inspect the grave,—if such it can be called, as shown in the picture on this page,—where the body was dried up like a mummy, and nothing else but fragments of a buffalo-robe dangling in the wind was to be seen. Relic hunters had carried away everything in the shape of bow and arrow, wampum, etc.

We moralized over this beautiful feature of Indian superstition, wherein they are certainly free from the horrid thought that any one is ever buried alive!

Next we sought the place where the remains of Mon-i-ca, daughter of Zin-ta-gah-lat-skah, was placed, by her request, in the white man's cemetery, and alongside of the body of her uncle Sho-ta,—"Old Smoke,"—an old warrior. The coffin was made at the post, and elevated on posts about ten feet high. They cover these coffins with handsome red broadcloth, and deposit in each all the trinkets and valuables belonging to the departed. One other grave there the Indians visit annually, and mourn over with their lamentations,—that of a Frenchman named Sublette, who brought them down and directed them how to vanquish their enemies, the Pawnees, in a great battle.



THE HEAD CHIEF—RED CLOUD.

Red Cloud is regarded as the head chief of the Sioux nation, and for over twenty years has been thus venerated. He is fifty-three years old, and claims to have fought in eighty-seven battles, often wounded, but never badly hurt. Red Cloud is about six feet six inches in his stockings (I mean moccasins), large features, high cheek bones, and a big mouth, and walks knock-kneed, as others do. His face is painted, and his ears pierced for gaudy rings, which men and women have an equal pride for. His and other chiefs' robes were beautifully worked with hair, beads, and jewels. His leggins were red, handsomely worked with beads and horse-hair and ribbons, and his moccasins were fit for a prince to wear.

He has encountered the Utes, Pawnees, Snakes, Blackfeet, Crows, and Omahas. Thirty-three years ago, while he was the youngest of the braves, he engaged with a party of one hundred and twenty-five warriors of his tribe, and only twenty-five escaped alive. Twice was he wounded, and so distinguished by his daring that he was made a chief for his skill in fighting. Then he rose in rank to the highest station, and he holds it to-day. His people regard him as one of the greatest warriors on the plains, being skilled with the tomahawk, rifle, and bow and arrow, and in councils of chiefs, his wonderful sagacity and eloquence have stamped him, in the eyes of all Indians, as worthy of veneration and implicit obedience. As I had missed the party on their way to Washington by a few hours' tarrying on the "Chug," and General Smith had taken a short cut across to Pine Bluff Station, seventy-three miles below Cheyenne, to avoid a conflict anticipated about Richaud, I will give an account gleaned from others, of this expedition, which it is hoped may result in lasting peace.

The "outfit" assembled in front of General Flint's house, on their arrival at Fort Laramie, and got up a regular war-dance to amuse the general's family and others there. This chief, Red Cloud, whose fame had extended hardly east of the Missouri River, has now spread over the world; and from his wigwam and hunting-grounds, he is heard of across the Atlantic as a great man of destiny. He has passed through Omaha and Chicago to Washington in his war-paint, ornamented with eagle's feathers, buffalo-skins, horse-hair, bears' claws, and trophies of his skill, which he values more highly than a brigadier the stars upon his shoulders!

Along with him were nineteen of his braves and four squaws, which is a small number, considering that the Indian is a Mormon in the matter of polygamy. The Indian buys his wife (or wives) by giving a pony for the prize; and when Mother Bickerdyck, the army-nurse, saw "Friday" in Kansas, and upbraided him with having two squaws, he said, "Well, give me one white squaw, and I'll be content; you know one white squaw is equal to two Indian squaws!"

General Smith was a favorite of Red Cloud's, having met him in the Powder River country, and under circumstances which made him respected among the Sioux Indians.

The chiefs on Red Cloud's staff, and going to Washington, were:

Shem-ka-lu-tah, Red Dog. Mon-tah-o-he-te-kah, Brave Bear. Pah-gee, Little Bear. Mon-tah-zia, Yellow Bear. Makh-to-u-ta-kah, Sitting Bear. Makh-to-ha-she-na, Bearskin. Sha-ton-sa-pah, Black Hawk. Shunk-mon-e-too-ha-ka, Long Wolf. Me-wah-kohn, Sword. Ko-ke-pah, Afraid. Ke-cha-ksa-e-un-tah, The One that runs through. Ke-yah-lu-tah, Red Fly. En-ha-mah-to, Rock Bear. Me-nah-to-ne-ow-jah, Living Bear. Och-le-he-lu-tah, Red Shirt.

Squaws of High Blood.

Dah-sa-no-we, The White Cow Rattler, Sword's wife. Ny-ge-uh-ha, Thunder Skin, wife of Ke-cha-ksa-e-un-tah. E-dah-zit-chu, The Woman without a Bow (Sansare tribe), wife of Yellow Bear. Mak-ko-cha-ny-an-tah-ker, The World Looker, wife of Black Hawk.













Along with them were John Richaud, the renegade, and a half-breed, James McCluskey. Also William G. Bullock, the post-trader at Fort Laramie, as familiar with the Indians as any one in those parts, unless it is a wealthy merchant in St. Louis, Mr. Beauvais, a Frenchman.

As the Indians entered the cars at Pine Bluff Station,—and one can hardly imagine what were their thoughts, because they had never before seen a train of cars or a locomotive,—a friend who was there said that, as soon as the cars started, the Indians expressed some terror in their countenances, and all at once grasped hold of the seats with both hands to hold on! As they passed through Columbus, on the road, several of the Pawnees (their deadly enemies) came in and shook hands with them. Arrived at Omaha, they were quartered at the Cozzens Hotel; but instead of occupying bedrooms and beds, they spread their blankets and skins on the floor, and sank down to a rest much coveted after a long and tedious journey of a thousand miles. Here crowds poured in from every quarter to interview these noted warriors; but as they did not speak English, they were only gazed at by curious people.

Red Dog ranks next as a warrior chief, and is much finer looking; but Man-afraid-of-his-Horses (sick at home) is head chief in civil matters.

Red Shirt is head chief of the White-Sash Band, of three hundred braves, is twenty-seven years of age, and was twice wounded in battle.

Long Wolf, with four ugly scars, is of the same band.

Black Hawk, wounded three times, is about second to Red Cloud as a bold warrior. All have distinguished themselves in various ways, and their buffalo-robes are worked and stained with figures and various objects, all of which tell the history of each one, describing minutely from childhood the first game they killed, whether a bird, antelope, or deer, and so on to some fight with an enemy,—all of which, clear as mud to me, is plain to them as a book. It is said that Red Cloud had prepared the following speech to make to his "Great Father," the President; but he changed his mind, and made another:

"Thousands of miles away, where the sun's last light falls on the big hills, I have left my people, to come and look my Father in the face. As that light makes us see all things around us clearly, so may the Great Spirit make our talk plain, that we may understand each other, and that our councils shall be as brothers who have met to smoke the pipe of peace. Father, I have heard that you are great and good. Listen to me, my Father, and let your ears hear one of your children, who comes from the wigwams of his people, with truth in his heart, and no lies upon his lips. I have made many treaties with your Commissioners, and they have promised many times, but have never kept their promises; and I have now come to see my Great Father myself, so that we can understand each other, and make no promises that we do not mean to keep. They have told you that I am a murderer; but I do not understand it in that way. You, Great Father, have driven me away from my country,—the only country I had to raise my children on. Tell me, Father, could any living man on this earth stand such a thing as this? Suppose I should go to your country, tear down your fences, and steal your cattle and your hogs, would you stand by and have no word to say? No, Father, I know you would not. In all the troubles of my people, the white man has been the first aggressor. Father, we are not cowards. We know that you are great, and that you can crush us with your mighty power. But we believe that you are good, and that you will protect your children, when they come to you for what they believe is theirs. We ask you to listen to us, to do by us as a good father should do by his children, and to let us carry back to our brothers and our people the assurance that the Great Spirit has smiled upon us, and that the Great Father is the Indian's friend, and the Indian's protector."



