on the trail—a pursuit—the mark is overshot—a night march—morning—the curtain rises—we are prisoners—blackfeet—penoquam—the far-off dawn—his history—his medicine robe—interrogations—new arrivals—the trader again.
well watched by sharp and restless eyes were we that evening as our figures grew fainter in the grey of the prairie.
tashota had already laid his plans; and although no overt act had yet been taken, everything was ready to ensure a rapid pursuit when the proper moment had arrived.
two hours passed, and darkness began to close over the plains. then over both sides—the travellers and the camp—a marvellous change suddenly passed.
it is true that, long before darkness had begun, preparations must have been rife within the camp; and horses ready for a foray, and braves busy getting arms and ammunition together, must have been visible on all sides. the red man is ever more or less equipped for war, and it takes little time for twenty men to be in all respects ready for a week’s raid.
as the sun went down, each man of the war-party stood ready by the lodges for the signal to pursue, and many[248] anxious eyes doubtless followed us and our band of led horses, grudging every step that daylight permitted us to take farther on our way.
but darkness was not thus descending upon us to find us wrapt in a false sense of security. scarcely had the camp been left behind, ere the sioux imparted to me all his forebodings of evil and his plans for averting it.
“when night has come,” he said, “these men will pursue us. if they fail to overtake us to-night, they will continue on our trail day after day. it is impossible we can escape them by fair riding, encumbered as we are with these horses. they will, in the long-run be certain to outpace us.
“at the same time it is impossible for us to leave the direction we are now following and to strike on a new line home. we have not food sufficient to last us six days, and we could not draw upon our horses for more, except in case of actual starvation. what i intend to try is this. when it is quite dark, we will turn abruptly from the present line and seek shelter in the ravine of that stream on our left. the pursuing party will push on in the darkness thinking we will have travelled all through the night.
“at daybreak they will separate to seek our trail. they will search all day, but will not find it; their horses will then be dead tired; they will rest, but they will not give up the attempt to overtake us. as we have not been found in front or to the right or left, they will determine to seek us on the back trail; but they will not have come to that decision until to-morrow evening, when their horses will be useless for pursuit.
“on to-morrow evening at nightfall we will start from here with horses all fresh, and we will direct our course to the right of the line we followed when leaving the camp. so as to hit off the buffalo two days from here. we will travel all night, change saddles at daybreak, and travel all day to-morrow; by that time we should be far away from our pursuers.”
soon the evening hour drew on. the short twilight rapidly deepened into night, and as the last glimmer of light vanished, the plan was put into operation. turning sharp to the left, we plunged down amid some broken ground that led to the ravine by the stream, and were soon securely ensconced amid the bluffs and rocks that fringed its lowest levels.
it was a dark moonless night, and once amid the broken ground all objects became a shapeless blank.
the sioux pulled up as soon as he found himself at the bottom of the ravine. he dismounted, and gave me his horse and the larêt which ran through the bits of the three he led.
“i will go back on foot and lie near the trail,” he said. “sit you down here until i return.” so saying he vanished on foot into the darkness, and reaching the neighbourhood of his former trail, lay down in the grass to watch.
he had not long to wait.
through the gloom there suddenly passed, riding at a hard pace, a body of men. they had swept by almost as soon as the keen ear of the sioux had detected their approach, and quick as they had come they were gone.
the sioux came back to the ravine and the night passed slowly away.
when dawn revealed the features of the surrounding neighbourhood, we moved into a more sheltered position, where, amid rock and bushes, we remained perfectly screened even from any observer who might have stood at the edge of the ravine. here during the day we relieved each other in the work of allowing the horses to graze with a larêt passing from one to another.
at length evening came again. the meal of dried meat was eaten, with water from the rill that trickled through the bottom of the glen; then saddles were adjusted; girths were drawn, and as night wrapped its black mantle around the waste, we emerged upon the level prairie to begin our long march to the north.
it was quite dark; not a sound stirred over the wilderness. the sioux led the advance; he had three horses to his larêt. i followed, leading two. the pace was a sharp trot, and the course lay with undeviating precision to the[251] east of north.
at last the long monotony of the night was over.
light, faint enough it is true, but still light, began to show itself along the line where the prairie and the sky touched each other in the east; then it grew into a broader band of pale yellow, and soon stray tints of rose began to streak it, and to push the first faint reflection still higher into the heavens.
