{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_43399/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_43399","id":"gutenberg_43399","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/43399","summary":null,"tags":["Category: History - American","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Glacier National Park (Mont.)","Indians of North America -- Folklore","Siksika Indians -- Folklore"],"text":"Blackfeet Tales of\n              Glacier National\n                    Park\n\n                     BY\n            JAMES WILLARD SCHULTZ\n\n            _With Illustrations_\n\n\n               [Illustration]\n\n\n             BOSTON AND NEW YORK\n          HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY\n        The Riverside Press Cambridge\n                    1916\n\n\n  COPYRIGHT, 1916, BY JAMES WILLARD SCHULTZ\n             ALL RIGHTS RESERVED\n\n           _Published April 1916_\n\n\n             The Riverside Press\n          CAMBRIDGE . MASSACHUSETTS\n                  U . S . A\n\n\n\n\n  [Illustration: THE NARROWS, UPPER ST. MARY'S LAKE, WITH BARING'S\n    BASIN IN THE BACKGROUND\n      _Page 214_]\n\n\n\n\n  TO\n  LOUIS WARREN HILL, ESQ.\n\n  TRUE FRIEND TO MY BLACKFEET PEOPLE, AND\n  THE ONE WHO HAS DONE MORE THAN ANY OTHER\n  INDIVIDUAL, OR ANY ORGANIZATION, TO MAKE THE\n  WONDERS OF GLACIER NATIONAL PARK ACCESSIBLE\n  TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE, THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED\n  BY\n\n  THE AUTHOR\n\n  GLACIER NATIONAL PARK,\n  SEPTEMBER 10, 1915.\n\n\n\n\nContents\n\n\n    I. TWO MEDICINE                                        1\n           HUGH MONROE                                     1\n           THE WOMAN WHO EARNED A MAN'S NAME              12\n           THE STORY OF THE THUNDER MEDICINE              23\n\n   II. PU-NAK\u00b4-IK-SI (CUTBANK)                            43\n           HOW MOUNTAIN CHIEF FOUND HIS HORSES            49\n           WHITE FUR AND HIS BEAVER CLAN                  59\n           THE STORY OF THE BAD WIFE                      85\n           OLD MAN AND THE WOMAN                          98\n\n  III. KI-NUK\u00b4-SI IS-SI-SAK\u00b4-TA (LITTLE RIVER)           110\n           OLD MAN AND THE WOLVES                        112\n           NEW ROBE, THE RESCUER                         129\n\n   IV. PUHT-O-MUK-SI-KIM-IKS (THE LAKES INSIDE): ST.\n         MARY'S LAKES                                    146\n           THE STORY OF THE FIRST HORSES                 158\n           ONE HORN, SHAMER OF CROWS                     182\n           THE ELK MEDICINE CEREMONY                     199\n           NA-WAK\u00b4-O-SIS (THE STORY OF TOBACCO)          216\n\n    V. IKS-I\u00b4-KWO-YI-A-TUK-TAI (SWIFT CURRENT RIVER)     226\n           THE JEALOUS WOMEN                             227\n\n   VI. NI-NA US-TAK-WI (CHIEF MOUNTAIN)                  233\n           THE WISE MAN                                  235\n\n\n\n\nIllustrations\n\n\n  THE NARROWS, UPPER ST. MARY'S LAKE, WITH\n    BARING'S BASIN IN THE BACKGROUND          _Frontispiece_\n\n  UPPER TWO MEDICINE LAKE AND RISING BULL MOUNTAIN         8\n\n  PI\u00b4-TA-MAK-AN (RUNNING EAGLE) FALLS                     12\n\n  AT UPPER TWO MEDICINE LAKE                              20\n      Showing Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill,\n        Yellow Wolf, and the author\n\n  MOVING CAMP FROM TWO MEDICINE                           42\n\n  OUR CAMP ON CUTBANK RIVER                               46\n      Showing Wonderful Runner and Little Plume\n        Mountains\n\n  STREAM FROM UNNAMED GLACIER POURING INTO CUTBANK\n    CANYON                                                52\n\n  THE BEAVER DAM                                          60\n\n  BIGHORN COUNTRY. HEAD OF CUTBANK RIVER                  80\n\n  CUTBANK RIVER. A GOOD TROUT RIFFLE                      84\n\n  BLACK BULL AND STABS-BY-MISTAKE NEAR LOWER END\n    OF CUTBANK CANYON                                     96\n\n  STABS-BY-MISTAKE, SUN WOMAN, AND HER SON, LITTLE\n    OTTER, IN CUTBANK CANYON                             106\n\n  BIG SPRING PAINTING AUTOBIOGRAPHY ON THE FLESH\n    SIDE OF A TANNED ELK-SKIN                            110\n\n  SUN WOMAN                                              128\n\n  CAMP NEAR LOWER END OF UPPER ST. MARY'S LAKE           146\n\n  AT THE NARROWS, UPPER ST. MARY'S LAKE                  152\n\n  GOING-TO-THE-SUN MOUNTAIN                              156\n\n  GOING-TO-THE-SUN CHALET, UPPER ST. MARY'S LAKE         180\n\n  OPENING OF THE ELK MEDICINE PIPE CEREMONY              206\n\n  