RED CLOUD'S JOURNEY.

The following piece of history is compiled from all that I could learn about a journey, which will be worth preserving, if only the results prove to be a lasting peace, as we hope and pray it will be.

In 1866, in searching for a short route to Montana and Idaho, the government took possession of the Powder River and Big Horn country, along the mountains, where gold is said to abound. A regiment of soldiers was ordered, under Colonel Carrington,—the 18th Regulars,—to open up a road and build forts for protection.

He went up by Fort Laramie, an old trading-post, situated on the North Platte River; from there he laid out one that shortened the distance from Omaha to Virginia City, Montana, three hundred miles. The colonel founded three forts, one on Powder River, one at the crossing of the Big Horn, and one on Tongue River. They were named Fort C. F. Smith, Fort Reno, and Fort Phil. Kearney,—after distinguished generals. These cost about six hundred thousand dollars. As soon as it reached the Indians that their country was to be occupied by the whites, Red Cloud claimed the whole portion all along the Big Horn Mountains, and sent word to them that the Indians would kill all they met. Notice was sent to the government that if the soldiers did not withdraw north of the Platte, he would declare war. Of course no attention was paid to this, and the colonel went on to open roads, strengthen posts, and patrol the country. Some skirmishes took place between small bands of Indians and parties, but no fight of much account occurred till fall.

In October it was said that Red Cloud had given orders for all the Sioux to meet and prepare for war, and next month it was reported he was marching at the head of three thousand warriors. This the government as usual was slow to believe, and gave no heed to it. But early in December the Indians became troublesome along the Powder River country, and Red Cloud's policy was seen to guide them. The wily chief had planned the movement so as to strike a hard blow and capture Fort Kearney, and murder the garrison.



PHIL. KEARNEY MASSACRE.

Red Cloud collected all his warriors near the fort, and concealed them in the hills. Watching his opportunity, he surrounded and attacked a small party sent out against him from the post. As he expected, when the attack was made known, the gates of the fort were thrown open, and the main portion of the soldiers—cavalry and infantry—marched out to rescue their friends, corraled by the Indians. As soon as he got them where he wanted, in the hills, he surrounded them with his three thousand warriors, and cutting off all chance of retreat, massacred every one of them! So sudden was the surprise, that the battle was over before a reinforcement could go out, and the commander at once closed the gates and remained in a state of siege, to protect those who were not slaughtered. In the Phil. Kearney massacre there fell three officers, forty-nine infantry, twenty-two cavalry, and two citizen employes, with Colonel Fetterman, the officer who led them.

After the Phil. Kearney massacre, which thrilled the country with horror, the government hastened to call a council with all the tribes at Fort Laramie, and sent Generals Sherman, Harney, Sanborn, Terry, Augur, and Colonel Tappan to treat with them. Red Cloud kept up his skirmishes and fights as occasion offered. The 1st of August, 1867, the Sioux attacked and killed Lieutenant Sternberg, of 27th Regiment Infantry. And the next day quite a large body of warriors engaged Major Powell and his soldiers on the Piney Creek, four miles from Kearney, and a severe battle was fought for hours. On the 27th, some Indians came down—about one hundred and twenty—to the hay-fields near the fort, and Lieutenant Belden, of 2d Cavalry (a good fighter), went for them with forty soldiers, and cleared them out. On the 3d November, Brevet Captain E. R. P. Shurley (whom the writer knew as post-adjutant in Camp Douglas, Illinois, and who was wounded in the war) was suddenly attacked on Goose Creek; he was desperately wounded, and his command was surrounded and "corraled" for some time, until troops came to his relief and saved the "outfit." Soon after, the train going to Phil. Kearney was attacked and corraled within three miles of the post. The 14th December, the wood-choppers for the forts were attacked on the Big Piney, and two men wounded. The forts now were in a state of siege, and communication between them became nearly cut off. The council at Laramie agreed to abandon that portion of the country, it being no longer needed, as freighting was changed to Montana, via Corinne, on the Pacific Railroad. But the Indians became impatient, and to hurry up matters, they kept on skirmishing from time to time. These were Sioux and some of the Arapahoes and Cheyennes.

In January, 1868, quite a scare was gotten up at Phil. Kearney by the sudden appearance of several hundred Sioux, Cheyennes, and Arapahoes, along with some friendly Crow Indians, and an attack was supposed to be meditated.

Dr. Matthews, one of the special peace commissioners, was there at the time, and he sent a message to the chiefs to meet him in council on the hill above the fort. Most of the Indians came, and after prayer by post-chaplain White, and a long smoke, the doctor made them a speech. After this, an old Sioux Indian, named the "Stabber," got up and said,—

"Whoever our father who has just spoken is, I believe he is a good man. We are told that the Great Father (President) sent word some time ago for his soldiers to leave the country, and I want to tell you that we want them to hurry and go. Send word to the Great Father to take away his warriors with the snow and he will please us. If they can go right away, let it be done, so that we can bring our old men, women, and children to live on these grounds in peace, as they did before you all came here. The Sioux, Arapahoes, and Cheyennes never fought each other until you came and drove away the game (meaning in the whole West), and then attempted to drive us away. Now we fight each other for sufficient ground to hunt upon, though all the lands to the east were once ours. We are talking to-day on our own grounds. God Almighty made this ground, and when He made it He made it for us. Look about you, and see how He has stocked it with game. The elk, the buffalo, and deer are our meat, and He put them here for us to feed upon. Your homes are in the East, and you have beef cattle to eat. Why, then, do you come here to bother us? What have you your soldiers here for, unless it is to fight and kill us? If you will go away to your homes and leave us, we will be at peace, but if you stay we will fight. We do not go to your homes, then why come to ours? You say we steal your cattle and horses; well, do you not know that when you come into our lands, and kill and drive away the game, you steal from us? That is the reason we steal your stock. I am done."

When "Stabber" sat down, "Black Hawk" (now en route for Washington) came forward and said,—

"Where was I made? I was raised in the West, not in the East. I was not raised in a chair, but grew upon the ground." He then sat down on the earth, and continued: "Here is my mother, and I will stay with her and protect her. Laramie has always been our place for talking, and I did not like to come here. You are getting too far west. You have killed many of our young men, and we have killed some of yours in return. I want to quit fighting to-day. I want you to take pity on us and go away."

A Cheyenne chief next addressed the council. He said,—

"We have been told that these forts are to be abandoned and the new road given up, and we have come over to see about it. If this is true, tell me so. I never thought we would come to a council so far west, but the old men prevailed and we are here. All last summer we heard that General Harney wanted to see us at Laramie, but we would not go. General Sherman also sent for us, but we would not listen while you were here. I do not know the name of my father there (pointing to Dr. Matthews), nor who at present is my Great Father (President) at Washington, but this I do know, my father (his parent) when he raised me told me to shake hands with the white man, and to try to live at peace with him, for he was very powerful. But my father also told me to fight my enemies, and since the white man has made himself an enemy I fight him. How are you our enemy? You come here and drive away our game, and he who does that steals away our bread, and becomes the Indian's bitterest enemy, for the Indian must have food to live. I have fought you, and I have stolen from you, but I have done both to live. The only road you have a right to travel is the Platte road. We have never crossed it to fight you. I am a soldier. I have a great many young men here who are soldiers, and will do my bidding. It is our duty to protect and feed our old men, women, and children, and we must do it. If you are friendly, why don't you give us powder and bullets to shoot game with? We will not use them against you, unless you do us harm. I want ten kegs, and when the other tribes know you have given them to me they will know we are good friends, and will come in and treat, and we will all live at peace. I come here to hear talk, not to make talk. We are poor. Take pity on us, and deal justly by us. I have done."