how weird and distant it used to look, that first dawn over the virgin wilderness! shadow-land, grim darkness going, glorious light approaching—approaching so stilly, with such solemn steps that seemed ever to hesitate as they trod the gloomy sands of the shore of the night! then gradually growing bolder, they rolled back the waves of darkness, and drew from the abyss hill-top after hill-top, until all the wondrous beauty of the sun was flashed upon the silent land.
little time had i to think of these things as now, in hot haste, the saddles were taken from the two old horses and placed upon the backs of two of the recent purchases.
then away we went again, and the morning wore on to mid-day, and the evening came and found us still moving to the north-east.
when night again fell we stopped, unsaddled, and turned the weary horses out to rest.
we were one hundred miles from the camp of the indians.
morning again; a thin rain fell. the south-west wind carried with it fleecy folds of mist, that at times completely obscured the prairie and wrapt ridges and hollows in veils of vapour.
as we pursued our course and the mid-day sun began to exercise more influence upon the vapoury clouds, the mists drew up from the valleys and drifted slowly along from the ridges and elevations. all at once the wind changed; a light, dry breeze swept over the land, driving before it all traces of fog and mist, until the whole plain stood revealed to its depths before our eyes.
the first sight that greeted us was ominous. a little to the west a long cavalcade of indians was passing towards the south. scarcely a mile intervened between us and them; the ground on all sides was bare and open; recognition by the cavalcade was immediate; from its front, centre, and rear braves were seen to start simultaneously towards us, and ere five minutes had elapsed twenty or thirty indians had surrounded us. the meeting was not a hostile one; the indians were not on a war-trail. it was the whole camp which was on the move, and though trouble might afterwards arise from the meeting no violence was now offered or threatened. still there was a display of force on the part of the new comers that made compliance with their wishes necessary, and when they turned their horses’ heads back towards the cavalcade it was evident that the sioux and i[253] were virtually prisoners.
“there is trouble before us,” said red cloud to me, as we rode towards the spot where already, in anticipation of our arrival, camp was being pitched. “these are blackfeet; but they will not detain you.”
upon reaching the camp, we were conducted at once into a circle of indians who were seated upon the ground, apparently waiting to receive us. prominent amid the circle sat a powerful indian, whose dress and bearing proclaimed him chief. he wore a deer-skin shirt beautifully embroidered on the breast with stars, and circles of coloured porcupine-quill work. the sleeves were fringed with human hair. on his head he carried a sort of helmet or cap, of ermine tails and eagle feathers, and his leggings and moccasins bore similar tokens of elaborate handiwork.
in common with many of the surrounding braves he smoked in solemn silence.
penoquam, or the far-off dawn, was indeed a savage well worthy of the name he bore, and of the power which he wielded. his fame had for years spread far over prairie land. twenty years before the time we speak of, his reputation for dauntless bravery had been for ever established by an extraordinary raid which he had made alone, far down the missouri river, into the countries of the mandan and minatarree sioux. a few years later he had engaged in single combat with a celebrated crow chieftain named[254] octoo, or the lightning. the combat had been in full view of the rival tribes, and both blackfeet and crows had fairly kept the conditions of the conflict and abided faithfully by its issue.
a favourite tale by blackfeet camp-fire for many years after, was that long and varying struggle. the old men loved to dilate upon the joy that filled the hearts of the onlookers when they saw the horse of the crow chief fall pierced by an arrow, leaving his rider on foot, almost at the mercy of his still mounted antagonist; and how that feeling of wild exultation changed to anxious suspense when they beheld their champion spring from his horse, disdaining to accept the fortunes thus given to him, and advance on foot to meet his foe on equal terms of ground and weapon.
not less terrible were the feelings with which they watched the closing moments of the fight. when the combatants met in the last deadly embrace, from which one should never rise; and how at last that deadly struggle ended in the victory of the far-off dawn, who, bleeding at many wounds, rose alone from the sandy soil, gained with a great effort his saddle, and rode slowly back to his people, to fall into their ready arms, while their shouts of triumph fell unheard upon his ears.
on the medicine robe of the far-off dawn’s history, the central figure, representing a man standing over the prostrate form of another man, and holding aloft the scalp of his enemy, still commemorated that great victory.
at the time of which i write, his power over the blackfeet and their confederates was very great. his possessions too, in the light of indian wealth, were very large. fully four hundred horses ran in his bands. his weapons for war and for the chase included almost every specimen of modern fire-arms. his generosity was said to be in keeping with his courage; he gave freely away his share of the booty that fell to his lot. altogether penoquam was a chief whose reputation for valour, capacity, and wealth, might favourably compare with that of any indian leader from texas to the great sub-arctic forest.