ELK MEDICINE PIPE DANCE                                210\n\n  TAIL-FEATHERS-COMING-OVER-THE-HILL PROPITIATING\n    THE DREADED UNDER-WATER PEOPLE AT UPPER TWO\n    MEDICINE LAKE                                        212\n\n  ICEBERG LAKE                                           226\n\n  EN ROUTE TO ICEBERG LAKE                               234\n\n  GLACIER ON TRAIL TO ICEBERG LAKE                       240\n\n_From photographs by R. W. Reed_\n\n\n\n\nBLACKFEET TALES OF GLACIER NATIONAL PARK\n\n\n\n\nI\n\nTWO MEDICINE\n\n\n\n_July 12, 1915._\n\n\nHUGH MONROE\n\nAfter an absence of many years, I have returned to visit for a time my\nBlackfeet relatives and friends, and we are camping along the mountain\ntrails where, in the long ago, we hunted buffalo, and elk, and moose,\nand all the other game peculiar to this region.\n\nTo-day we pitched our lodges under Rising Wolf Mountain, that massive,\nsky-piercing, snow-crested height of red-and-gray rock which slopes up\nso steeply from the north shore of Upper Two Medicine Lake. This\nafternoon we saw upon it, some two or three thousand feet up toward\nits rugged crest, a few bighorn and a Rocky Mountain goat. But we may\nnot kill them! Said Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill: \"There they\nare! Our meat, but the whites have taken them from us, even as they\nhave taken everything else that is ours!\" And so we are eating beef\nwhere once we feasted upon the rich ribs and loins of game, which\ntasted all the better because we trailed and killed it, and with no\nlittle labor brought it to the womenfolk in camp.\n\nRising Wolf Mountain! What a fitting and splendid monument it is to\nthe first white man to traverse the foothills of the Rockies between\nthe Saskatchewan and the Missouri! Hugh Monroe was his English name.\nHis father was Captain Hugh Monroe, of the English army; his mother\nwas Am\u00e9lie de la Roche, a daughter of a noble family of French\n_\u00e9migr\u00e9s_. Hugh Monroe, Junior, was born in Montreal in 1798. In 1814\nhe received permission to enter the employ of the Hudson's Bay\nCompany, and one year later--in the summer of 1815--he arrived at its\nnew post, Mountain Fort, on the North Fork of the Saskatchewan and\nclose to the foothills of the Rockies.\n\nAt that time the Company had but recently entered Blackfeet territory,\nand none of its _engag\u00e9s_ understood their language; an interpreter\nwas needed, and the Factor appointed Monroe to fit himself for the\nposition. The Blackfeet were leaving the Fort to hunt and trap along\nthe tributaries of the Missouri during the winter, and he went with\nthem, under the protection of the head chief, who had nineteen wives\nand two lodges and an immense band of horses. By easy stages they\ntraveled along the foot of the Rockies to Sun River, where they\nwintered, and then in the spring, instead of returning to the\nSaskatchewan, they crossed the Missouri, hunted in the Yellowstone\ncountry that summer, wintered on the Missouri at the mouth of the\nMarias River, and returned to Mountain Fort the following spring with\nall the furs their horses could carry.\n\nInstead of one winter, Monroe had passed two years with the tribe, and\nin that time had acquired a wife, a daughter of the great chief, a good\nknowledge of the language, and an honorable name, Ma-kwi\u00b4-i-po-wak-s\u012dn\n(Rising Wolf), which was given him because of his bravery in a battle\nwith the Crows in the Yellowstone country.\n\nDuring Monroe's two years' absence from the Fort, another _engag\u00e9_ had\nlearned the Blackfeet language from a Cree Indian, who spoke it well,\nso that this man became the interpreter, and Monroe was ordered to\nremain with the Piegan tribe of the Blackfeet, to travel with them,\nand see that they came annually to the Fort to trade in the winter\ncatch of furs. And this exactly suited him; he much preferred roaming\nthe plains with his chosen people; the stuffy rooms of the Fort had no\nattractions for a man of his nature.\n\nHow I envy Hugh Monroe, the first white man to traverse the plains\nlying between the Upper Saskatchewan and the Upper Missouri, and the\nfirst to see many portions of the great stretch of the mountain region\nbetween the Missouri and the Yellowstone. He has himself often told me\nthat \"every day of that life was a day of great joy!