The next speaker was a Crow chief, who, standing by the council-table, said,—

"Sioux, Cheyennes, Arapahoes, Crows, Father: I have been listening to your words, and they sound good. I hope you are not lying to each other. The Crows have long been the friends of the whites, and we want peace for all. We want powder, and when the white Father makes us presents, I want him to give us a good deal of ammunition."

An Arapahoe chief said:

"I want to say this: You are here with soldiers, and what for? Soldiers are your fighting men. Do you then want to fight? If so, tell us. If you desire peace, send your soldiers away. I have some of your stock. I would like to see you come and try to get it back."

This ended the talk on the part of the Indians,—then Dr. Matthews replied. He told them the Peace Commissioners would as willingly meet at Laramie as at any other place, but it was more convenient for the Indians to come to Fort Kearney. He did not promise them that the roads and country would be given up, or the posts abandoned. As to the powder the Indians asked for, he gave no reply, but said, "If the Indians cease fighting and keep the peace during the winter, the Commissioners will meet them in the spring and make a treaty, which will satisfy both them and us." The council broke up,—no good result being reached,—and the Indians being evidently in bad temper. When asked why Red Cloud did not come in to attend the council, a chief said, "He has sent us as the Great Father has sent you. When the Great Father comes, Red Cloud will be here!" This meant that the haughty chief would only treat through his agents, unless President Johnson came in person.

After the council in January, matters were unsettled all along the northwestern frontier until 10th April, 1868, when a large party of Indians appeared on the bluffs overlooking Phil. Kearney Fort. General John E. Smith (who was Red Cloud's choice to escort him to Washington) was at the time commanding the post, and made signals to the Indians to come in, but they refused to do so.

Most of the Indians carried scalp poles, and wore war-paint, to show that they were hostile. Finding that they would not come in, General Smith mounted his horse, and, taking an interpreter (Boyer), rode out to have a parley with them. The general wished to go up the hill, but the interpreter begged him not to do so, and then rode to the bottom and called out, "How?" Then a chief replied, "How?"

General Smith.—Come down, I want to talk.

Chief.—Who are you, and what do you want to talk about?

General Smith.—I am the chief at the fort, and want to see you.

Three Indians then advanced, and came slowly down the hill to where General Smith and Boyer were. When the chief, who was in his war-paint, came up, General Smith held out his hand, but the chief refused to take it, saying, "My brother was killed over there at the Phil. Kearney massacre, and I swore never again to shake hands with a white man."

General Smith.—Who are you, and who are those Indians on the hill?

Chief.—I am a chief, and the warriors are part of Red Cloud's band. Here is his son (at the same time pointing to a young man who sat on a pony by his side).

General Smith.—What have you come here for?

Chief.—We have been on the Laramie road, fighting the Snakes.

General Smith.—You were expected at the big talk at Laramie by the Peace Commissioners.

Chief.—I was there, and they promised that this country should be abandoned by your troops in two months. The two months are up, you are still here, and I see no sign of your moving.

General Smith (sharply). We have made some preparations to go, and will leave as soon as all is in readiness; but if your warriors commit depredations, or kill any more white men, we will not go at all, but stay here, kill you and drive off your game.

Chief (not noticing this threat). I want you to give me something to eat for my young men, and I will go over there and camp on the creek to-night.

General Smith.—I have nothing to give you, but I want to warn you to restrain your warriors from committing any depredations around here.

At this stage of the interview, a company of cavalry, which General Smith had ordered to saddle up and stand ready for any emergency, was seen filing out of the gates of the post, and as soon as the Indians caught sight of the troops, they whipped up their ponies and did not stop till out of sight.

General Smith was very much provoked at this interruption, by a stupid officer coming out when he had no business to do so,—and the impression of treachery on his part made on the minds of the Indians caused them to refuse to come back again to have another talk with him. Near sunset, the Indians were seen crossing the plateau near the creek where the chief indicated he would camp. The evening gun fired as they crossed the stream, and the whole party halted and took a good look at the fort. After a confab among themselves, they seemed to think some sort of defiance had been shown them, and a warrior aiming his gun at the fort, fired. The ball struck on the parade-ground, but did no harm.

The Indians then went into camp, but went off next morning for Red Cloud's camp, which it is thought was not far off. General Smith soon after gave up the post, as ordered to from Washington; and in like manner Reno and C. F. Smith were abandoned, and the troops marched down to Fort Russell. The Indians did not attack the troops, but followed and stole stock when they could. No sooner were the forts abandoned than the Indians came in and set fire to the buildings, destroying property that cost the government over half a million dollars. They did this lest the troops should come back and occupy them again. But the giving up of these posts gave the Indians a false idea of their power, and they thought the government did it from fear.

Many of the Sioux now actually believe that their nation is more powerful than the United States, and Red Cloud a greater warrior than Grant, Sherman, or Sheridan. One of Red Cloud's party said, "If you are so strong and have so many warriors, why did you not keep your forts on the Powder River?" The delegation to Washington will go back and tell the people not how many men, women, and children they saw, as evidence of our power and greatness, but how many horses, soldiers, guns, and corn they saw. For thus they estimate the power and glory of a nation.

Red Cloud won great glory among all the Indians on the plains by his skill in manoeuvring in getting us to give up four hundred miles of rich territory, pulling down three forts, and retiring back to the Platte River. No chief since King Philip or Red Jacket has achieved such a feat and a reputation as Red Cloud.

On account of repeated acts of hostility on the part of the Sioux, the government refused to trade with them at the posts, or have traders sent among them. They need powder and lead, etc., but it would be used to kill our people instead of game,—they allege it is needed, for now it is more scarce.

Red Cloud came into Laramie and Fetterman several times to get leave to trade, but at last he said "he'd go to the Great Father at Washington, and not treat with understrappers, with whom he will in future have nothing to do." About the middle of April he left his hunting-grounds, and on the 24th appeared on the north bank of Platte, opposite Fort Fetterman. With him were some warriors, squaws, and children. They marched down to the ferry in state, singing their song of welcome, and shouted across that they were in a hurry! They were halted there till next day, and the warriors allowed to come over unarmed.

Colonel Chambers, commanding, received them at headquarters. A long smoke all round followed, and then Red Cloud rose up and in a loud voice invoked the countenance and favor of the Great Spirit on his mission, shook hands with all the officers present, and went up to the council-table to have a long talk, as he had come a long way, and wanted to trade.

He said, "I have been treating with you since 1851, and no good has come of it. Our treaties do not last, and now I want to go and see the Great Father, and make a treaty that will last. Tell the Great Father I am here and desire to see him, and take fifty of my people with me to see him. I will wait for his reply at my camp beyond the river."

Colonel Chambers said he would "blow the Great Father a message on his hollow wire, and repeat all the chief had said to him," which quite pleased Red Cloud. He said, "I have waited for the soldiers to leave my country, and I want things settled."

The colonel intimated that the Father was at that time very far away at the East, and it might be many "sleeps" before he could hear from him, and as soon as the Father blew back words by the telegraph, he would send word to the chief's camp and let him know. He then asked to trade, and was allowed to buy tobacco and flour for robes left with the commissary, but nothing else.

He then spoke of his prisoner, John Richaud, and his wish to take him to Washington for a pardon. Also, that Richaud had some property in the fort locked up, which he wanted a chief to take care of. Colonel C—— said he would not do that without orders from his chief (General Augur) at Omaha. This was satisfactory, and the chief sat down.

Speeches then were made by Man-afraid-of-his-Horses and Red Horse, and the council broke up.

Soon as it was known at Washington, and a consultation was had with General Sherman and Secretary of War Belknap, the President sent word that he would be glad to see the chief, and would send a guide to show him the way to the Great Father's wigwam. This message came the 12th May, and the Indians started on the 14th. A great dance was celebrated among the tribe of Ogallallas, and repeated at Fort Laramie for the officers and families.

To this point Red Cloud's son and wife came, but they returned with the others to their hunting-grounds in the Sioux country.