such was the man in whose presence we now found ourselves. a buffalo robe was spread for us in a break of the circle directly facing the spot where penoquam sat, and the discourse began at once.
interrogated as to place from whence we had come, destination, and object of our journey, the sioux replied in answers as short as they could well be made, consistently with replying to the main questions put to him. he was coming from a camp of the blood indians near the cypress hills. he was returning to the banks of the red deer river, and the object of his journey had been to get horses. he had purchased some of his present band from the chief.
when red cloud had finished replying to the questions which had been put to him in the sioux language, some[256] conversation was carried on in blackfeet among the men who sat around. presently one of them spoke:—
“our young men who have lately been to their cousins the sircies, have spoken about a wandering sioux having built himself a hut at the forks of the red deer and pascopee rivers, and of war that was carried on between him and their tribe. are you not that sioux against whom our cousins have had war?”
to which red cloud replied,—
“i built a hut at the spot you speak of, and dwelt in it during the past winter; but i made no war on the sircies or with any other tribe.”
the others consulted together for a few minutes, and then the chief spoke,—
“our cousins the sircies are only two camps’ distance behind us on this trail,” he said; “they can be here by to-morrow’s sunset. if they have no quarrel with you, i shall be your friend; but my cousins’ quarrel must be mine also. you can stay in my lodge until our cousins have arrived, and then you shall be free to go if your hands are clean of their blood. as for the white man who is your companion, we have no quarrel with him; he is at liberty to depart or to stay with you, as he pleases.”
in fact the sioux was a prisoner. his horses and arms were taken away, and he found himself treated, it is true, with no indignity of durance, but bereft of any means of flight or of fight, and constrained to await the arrival of those very foes whose unprovoked attack on him a few days before was now to be brought as evidence against him of enmity to the blackfeet confederated tribes.
in the lodge which was now given to us (for it is needless to say i gave not a second thought to the permission to depart) there was ample time to con over the position, and to realize fully its dangers. the arrival of the sircies would undoubtedly be the signal for an outbreak of angry feeling against the sioux on the part of the united camps of blackfeet and sircies. the defeat and disappointment which the latter had suffered at his hands, to say nothing of the wounds he had inflicted upon at least two of their braves, would now be counted heavily against him—all added to whatever incentive to his destruction the trader had originally held before them. these thoughts were by no means reassuring as we sat moodily through the night in the lodge; but long before morning he had determined upon a plan which would at least defeat in some measure the machinations of his enemies, and might eventually be the means of freeing him altogether from danger.
from two quarters next day there arrived at the blackfeet camp enemies to the sioux. a party of bloods from the cypress hills, and the sircies from the medicine, appeared upon the scene ere the sun had set.
as may be supposed, their joy at hearing of the capture of the sioux was very great; but there was this difference between them—that whereas the bloods only sought the property of their enemy, the sircies longed for his life.
the trader had laid his schemes this time with no uncertain purpose, and the price to be paid to the sircie chief was for the life of his enemy, not for his horses or weapons. little wonder was it then that when they found actually in their possession the same man who had recently completely baffled all their machinations, escaping from their snares in a most mysterious and unaccountable manner at the very moment they had deemed his capture most assured, that they should give vent to their feelings in loud yells and shouts of savage triumph, the sounds of which told but too surely to red cloud the confirmation of his worst anticipations.
in a large council held this evening, and at which all the chiefs and leading men were present, it was almost unanimously resolved that the sioux was a lawful prize. firstly, by reason of the aggression made by the ogahalla tribe upon the bloods; and secondly, by the wounds inflicted upon the bodies of two sircies at the hut at the forks of the red deer river.
it was decided, however, that before any final decision was come to with reference to the punishment which the captive was to suffer he should be heard in full council, and an opportunity given him of putting forward anything he had to say in his defence. this was done more on account of my presence in the camp than from any idea of justice to the sioux. it was thought that the white man might carry to the forts on the saskatchewan information that might afterwards lead to trouble between the white man and the indians, and it was therefore advisable to carry out as many of the forms of justice as it was possible to arrange.
this council was to meet on the following day, and to it were summoned the chiefs and leading men of the bloods, sircies, and blackfeet here assembled.
