Part 6 (2/2)

before which breech-loaders and revolvers must alike go down. All day we kept a sharp look-out for a party of seven American officers, who, in defiance of the scout's advice, had gone out from the fort to hunt buffalo upon the track. About sundown we came into the little station of Lost Creek. The ranchmen told us that they had, during the day, been driven in from their work by a party of Cheyennes, and that they had some doubts as to the wisdom of the officers in going out to hunt.

Just as we were leaving the station, one of the officers' horses dashed in riderless, and was caught; and about two miles from the station we pa.s.sed another on its back, ripped up either by a knife or buffalo horn.

The saddle was gone, but there were no other marks of a fight. We believe that these officers were routed by buffalo, not Cheyennes, but still we should be glad to hear of them.

The track is marked in many parts of the plains by stakes, such as those from which the Llano Estacado takes its name; but this evening we turned off into devious lines by way of precaution against ambuscades, coming round through the sandy beds of streams to the ranches for the change of mules. The ranchmen were always ready for us; for, while we were still a mile away, our driver would put his hand to his mouth, and give a ”How!

how! how! how--w!” the Cheyenne warhoop.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

In the weird glare that follows sunset we came upon a pile of rocks, admirably fitted for an ambush. As we neared them, the driver said: ”It's 'bout an even chance thet we's sculp ther'!” We could not avoid them, as there was a gully that could only be crossed at this one point. We dashed down into the ”creek” and up again, past the rocks: there were no Indians, but the driver was most uneasy till we reached Big Creek.

Here they could give us nothing whatever to eat, the Indians having, on Tuesday, robbed them of everything they had, and ordered them to leave within fifteen days on pain of death.

For 250 miles westward from Big Creek we found that every station had been warned (and most plundered) by bands of Cheyennes, on behalf of the forces of the confederation encamped near the creek itself. The warning was in all cases that of fire and death at the end of fifteen days, of which nine days have expired. We found the horse-keepers of the company everywhere leaving their stations, and were, in consequence, very nearly starved, having been unsuccessful in our shots from the ”coach,” except, indeed, at the snakes.

On Thursday we pa.s.sed Big Timber, the only spot on the plains where there are trees; and there the Indians had counted the trunks and solemnly warned the men against cutting more: ”Fifty-two tree. You no cut more tree--no more cut. Gra.s.s! You cut gra.s.s; gra.s.s make big fire.

You good boy--you clear out. Fifteen day, we come: you no gone--ugh!”

The ”ugh” accompanied by an expressive pantomime.

On Thursday evening we got a meal of buffalo and prairie dog, the former too strong for my failing stomach, the latter wholesome nourishment, and fit for kings--as like our rabbit in flavor as he is in shape. This was at the horse-station of ”The Monuments,” a natural temple of awesome grandeur, rising from the plains like a giant Stonehenge.

On Friday we ”breakfasted” at Pond Creek station, two miles from Fort Wallis. Here the people had applied for a guard, and had been answered: ”Come into the fort; we can't spare a man.” So much for the value of the present forts; and yet even these--Wallis and Ellsworth--are 200 miles apart.

We were joined at breakfast by Bill Comstock, interpreter to the fort,--a long-haired, wild-eyed half-breed,--who gave us, in an hour's talk, the full history of the Indian politics that have led to the present war.

The Indians, to the number of 20,000, have been in council with the Was.h.i.+ngton Commissioners all this summer at Fort Laramie; and, after being clothed, fed, and armed, lately concluded a treaty, allowing the running on the mail-roads. They now a.s.sert that this treaty was intended to apply to the Platte road (from Omaha and Atchison through Fort Kearney), and to the Arkansas road, but not to the Smoky Hill road, which lies between the others, and runs through the buffalo country; but their real opposition is to the railroad. The Cheyennes (p.r.o.nounced s.h.i.+ans) have got the Camanches, Appaches, and Arrapahoes from the south, and the Sioux and Kiowas from the north, to join them in a confederation, under the leaders.h.i.+p of Spotted Dog, the chief of the Little Dog section of the Cheyennes, and son of White Antelope,--killed at Sand Creek battle by the Kansas and Colorado Volunteers,--who has sworn to avenge his father.

Soon after leaving Pond Creek, we sighted at a distance three mounted ”braves,” leading some horses; and when we reached the next station, we found that they had been there openly proclaiming that their mounts had been stolen from a team.

All this day we sat with our revolvers laid upon the mail-bags in front of us, and our driver also had his armory conspicuously displayed, while we swept the plains with many an anxious glance. We were on lofty rolling downs, and to the south the eye often ranged over much of the 130 miles which lay between us and Texas. To the north the view was more bounded; still, our chief danger lay near the boulders, which here and there covered the plains.

All Thursday and Friday we never lost sight of the buffalo, in herds of about 300, and the ”antelope”--the p.r.o.ng-horn, a kind of gazelle--in flocks of six or seven. Prairie dogs were abundant, and wolves and black-tail deer in view at every turn.

The most singular of all the sights of the plains is the constant presence every few yards of the skeletons of buffalo and of horse, of mule and of ox; the former left by the hunters, who take but the skin, and the latter the losses of the mails and the wagon-trains through sunstroke and thirst. We killed a horse on the second day of our journey.

When we came upon oxen that had not long been dead, we found that the intense dryness of the air had made mummies of them: there was no stench, no putrefaction.

During the day I made some practice at antelope with the driver's Ballard; but an antelope at 500 yards is not an easy target. The driver shot repeatedly at buffalo at twenty yards, but this only to keep them away from the horses; the revolver b.a.l.l.s did not seem to go through their hair and skin, as they merely shambled on in their usual happy sort of way, after receiving a discharge or two.

The prairie dogs sat barking in thousands on the tops of their mounds, but we were too grateful to them for their gayety to dream of pistol-shots. They are no ”dogs” at all, but rabbits that bark, with all the coney's tricks and turns, and the same odd way of rubbing their face with their paws while they con you from top to toe.

With wolves, buffalo, antelope, deer, skunks, dogs, plover, curlew, dottrel, herons, vultures, ravens, snakes, and locusts, we never seemed to be without a million companions in our loneliness.

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