When the party under General Smith left the post in ambulances, etc., some felt "sea-sick," never having rode in a wagon before!

Once on the cars, it was kept as quiet as possible. At Fremont, forty-seven miles from Omaha, it had leaked out, and much excitement prevailed there, as it was reported that the Pawnees, the old and inveterate enemies of the Sioux, were coming in from their reservation (near there), and would attack the train and kill the Sioux chiefs. A number of them were there when the train came along, but they kept very quiet. One or two of the Pawnees went up and shook hands with their old enemies (with whom a deadly feud has existed for years), but they were closely watched by General Smith, lest a stab should be given with their knives. Although the Sioux chiefs were told of the danger, they were "as cool about it as a cucumber." They looked at their knives being all right, and that was all. Of course all along their route they were objects of curiosity to everybody; and had the government declined to have them go (as it was said at first they would), a war would have followed soon after!



PERILOUS ADVENTURE—PURSUIT OF A HORSE-THIEF.

A young man named Frank Hunter, born in Massachusetts, migrated to the Indian country, and was very successfully employed as a government detective in "Camp Carling," between Cheyenne and Fort Russell. In the winter of 1868, a bold robbery was committed by a man employed in taking care of horses by Major J. D. Woolley, the post-trader at Fort Russell.

One morning in December the stable-door was left open, and soon found out that the man and two valuable horses were missing. One of them belonged to Lieutenant Wanless, of the 2d United States Cavalry (who was East at the time on leave); this was the fastest pacing horse in the territory, and for which he had refused a high price in money. The other belonged to the major, and was of considerable value. The matter of catching the thief and horses was given into Mr. Hunter's hands, with instructions to spare no pains or expense in securing the thief, who had hired out on purpose to steal the fast nag. The following I copied from the detective's journal, and verified the facts from other sources.

Mr. Hunter started out to Colorado with ten cavalrymen and Lieutenant Belden on the road to Denver via Boulder City, to prevent the thief (who went by the name of Durant) from getting into the mountains, and so on to New Mexico. This trip proved fruitless. The alternative that suggested itself was that the thief had gone another road, towards the Smoky-Hill route. The first tidings revealed the fact to them, at the South Platte River, that the inferior horse had been disposed of near Godfrey's ranch on the Platte, where the writer's horse and a beautiful Cheyenne pony had been taken by horse-thieves in the preceding summer. The thief, hard pushed for money, had sold Mr. Woolley's horse to a man here named Perkins, who paid thirty-five dollars, while he was worth two hundred dollars. This he placed out of the way, some thirty miles off, thinking him safe from discovery.

Here the utmost caution and strategy were necessary to recover this horse they had secreted, and find out what road the rogues took with the thoroughbred animal. But it was done. The detective came back to Cheyenne with his escort and left it there. Then, on one of Wells, Fargo & Co.'s fast coaches, he embarked for Denver City. A heavy snow-storm set in and impeded the way. Thus the thief had nine days the start.

From Denver he made the best of his way—after being detained five days by the storm—for Sheridan, in Kansas, which was reached in five more days' time,—the trip being made usually by railroad in forty-eight hours. At Sheridan the cars were blockaded with snow, and quite a number of gentlemen were snow-bound, among them the members of Congress from New Mexico and Kansas. The detective proposed to these honorable gents the pleasure of a tramp as far as Fort Hays, only one hundred and thirty-five miles! All agreed, and the party set out, though the snow was very deep.

The expedition proved to be one of much interest; but the pursuit of the thief being the main object before us, we find the detective arrived at Fort Harker, Kansas, and in communication with a gentleman named Stone, who had seen the famous pacer, and had tried to buy him of the supposed owner; and from him the detective learned that the horse was near at hand, only twenty miles farther east, at a place called "Saline," on a small river, in Kansas. From this place the thief intended to convey the horse to Aurora, Illinois (his native town), to match him there with another, and thus to obtain a large sum of money for his thieving wickedness.

Arrived in Saline, Mr. Hunter lost no time in putting himself in communication with the sheriff there, who seemed to Mr. Hunter not to be entirely reliable; indeed, from a careful survey of faces of the loungers in the bar-room of the one-horse town of border settlers, the sheriff appeared to be hand-in-glove with the thief, so he concluded that his only chance of any help in the matter could come from the landlord and the telegraph operator,—the latter having sent messages from the rogue to Aurora, while detained there by the depth of snow. But no time was to be lost, and a desperate effort must be made.

Mr. Hunter went into the bar-room with the sheriff, after breakfast, and a crowd was sitting around the stove. The rogue was sent for with a message that "a gentleman wished to speak with him." He came into the room presently, picking his teeth, and putting on an assumed air of indifference; he looked at the detective with a coolness quite refreshing, as he stepped up to the bar and called for cigars, saying, "Gentlemen, who'll have a smoke? I don't see any gentleman here that I know, besides myself."

"How are you, Ned?" said Mr. Hunter. "You don't know me?"

"Gentlemen," replied he, "on my honor, before God, I never saw this man before in my life! This is a put-up game of a man named Stone, to bilk me out of my fast horse; and (putting his hand on his six-shooter in his belt) no man shall get this horse, which I bought, or me either, alive."

The detective with great presence of mind assured him that his game was up; that the first motion he made of resistance he was a dead man! Then drawing a pair of manacles from his pocket, he soon clasped them on his prisoner's wrists, and relieved the rogue of his pistols, handing them over to the barkeeper for safety. He was taken to his room to pick up his traps, until the horse could be saddled up to return.

By this time a reaction had taken place among the crowd, who seemed to sympathize with the thief, and some exclaimed against taking him, and for all they knew, he might be innocent. Here was a new danger not expected. If these fifteen or twenty hard-looking customers should take it into their heads to vote the man guiltless, there was an end to justice, and the detective might find himself suspended from the nearest cottonwood limb of a tree, dangling like Mohammed's coffin, between heaven and earth! But as good luck would have it, the irons pressed tightly and painfully on the wrists of the captive, and he cried from his room, "Hunter! oh, Hunter! come and loose these cursed irons,—they're killing me!"

"Now, gentlemen," said Hunter, "you see whether he knows me or not." To the prisoner he said, "I'll loosen them if you'll tell all about it." He came in and said, "Yes, I stole the horse; I'm a thief, and that man is a detective of the government from Cheyenne."

Of course, here all danger should end, and my story cease. But the truth is, something new turned up very often to embarrass the journey back to Cheyenne. After leaving Fort Harker, a new dodge was attempted, but different from the one that Paddy essayed when he greased the horse's mouth to save the oats. Leaving the culprit in irons at Fort Harker, the detective proceeded on to Fort Ellsworth, Kansas, from which place he started in the morning with his horse, in high hopes of reaching Cheyenne in a few days.

But alas for the vanity of human hopes and expectations! Having ridden about fifteen miles, the horse came to a sudden pause, and acted like one afflicted with spring-halt. Stopping at a ranch near by, after a careful examination, it was found that some precious villains had tied some silk cords on his legs underneath the fetlocks, thoroughly crippling him, so he could hardly move a limb. They hoped to lame the horse till he could be stolen again! But it was not successful. This journey of seventeen hundred miles cost the sum of six hundred dollars. But the horses were valued at fifteen hundred dollars, and it was right to put a stop, if possible, to the crime so common in the West of stealing horses, and one which subjects the culprit to a ball in his body, if needful to recapture stolen stock, and all say it is just and right, as a man's horse there may, in some cases, be "his life."

But the fellow while in limbo sawed off the chain and ball from his leg and escaped. He, moreover, had the impudence to write a saucy letter to Mr. Hunter, telling him "that the caged bird had flown, and the probability of their never meeting again!"

The rascal had been a soldier in the army, deserting several times, and re-enlisting under a new name each time, at different posts in the western country.



HANGING HORSE-THIEVES.