\"\n\nMonroe was a famous hunter and trapper, and a warrior as well. He was\na member of the Ai\u00b4-in-i-kiks, or Seizer band of the All Friends\nSociety, and the duty of the Seizers was to keep order in the great\ncamp, and see that the people obeyed the hunting laws--a most\ndifficult task at times. On several occasions he went with his and\nother bands to war against other tribes, and once, near Great Salt\nLake, when with a party of nearly two hundred warriors, he saved the\nlives of the noted Jim Bridger and his party of trappers. Bridger had\nwith him a dozen white men and as many Snake Indians, the latter\nbitter enemies of the Blackfeet. The Snakes were discovered, and the\nBlackfeet party was preparing to charge them, when Monroe saw that\nthere were white men behind them. \"Stop! White men are with them! We\nmust let them go their way in peace!\" Monroe shouted to his party.\n\n\"But they are Snake white men, and therefore our enemy: we shall kill\nthem all!\" the Blackfeet chief answered. However, such was Monroe's\npower over his comrades that he finally persuaded them to remain\nwhere they were, and he went forward with a flag of truce, and found\nthat his friend Jim Bridger was the leader of the other party. That\nevening white men and Snakes and Blackfeet ate and smoked together! It\nwas a narrow escape for Bridger and his handful of men.\n\nMonroe had three sons and three daughters by his Indian wife, all of\nwhom grew into fine, stalwart men and women. Up and down the country\nhe roamed with them, trapping and hunting, and often fighting hostile\nwar parties. They finally all married, and in his old age he lived\nwith one and another of them until his death, in 1896, in his\nninety-eighth year. We buried him near the buffalo cliffs, down on the\nTwo Medicine River, where he had seen many a herd of the huge animals\ndecoyed to their death. And then we named this mountain for him. A\nfitting tribute, I think, to one of the bravest yet most kindly men of\nthe old, old West!\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nAt the upper east side and head of this beautiful lake rises a\npyramidal mountain of great height and grandeur. A frowse of pine\ntimber on its lower front slope, and its ever-narrowing side slopes\nabove, give it a certain resemblance to a buffalo bull. Upon looking\nat a recent map of the country I found that it had been named \"Mount\nRockwell.\" So, turning to Yellow Wolf, I said: \"The whites have given\nthat mountain yonder the name of a white man. It is so marked upon\nthis paper.\"\n\nThe old man, half blind and quite feeble, roused up when he heard\nthat, and cried out: \"Is it so? Not satisfied with taking our\nmountains, the whites even take away the ancient names we have given\nthem! They shall not do it! You tell them so! That mountain yonder is\nRising Bull Mountain, and by that name it must ever be called! Rising\nBull was one of our great chiefs: what more fitting than that the\nmountain should always bear his name?\"\n\n\"Rising Bull was a chief in two tribes,\" Yellow Wolf went on. \"In his\nyouth he married a Flathead girl, at a time when we were at peace\nwith that people, and after a winter or two she persuaded him to take\nher across the mountains for a visit with her relatives. Rising Bull\ncame to like them and all the Flathead people so well that he remained\nwith them a number of winters, and because of his bravery, and his\nkind and generous nature, the Flatheads soon appointed him one of\ntheir chiefs. When he was about forty winters of age, some young men\nof both tribes quarreled over a gambling game and several were killed\non each side. That, of course, ended the peace pact; war was declared,\nand as Rising Bull could not fight his own people, he came back to us\nwith his Flathead wife, and was a leader in the war, which lasted for\nseveral years. When that was ended, he continued to lead war parties\nagainst the Crows, the Sioux, the Assiniboines, and the far-off\nSnakes, and was always successful. Came the dreadful Measles\nWinter,[1] and with hundreds of our people, he died. He left a son,\nWhite Quiver, a very brave young warrior, and two years after his\nfather's death, he was killed in a raid against the Crows.\"\n\n    [1] The winter of 1859-60.\n\n  [Illustration: UPPER TWO MEDICINE LAKE. RISING BULL MOUNTAIN\n    ON RIGHT]\n\n\"Ai! Rising Bull was a brave man. And oh, so gentle-hearted! So good\nto the widows and orphans; to all in any kind of distress! We must in\nsome way see that this mountain continues to bear his name,\" said\nTail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill.\n\nAnd to that I most heartily agree.\n\n\n\n_July 15._\n\nWe are a considerable camp of people: Yellow Wolf, my old uncle-in-law;\nTail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill, another uncle-in-law; Big Spring;\nTwo Guns; Black Bull; Stabs-by-Mistake; Eagle Child; Eli Guardipe, or\nTakes-Gun-Ahead. And with them they have their eleven women and fourteen\nchildren. All are my especial friends, and all the men have been to\nwar--some of them many times--and have counted _coup_ upon the enemy.