It seems awful when we hear of the "Vigilance committees" in new countries. They are a body of men combining together, in a secret society, to rid the community of vile men, who rob, steal, and commit murder, just as easy as lying, and all for a few dollars. I say it seems awful to hear of their sentencing individuals to be hung by the neck to the telegraph-poles, often with only a single hour's notice, without a trial by jury. But it is done in new towns such as Julesburg was, where people would not be safe without some such action. California began it, and other places found it necessary.

At Cheyenne, when it was full of these horse-thieves and gamblers, I was called upon to bury "a gentleman" (as he was called), who had died suddenly, they said, at the "Beauvais House." I went down from the fort in February, and as the day was pleasant, crowds of young men were gathered in front of the house, and the street was full of carriages. It seems the dead man was the proprietor of the hotel, and it did not bear a very good reputation. Harris had formerly a partner named Martin, with whom he had a quarrel one evening, and Harris ordered his former partner to leave,—shutting the door upon him. Then Martin turned and shot three balls through the panel of the door, one of which hit Harris, and of which he died in about twelve hours. This produced a great excitement, and called out the crowd at the funeral. The person in charge asked me to step out on the balcony and address the people in the street. But I declined, and said I would speak to the young men, as I felt it my duty to do, in the parlor and hall. I remarked to them "that the deceased was past our praise or blame. But it was my duty to warn them at this time, when no man's life was safe, to think of the shortness and uncertainty of human life! Here, away from good examples you once had at home, you are in much danger. You and I think that we will die on a sick-bed, with dear friends around us; but you nor I will die just when or where we expect to. Some of you have learned to say your prayers at your mother's knee, but you forget, or are ashamed to do so now. Oh, be warned, my friends, to seek Christ and his favor, and He will take care of you, etc."

I could see many faces intent on what I had to say, and among them was a little dwarf belonging to the house, as an errand-boy. He covered up his face with his hands, sitting upon a low stool, and perhaps his mind wandered back to the humble cottage where he was born, and a mother's smile was his best beacon of goodness: he had not forgotten! For when I came back from the graveyard, he said, "Parson, I thought a good deal about what you said, indeed I did, and it's true, every word of it, you bet!"

Martin was tried by a court, and got clear. But he was fool enough to go round the saloons right away, boasting that he would serve out several more before breakfast. Then the vigilantes got hold of him that night, and hung him to the telegraph-poles near Cheyenne, till he was dead.

Sam Dugan was in our military prison at Fort Russell, for the crime of stealing horses. He was released upon a writ of habeas corpus from Colorado and taken to Denver, where members of the vigilance committee took him from jail outside the city in an express-wagon, and fastening a rope around his neck, and throwing it over a limb of a large cottonwood-tree, they hung him up; leaving the body suspended for twenty-four hours.

He confessed to have stolen many horses, and to have murdered at least six men in his life on the plains.

Most of these hardened villains die as brave men; but Dugan they said whined like a child. He was really afraid to die, because of his great wickedness.



AN INDIAN FIGHT AT SWEETWATER MINES.

On the morning of the 4th May, 1870, there was a desperate fight with two companies of the 2d United States Cavalry, under Major D. S. Gordon and Lieutenant C. B. Stambaugh, a god-child of General Sherman. The Indians had committed some outrages, in return for which a party of miners killed a chief named Black Bear, his squaw, and eleven other Indians, Arapahoes.

When the principal chief of the Arapahoes heard of the fate of Black Bear and his party, he was very angry, and called together three hundred warriors (the tribe only numbering about fifteen hundred souls), and marched for Atlantic City, as it is called (a small town in the Wind River valley). Two companies of cavalry camped near the place just before the Arapahoe warriors appeared. A young man named Bennett saw them first, as he was driving his mules from the pasture. The Indians at once surrounded him and marched for the town, to kill him in sight of the village, where the troops were, but not known to the Indians. Bennett soon saw they were taking him towards a gulch close by the village where Gordon and Stambaugh were camped.

On coming up to the top of the hill, the camp was in full view, and only a few hundred yards away.

Bennett shouted at once for help, and, putting out as hard as he could, soon got into camp safe and sound. The sight of the military astonished the Indians so that they did not try to recapture Bennett, but made good time in every direction to escape. The soldiers were just getting up for "reveille," when the guard saw Bennett coming with the Indians, they driving and whipping him with their bows. The shout rang out, "Indians! Indians!" and at once they opened fire, officers and soldiers tumbling out of their beds. Some had on their drawers only,—some in one stocking, and many without boots,—all seized their arms, and rushing to the picket lines, unhitched their horses, jumped on with no time to saddle, and without hats galloped over the hills in pursuit of the flying Indians. Learning that some cattle were run off near the town, some of the soldiers galloped through the streets and hallooing "Indians!"—a cry the most terrible of all alarms along the border,—soon brought every man to his feet, and gun in hand, rush out to meet the foe. Soon these half-naked warriors had cleared the hills of the red men, and strolling home as the sun rose over the bluffs, when a horseman came into Major Gordon's camp with the news that "Miner's Delight" camp was attacked, and the teams of Mr. Fleming, who was hauling hay for the government. Major Gordon taking Lieutenant Stambaugh, Sergeant Brown, and nine privates (all the soldiers in the camp), and leaving orders for the rest to follow as fast as they came in, they set off for the hay-field, distant about eight miles. There they saw none, as the Indians had left, but striking their trail, went on as fast as possible. A storm had been gathering all the morning, and soon as they had gone six miles, it burst upon them with terrible fury, completely covering up all traces of the enemy. The major thinking it useless to follow further, set out to return to the post; but he had not gone far before he encountered a lot of about sixty Indians. The snow and sleet was so blinding at the time, that he did not see them until he came close upon them. A charge at once was ordered, and the troops dashed forward, scattering the Indians in every direction. Unfortunately, however, in the attack Lieutenant Stambaugh received a ball from an Indian's pistol, and Sergeant Brown had his jaw broken by another shot. Lieutenant S——, though wounded, was held on to his horse by Major Gordon, until surrounded by an immense crowd of desperate warriors, when Gordon told Stambaugh, "For God's sake, hold on to the mane of your horse, as I have to shoot!"

Lieutenant S—— fell off soon after, valiantly fighting. He was shot through the head sideways,—from the throat up through his brain,—through the chest, arms, and hands. He was brave to a fault, and the Indians probably took him for a "brave" white chief of high rank.

Seeing these two men fall from their horses, and that few soldiers were there, the Indians rallied and charged them furiously. A severe fight followed over the body of Stambaugh, the savages trying to capture and scalp it, and the soldiers defending it nobly. Six Indians were killed and two soldiers wounded. Soon the Indians retreated, leaving their wounded and dead with the soldiers. The fight lasted about two hours. All then became quiet, and Major Gordon descended the ridge,—a strong position,—and carrying the body of Stambaugh a piece, hid it away in some bushes. Expecting the Indians would attack him on the way, he set out for camp, the Indians having gone that way. He saw no more of them, however. Late at night with his men he reached Atlantic City, they having eaten nothing since the day before.

Strange it was, the reinforcements he had ordered did not reach him, and none knew where they were. Of course all the miners there were greatly excited; the events of the day were talked over, rockets thrown up, and fires kept burning on the hills as beacons for a guide to the soldiers still out; but before daylight they all came in, after having lost their way in the storm while searching for Major Gordon and his party.

Early next morning, Lieutenant Dinwiddie took a strong detachment of troops and twenty citizens and went out to the scene of battle, and taking up the body of young Stambaugh, marched slowly back on their sad journey with the noble brave fellow to the camp, which should know him no more!



INDIAN ATTACK ON THE STAGE-COACH GOING TO DENVER—REV. MR. FULLER'S ACCOUNT OF TWO ATTEMPTS UPON HIS LIFE.

The following letter tells its own story. Moreover, it is a truthful narrative, and shows to the young that a Christian man is a bold man to meet danger, knowing that God helps us, while we use all proper means of safety to help ourselves.

PITTSBURG, May 30th, 1870.

REV. E. B. TUTTLE, Cheyenne, Wyoming Ter.

REV. AND DEAR SIR,—I will try to give you a brief account of my adventure with the Indians, in answer to your request. It was on the 1st day of June, 1867, the same year that the Right Reverend Bishop Tuttle went out to his jurisdiction (whom I met a few days after the adventure at the North Platte Station). The scene of the adventure was Fairview Station, which was a deserted ranch about ten miles east of "Fort Wicked," or Godfrey's ranch. The station house had been burned, and the high adobe walls with an open front entrance, facing the road, were left standing. About half-past two P.M. we stopped at "Godfrey's" for a change of horses and refreshments. I was the only passenger, and as we started on, the company consisted of the driver, myself inside the coach, and two horsemen, "stock leaders" (employed by the stage company to transfer stock from one point to another), four in all. Unsuspectingly, we went straight into the Indian's trap. It was about four P.M. I sat on the front seat with my back to the driver, the windows being down. The first thing that caught my attention was the discharge of a number of rifles, some of the balls crashing through the sides of the coach.

The Indians were well armed with rifles, bows and arrows, and were all mounted. Instantly I seized my revolver (a small six-shooter), and made ready to defend myself. I saw the two horsemen wheel their horses and start back towards "Godfrey's" Station. They were just a little behind the coach. The driver also yelled at his horses and gave them a short turn, for the same purpose, no doubt. While we were turning round, a tall Indian rode up close to the coach-window and looked in, and as he did so I looked out; our faces met only about six feet apart. He had a rifle in one hand; I saw him drop his rein and grasp his gun with both hands. I heard the click of the trigger. I could easily have shot him, having my revolver in my hand, but I did not,—why I do not know. It was well that I did not, as it proved. I dropped under the coach-window to avoid his fire, if possible. He fired and rode on quickly ahead, his shot being delivered either at the driver or myself, I know not which. The horses and coach were now turned about and faced towards "Godfrey's," and were running as only thoroughly frightened horses will run. They were large, powerful animals, four in number. The Indians had meantime divided themselves into two bodies. (There were about thirty of them in all, of the Cheyenne tribe. I will shortly state how they were numbered.) One party starting in pursuit of the horsemen, and the other remaining with the coach to take it.

The situation was most critical. I soon saw that the horses did not keep the road, but turned out of it towards the Platte River (the river and the road run parallel about half a mile apart, as you probably know), and I knew that the driver was not guiding them! Putting my revolver in my side-pocket, I opened the door and, taking hold of the railing above, looked first to see if the driver was indeed gone. He was not there! I did not turn back; to stay inside was sure death. If there was any chance of escape, it was from the outside. I sprang out to the driver's seat above, but judge of my dismay to find the reins on the ground! I intended to get control of them. I knew not what to do, but had an idea at first of jumping to the ground to get the reins. While standing there thinking how to manage to get the reins, I was the only mark for the Indians, and was fired at a number of times. Such was the situation, standing alone on the coach-box,—the Indians before and behind endeavoring to shoot me and to stop the coach,—and yet I escaped. I have yet the coat, with a bullet-hole in the sleeve, which I had on. My escape was in this wise: I saw that the reins might be reached from the headstalls of the wheel-horses. I therefore sprang down on to the tongue of the coach to get them, but just then the horses had reached a slough about two rods wide and as many feet deep, with a sharp bank on either side. They did not stop, but plunged into and across it. I fell fortunately over the nigh horse's back, just clearing the wheels. The horses and coach went on and I was left in the slough. That fall to me at the time appeared sure death. I expected to be killed instantly. But, sooner than I can tell it, I was upon my feet upon the bank, my revolver in my hand, determined not to be taken alive; for well enough I knew what that would end in. To my astonishment, the Indians did not stop to give me a shot even; being under a full run, they barely glanced at me as they passed in pursuit of the coach. I saw the reason of this. I was on foot, and between me and "Godfrey's" was another body of Indians. They were all mounted and armed; I could not run away; I was in a vice apparently.

I looked towards the river, and observing some islands in it, my plan was instantly formed. If I could only reach the river, I would swim out and get behind one of the islands. And the river being high and turbid, with a quicksand bottom, I did not believe they would venture to come after me. (I had learned to swim when a boy, and that now was my means of salvation.) I started for the river as soon as the last Indian had passed me, "double quick," but as I started, I glanced towards the west, and, to my dismay, saw the other party coming back at a distance of four or five hundred rods from me, and I had at least two hundred rods to make to reach the river. They had got through with their chase of the two men. They had killed one of them and also his horse (I buried his body the next day). The other man being mounted on a trained racer, as I afterwards learned, managed by hard running to escape and reach the station.

At a certain angle bearing back towards "Godfrey's," I started for the river, and the Indians turned to run in between me and the river. But providence interposed again. Within one minute from the time of my fall, the Indians stopped the coach, shooting one of the horses to do it; and this drew the attention of the other party away from me to the coach, being drawn (I suppose) by motives of plunder on seeing the coach stopped. I have since learned that they do not divide the plunder in any civilized way, but what an Indian gets his hands on is his. But for this circumstance, they must have got between me and the river. Finding that I had actually gained the river-bank, I determined not to go in at once, but the rather to get as far away as possible, while the Indians were engaged in plundering the coach, knowing it would take them some minutes to do that. I had no hope of running away, but slipping off my boots, I began a rapid walk up the river-bank, all the while glancing back at the Indians, expecting momentarily that they would start for me. Thus I got nearly a mile away, when I noticed two men in the road, a little ahead of me. I stopped as soon as I saw them, feeling sure that they were Indians who had been sent to that point to prevent my escape. As I stopped, they made signs for me to come to them; but this I took to be a decoy, under a pretense of friendship, to get me away from the river. Instantly divesting myself of my outer clothing, I plunged in, seeing them start for me as I did so, at a full run. There were no islands there, and to get away, I must make the other side. The water was very cold, the current strong, and I soon became chilled. I found my strength going fast, and gave up my last hope of escape. I would have gone under but for another interposition of Providence. I drifted on to a sand bar, and stopping there, I expected to die. I did not wait long. In a brief time the two men had reached the river-bank opposite me, and judge of my joy, dear sir, to see the uniform of United States cavalry soldiers!

They had been sent out (from Fort Morgan) two days previous to search for some deserters. They happened to come upon the ground just then, else I should not be writing you this account to-day. They saw the whole affray from the outset, but did not dare to attack. They counted the Indians and said there were about thirty of them. Now, when I started for the river, after the fall, they agreed to assist me if they could. Fortunately I did not go in immediately on reaching the river, but went towards them without knowing of their presence. When I went into the river finally, they understood that I mistook them for Indians, and made a dash to save me. God bless them! In doing that they put themselves in danger. I saw this and spoke of it, but they said they intended to give the "red devils" to understand thus that they were supported by others. Their strategy had precisely that effect. I looked towards the Indians, and they were making off in the other direction towards "the bluffs," as fast as they could go. We went safely back to "Godfrey's," one of the soldiers kindly giving me his horse to ride. I wish it were in my power to reward in some substantial way these noble young men. After saluting me from the river-bank, I swam and waded back to the shore. It was with difficulty that I could stand when I reached it. My coat was stained with patches of blood. The soldiers at first were sure that I was wounded, but strange to say, I was not hurt. The blood was from the driver, and got upon my coat from the coach-box.

I lost my baggage, several hundred dollars of goods and money captured by the Indians. Stopping two days at "Godfrey's," with a force of eighteen men well armed, in three coaches bound east, we started on again. Godfrey, who has a mortal hatred of Indians, treated me with great kindness. This, dear sir, was my marvelous escape. Bishop Randall writing me afterwards about it, said that it seemed to him but little short of a miracle. Bishop Tuttle also expressed the same view. The fall from the tongue of the coach, the stopping of the coach just in time to call off the party that were getting between me and the river, the sand bar in the river, on which I rested in the last extreme, and finally, the singular appearance of the soldiers to deliver me, are plain indications that it was the will of God that I should be spared.