\nTail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill has many battle scars on different\nparts of his body. I was with him when he got the last one, in a fight\nwith the Crees. The bullet struck him in the forehead, ripped open the\nscalp clear to the back of his head, but did not penetrate the skull. He\ndropped instantly when struck, and we at first thought that he was dead.\nIt was some hours before he regained consciousness.\n\nWith all these men, and especially Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill\nand Guardipe, I hunted and traveled much in the old days. Naturally,\nwe spend much of our time telling over this-and-that of our\nadventures. Meantime the children play around, as happy as Indian\nchildren ever are, and their mothers do the lodge work, which is\nlight, and gather in groups to chat and joke. The boys have just been\nskipping stones on the smooth surface of the lake. The number of skips\na stone makes before it finally sinks, denotes the number of wives the\ncaster will have when he reaches manhood.\n\nTail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill and Two Guns are medicine men. The\nformer has the Elk medicine pipe, the latter the Water medicine pipe,\nboth ancient medicines in the tribe. They are spiritual, not material,\nmedicines. In fact, they are the implements used in prayers to the sun\nand other gods, and each carries with it a ritual of its own.\nTail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill has just told me that we will have\nsome prayers with his pipe a few days from now. I shall be glad to\ntake part in it all once more.\n\n\n\n_July 16._\n\nAgain my people are filled with resentment against the whites. I told\nthem this afternoon that the falls in the river between this and the\nlower lake had been given a foolish white men's name. I could not tell\nthem what it was, for there is no Blackfeet equivalent for the word\n\"Trick.\" But what a miserable, circus-suggesting name that is to give\nto one of the most beautiful of waterfalls, and the only one of its\nkind in America, and in all the world, for all I know! A short\ndistance below the outlet of the upper lake the river sinks, and a\nhalf-mile farther on gushes into sight from a jagged hole halfway up\nthe side of a high and almost perpendicular cliff.\n\n\"In the long ago we named that Pi\u00b4tamakan Falls,\" said\nTail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill.\n\n\"Yes? And who was he?\" I asked, although I had a fair recollection of\nthe story of that personage. But I had forgotten the details of it,\nand wanted them all.\n\n\"Not he, but she!\" he corrected me.\n\n\"But Pi\u00b4tamakan (Running Eagle) is a man's name,\" I objected.\n\n\"True. But this woman earned the right to bear a man's name, and so it\nwas given her. She was the only woman of our people to receive that\nhonor, so far as I know. Listen! You shall hear all about it.\"\n\n\nTHE WOMAN WHO EARNED A MAN'S NAME\n\n\"As a girl, her name was Weasel Woman. She was the eldest of two\nbrothers and two sisters, and when she had seen fifteen winters both\ntheir father and mother died. But unlike children in such circumstances,\nthey did not give up their lodge and scatter out to live with\nrelatives and friends. Said Weasel Woman: 'Somehow, some way, we can\nmanage to live. You boys are old enough to hunt and bring in meat and\nskins. We three sisters will keep the lodge in good order, and tan the\nskins for our clothing and bedding, and other uses.' And as she said, so\nit was done, and the orphan family prospered.\n\n  [Illustration: PI\u00b4-TA-MAK-AN (RUNNING EAGLE) FALLS\n      The greater part of the stream gushes from the orifice a third\n        of the way up the cliff]\n\n\"But Weasel Woman was not satisfied. Many young men and many old and\nrich men wanted to marry her, and to all she said 'No!' so loudly, and\nso quickly, that after a time all knew that she would not marry.\nWherever a party of warriors gathered for a dance or a feast, there\nshe was looking on, listening to their talk, and giving what help she\ncould. And when a party returned from war, she was loudest in praising\nthem. All she talked of, all she thought about, was war.\n\n\"On an evening in her twentieth summer a large party of warriors\nstarted out to cross the mountains and raid the Flatheads. They\ntraveled all night, and when daylight came found that Weasel Woman was\nwith them.