Truly yours,

WM. A. FULLER.



CHAPLAIN WHITE SAYS THERE'S A TIME TO PRAY AND A TIME TO FIGHT.

In July of the same year as the massacre at Phil. Kearney, that is to say on the 20th July, while Chaplain White was traveling on Powder River with Captain Templeton, Lieutenant Daniels, Lieutenant Wanns, and J. H. Bradley, in company with five white women and two colored also, going to join their command, and while quietly traveling along, about fifty to sixty wild Indians came suddenly upon them just as they approached "Crazy Woman's Fork River." At once there was a panic, and one of the officers suddenly put on a woman's bonnet and rode off. One woman had a babe. The chaplain, seeing all was confusion, and each one for himself, exclaimed, "For God's sake, don't leave these women to be murdered!" This seemed to call them to their senses, and they began to rally, though, all told, there were but thirteen armed men. One soldier, a German, got terribly frightened, and said, "Isn't there some one to pray?" The chaplain seized him by the collar and bid him hold his gun, saying, "There is a time to pray and a time to fight!" By nightfall they had all disappeared. Lieutenant Bradley was very courageous; for when the Indians shot their arrows, he would stoop down and pick them up in derision.

Chaplains may be sometimes of little account, but if their record could be written up, a large number would be found to have done noble service during the war of the rebellion.

Chaplain John McNamara, of the 1st Wisconsin Regiment, was one of them. I learned the following anecdote from a soldier who died in Camp Douglas:

Private Auchmuty said, "We had marched for a whole year, and had never a battle. Like all soldiers, we grumbled a good deal, and found fault with our rations. Our chaplain preached a sermon about our being discontented, saying we 'had done nothing at all for the government, only to soldier a little, and eat our rations.' This made us a little angry, and so we took it out in calling as he passed, 'There goes the chaplain that eats his rations!'

"But by-and-by we had a sharp and bloody fight at Stone River. Colonel B. J. Sweet was badly wounded in his right arm, and our captain was killed. This made us waver and fall back. But the chaplain rushed forward to lead us, exclaiming, 'Boys, come on! The enemy is wavering; we are sure of a victory!' On we rushed after him, and drove the foe off the field. After that we called him the 'Bully chaplain.' He lost his wig, but he gained the victory."



LEGEND OF "CRAZY WOMAN'S FORK."

The Absarakas, or Crow nation, have the reputation of being good friends to the whites, and it is also said they have never warred with them.

Iron Bull, a renowned chief of the Crows, relates the following legend.

In the journey through that most delightful region of Montana from Fort Phil. Kearney to Fort C. F. Smith (in the Powder River country), one of the most favored camping-grounds is the one called "Crazy Woman's Fork," the name of a pretty little stream of water that rises in the Big Horn Mountains, and emptying into the Little Horn River. About three miles from the mountains this stream crosses the trail between the two military posts mentioned.

This camp on the Fork is noted for its danger from Indian attacks, as an abundant supply of game being found in the valley, brings the Indian there to replenish his larder of wild meat. Notwithstanding the dangers attending a journey through this region, it has its attractions in the beautiful and diversified views of lovely scenery, which hasten the parties traveling that region to encamp, for a night at least, on the banks of a limpid stream that refreshes man and beast from an unfailing source in the mountains. The banks are skirted with cottonwood-trees, and to the west, one sees the tall spurs of the Rocky Mountains rising up, as it were, from your feet, their dizzy heights covered with snow; while the haze that surrounds them gives to them a halo of glory and weirdlike appearance, that the imaginative might compare to the garments that mantle the spirits of the blessed in Paradise!

Iron Bull said that about two hundred years ago, when the moon shone brighter, and there were more stars, his nation was a great people, and they roamed over all that country from the Missouri River to the west of the Yellowstone, and no dog of a Sioux dare show himself there. But the people had been wicked, and the Great Spirit had darkened the heavens and made the sun to shine with such heat that the streams were dried up, and the snow disappeared from the highest peaks of the mountains. The buffalo, the elk, the mountain sheep, the deer, and the rabbit, all disappeared and died away, bringing a great famine upon his tribe, and the spirit of the air breathed death into the lodges, so that the warrior saw his squaw and papooses die for want of the food he could not find on all the plain, or on the mountain-sides; so that the whole nation grieved and mourned in sorrow of heart.

Still, they kept up their wars with the Sioux, and fought many a bloody battle with them when they suffered most, and the game had entirely disappeared. Their great medicine-man called a council, and when the head-men had assembled, he told them of a wonderful dream that he had had, when he was bidden by the Great Spirit to gather the chiefs of the tribe at the fork of the stream where they lived.

Their ponies had all been eaten for food, so the proud Indians were compelled to make the journey on foot to the place of meeting.

But when they had arrived at the bluffs, on the edge of the valley, they were surprised to see a bountiful supper spread on the bank of the stream, close by the Forks, and a white woman close by, standing up and making signs to them to descend from the bluffs.

Having never before seen a "white squaw," they were greatly astonished. The medicine-man descended to the valley. The white woman told him that the Great Spirit would talk to the council through her. She told him that the wars of the tribe were displeasing to the Great Spirit, and they must make peace with the Sioux nation. When that was done, the great chief, "The-Bear-that-grabs," must return to her.

They sent out runners to the Sioux, and peace was declared between the tribes for the first time in one hundred years.

She then told the great chief to follow the mountain in a westerly course, until he came to the Big Horn River, and where the rock was perpendicular, he was to shoot three arrows, hitting the rock each time.

The chief departed on his mission, and as he gained the bluffs from the stream, he looked back at the white squaw, but what was his surprise when he saw her rising in the air and floating towards the mountains! He watched her until she disappeared over the highest peak towards the sky.

The chief pursued his journey, and, arriving at the place told him by the white squaw, he discharged his arrows. The first one struck in rock. The second flew over the mountain. The third was discharged, and a terrible noise followed: the heavens were aglow with lightning; the thunder shook the mountains. The earth trembled, and the rocks were rent asunder, and out of the fissure countless herds of buffalo came, filling the valleys and the hills. The hearts of the Indians were glad, and they ate and were merry, and returned thanks to the Great Spirit and to the good white woman.

The great fissure in the rocks is the canon of the Big Horn River.

Iron Bull avers that when anything of note is about to befall the tribe, the image of the white woman can be seen hovering over the peak of the mountain at "Crazy Woman's Fork." He says the Crows have never killed any of the whites, and his people say and believe "that they are treated by the government agents worse than the tribes who give us all the trouble."

In other words, because they are peaceable, we need not, as with others, to buy them off with presents. And they say we have taken some of their lands and given them to the Sioux, who were fighting and destroying the whites as often as they could.



PHIL. KEARNEY MASSACRE.

One of the most fearful and fatal massacres on the plains that is known, occurred in the forenoon of December 21st, 1866, at Fort Phil. Kearney, Dakota.

About nine o'clock, some Indians, a few only (as usual), were seen on the bluffs. Brevet General Carrington, Colonel of the 18th United States Infantry, in command of the post, sent out eighty-one men, one company of infantry, and one of 2d Cavalry, Company C, under command of Colonel Fetterman. The instructions, it is said, were not to go over the hills. However that may be, they pursued the hostile Indians beyond sight of the post, crossing the river near the fort to do so. At ten o'clock the fight began, the firing being heard plainly at the post. There were from fifteen hundred to twenty-five hundred Sioux, under chief Red Leaf.

The soldiers were led into an ambuscade, and having shot away all their ammunition in a panic, were surrounded and massacred before two o'clock in the afternoon. Sixteen Indians were killed, and chief Spider among them. The bodies of the soldiers were horribly mutilated and scalped. Why reinforcements were not sent out to help them out of their perilous condition does not appear. Colonel Fetterman was killed, a noble, brave man, and the fort next above "Laramie" was named after him. This is an eyesore to Red Cloud, and he requested the President to have it removed, as of no use, he said, and costing the government a great deal of money. His wish was not gratified.



MAUVAISES TERRES, OR BAD LANDS, DAKOTA.

Up in the Indian country, in Dakota, near White River, as one travels over a prairie country, one comes suddenly upon a valley, down between one and two hundred feet, which is at least thirty miles wide, by ninety in length. It looks as though it had sunk down below all the country round; while standing like sentinels all around, one sees pillars of immense height, of irregular prismatic columns of masses of stone, stretching up to the height of from one to two hundred feet or more. It reminds one of the ruins of Pompeii (described by Bulwer) as the traveler wends his way through deep passages, amidst petrified snakes, turtles, and mammoth animals, which must have been larger than elephants. Turtles weighing a thousand pounds, petrified, lie around, and all over is strewn the remains of extinct animals in this vast charnel-house.

Professor Leidy, of Philadelphia, has detected about thirty remains of species of extinct mammalia. Many of these belonged to animals such as the hippopotamus, rhinoceros, tapir, etc. One extinct animal, called the Oreodon, had grinding teeth like lions, cats, etc., and must have belonged to a race that lived on vegetables and flesh, and yet chewed the cud like a cow. Another called the Machairodus, was wholly carnivorous, and combined the size and weight of the grizzly bear with the jaws and teeth of the Bengal tiger. Most of the bones are yet in good preservation and highly mineralized. Dr. Owen says he saw all the bones of a skeleton eighteen feet long and nine in height; also a jaw of a similar animal, which measured five feet along the range of its teeth. At one place there is a valley which has the appearance of a floor of an ancient lake, where turtles lie imbedded by hundreds, and some weighing a ton. This wonderful place looks like the city of the dead; and as nothing grows there, and there is no water for animals, no living thing is found there, not even a bird. General Sully made a forced march through it with cavalry a few years ago, and had to carry water for the men and horses. The Indians never go there, unless driven in by some tribe attacking in superior numbers. The fossils which have been brought from the Mauvaises Terres belong to a species that became extinct before the period when the Mastodon inhabited this country. The strata in which these animals are imbedded indicate that the water was fresh or brackish. It is the most desolate and barren prospect one could lay his eyes on; and if the place for bad people is like this, when they come to die, may no boy have to go there and be frightened all his life-long for his wicked and cruel deeds to others, or to animals either; for the sight of these skeletons is enough to make any boy afraid of disobeying his mother, or to go to sleep any night without being sorry for his sins.

Gold is said to be deposited there, and may yet be found in large quantities, if the Indians can be induced to let the whites prospect there. A while since, an Indian brought into a fort some gold-dust and a large nugget. The post-trader looked at it and pretended it was iron, saying to the Indian, "No good." He threw it out of the window and gave the Indian a glass of whisky. When he went out, the trader picked it up, and it was worth thirty dollars. The Indian having refused to tell where he got it, was made quite drunk, and then he said it came from the Bad Lands; but if the chief found out he had told of it, he would kill him.



NATURAL HISTORY—ANIMALS ON THE PLAINS.

The animals which are found west of the Missouri River, especially in the Rocky Mountains, and far beyond them, are the buffalo, elk, deer, cimarron bear, mountain sheep, antelope, coyote, prairie-dog, etc.

The buffalo, which affords good beef to the Indian hunters, and has fed many thousand toilers over the plains to Salt Lake and California, is mainly known to boys in the comfortable buffalo robes, which every one knows the use of in sleigh-riding. But to us officers and soldiers on the plains they are life-preservers almost, in our sleeping out nights on the ground, far away from home and good beds and blankets.

The buffalo meat is tough, unless from a young cow; and the Indians make little difference in drying it for winter use, as they have good teeth and always a first-rate appetite. The skins are dried and tanned by the squaws, who lay them on the grass; and I saw an old gray-haired squaw toiling away with a sharp instrument, made of the end of a gun-barrel, something like a carpenter's gouge, and this had a bone handle, with which she kept scraping off the inside of the skin of its fibres, so as to make it soft and pliable. She had a stone to sharpen the tool with, and as she leaned over, tugging away, the perspiration rolled off her face in streams. Poor old creature, I felt sorry for her, as the work might have been done by several big, lazy, half-grown Indian boys I saw romping around and shooting their arrows at a mark. But it is disgraceful for the lords of creation to labor, so they only kill the game, and leave the squaws to cure and prepare it for eating.

It is astonishing how poorly Indians are compensated for their robes and furs. In Colorado, some Indians had been very successful in killing buffaloes, had plenty of meat, and purchased with their robes flour, sugar, coffee, dry-goods, and trinkets from the white and Mexican traders; but they did not realize one-fourth their value. They were worth eight or nine dollars by the bale at wholesale. The traders paid seventy-five cents in brass wire or other trinkets for a robe; two dollars in groceries, and less in goods. Six tribes, in 1864, furnished at least fifteen thousand robes, which, at eight dollars, would amount to one hundred and twenty thousand dollars. The traders literally swindled the poor Indians. They will give the robe off their backs for a bottle of whisky on the coldest day.

The cimarron bear is avoided by the soldiers, if possible, when met by them. Up in the Wind River country, a soldier was mauled terribly by one which he had wounded, but failed to kill on the first fire. The fight was desperate, for the bear, said to have been six or seven feet long, and weighing nine hundred pounds, had clinched the soldier, and both rolled down the ravine together, the other soldiers afraid to fire lest they should hit the poor comrade, almost in the jaws of death. They did rescue him, however, by lunging a knife into bruin's side, compelling him to release his hold, after lacerating the soldier's arm and side.

The coyote is a kind of wolf that preys on the antelope. It is a mean, sneaking thief, too mean to attack a herd of antelopes, but follows them up, and while one strays off, grazing, watches the opportunity to spring upon his victim, run him down, and snap the hamstring of poor antelope, and then eats him.

One night I was woke up at Fort Sedgwick, thinking I heard wild geese flying over. But I learned it was a drove of coyotes, which came over the bluffs, into and through the fort nightly, to eat the refuse meat outside, where beef was slaughtered. They prowl about, and sometimes make a noise like a lot of school-children hallooing at play. They never bite, unless attacked. An old lady got lost about a mile outside the post, at Russell, in the winter. She started out of Cheyenne, one Monday afternoon, to search for an emigrant train which might be going to Montana, where she had a son living.

She strayed away and was found in a snow-bank, by some soldiers going out to dig a grave. She was glad to see the faces of white men, for it was on Friday, and she had thus been out, wandering around since Monday, four days! She was brought into the hospital and given a warm cup of tea. "Dear me," she exclaimed, "give me a quart,—I'm almost famished!" She said she was only frightened by the coyotes coming round nights and barking at her. Her feet were partly frozen, but in a few weeks she went on to Montana.

The black-tailed deer are fine eating; the grass on which they feed in the mountains is said to make the meat tender and sweet.

The mountain sheep are large and very strong; they will throw themselves from a rocky cliff and strike on their head many feet below unharmed, being protected by horns and stout necks. They are larger than our domestic sheep.

The antelope is a pretty, gazelle-like creature, fleet and agile in springing up and running. Having passed over the Union Pacific Railroad many times, it has been my pleasure to see them running away from the train in droves of a dozen or more, in file one after the other, till out of sight, far away over the bluffs. By-and-by they will disappear as the buffalo have, driven away by approaching civilization. The young are easily caught and tamed, and make nice pets for children. The cost of one here is usually five dollars. They are hunted a good deal for their meat, as antelopes are tender and sweet to the palate. One method in hunting them is to raise a white or red flag, and the silly creatures, full of curiosity, will turn and walk towards it till shot down by the marksman.