\n\n\"'Go back! Go home!' the war chief told her. But she would not\nlisten.\n\n\"'If you will not let me go with you, I shall follow you,' she said.\n\n\"And then spoke up the medicine man of the party: 'Chief,' said he, 'I\nadvise you to allow her to go with us; something tells me that she\nwill bring us good luck.'\n\n\"'Ah! As you advise me, so shall it be,' said the war chief; and the\nwoman went on with them. No man of that party teased her, nor bothered\nher in any way: every one of them treated her as they would a sister.\nIt was the strangest war party that ever set forth from any tribe of\nthe plains!\n\n\"It was at the edge of Flathead Lake that they discovered the enemy, a\nlarge camp of the Flatheads and their friends, the Pend d'Oreilles.\nWhen night came they went close up to it, and the woman said to the\nwar chief: 'Let me go in first. Let me see what I can do. I feel that\nI shall be successful in there.'\n\n\"'Go!' the chief told her, 'and we will wait for you here, and be\nready to help you if you get into trouble.'\n\n\"The woman went into the camp, where all the best horses of the\npeople--their fast buffalo runners, their racers, and their\nstallions--were picketed close to the lodges of the different owners\nof them. If she was afraid of being discovered and killed, she never\nadmitted it. The dying moon gave light enough for her to see the size\nand color of the horses. She took her time and went around among them,\nand, making her choice, cut the ropes of three fine pinto horses, and\nled them out to where the party awaited her. There she tied them, and\nwent back into camp with the chief and his men and again came out with\nthree horses. Said she then: 'I have taken enough for this time. I\nwill await you here and take care of what we have.'\n\n\"The men went back several times, and then, having all the horses that\nthey could drive rapidly, the party struck for the mountains, and in\nseveral days' time arrived home without the loss of a man or a horse.\n\n\"A few days after the party came into camp the medicine lodge was put\nup, and on the day that the warriors counted their _coups_, and new\nnames were given them, an old warrior and medicine man called Weasel\nWoman before the people, and had her count her _coup_--of going twice\ninto the enemy's camp and taking six horses. All shouted approval of\nthat, and then the medicine man gave her the name, Pi\u00b4-ta-mak-an, a\nvery great one, that of a chief whose shadow had some time before gone\non to the Sand Hills.\n\n\"After that Pi\u00b4tamakan, as we now may call her, did not have to sneak\nafter a party in order to go to war with them: she was asked to go.\nAnd after two or three more successful raids against different\nenemies, the Crows, the Sioux, and the Flatheads, she herself became a\nwar chief, and warriors begged to be allowed to join her parties,\nbecause they believed that where she led nothing but good luck would\ncome to them. She now wore men's clothing when on a raid. At home she\nwore her woman clothing. But even in that dress she, like any man,\ngave feasts and dances, and the greatest chiefs and warriors came to\nthem, and were glad to be there.\n\n\"On her sixth raid, Pi\u00b4tamakan led a large war party against the\nFlatheads, and somewhere on the other side of the mountains fell in\nwith a war party of Bloods, one of our brother tribes of the North.\nFor several days the two parties traveled along together, and then one\nevening the Blood chief, Falling Bear, said to Pi\u00b4tamakan's servant:\n'Go tell your chief woman that I would like to marry her.'\n\n\"'Chief, you do not understand,' the boy told him. 'She is not that\nkind. Men are her brothers, and nothing more. She will never marry. I\ncannot give her your message, for I am afraid that she would be angry\nwith me for carrying it to her.'\n\n\"On the next day, as they were traveling along, the Blood chief said\nto Pi\u00b4tamakan: 'I have never loved, but I love now. I love you; my\nheart is all yours; let us marry.'\n\n\"'I will not say \"yes\" to that, nor will I say \"no,\"' the woman chief\nanswered him. 'I will consider what you ask, and give you an answer\nafter we make this raid.'\n\n\"And with that the Blood chief said no more, but felt encouraged: he\nthought that in time she would agree to become his woman.\n\n\"That very evening the scouts ahead discovered a large camp of\nFlathead and Kootenai Indians, more than a hundred lodges of them, and\nwhen night came both parties drew close in to it. Pi\u00b4tamakan then\nordered her followers to remain where they were and told the Blood\nchief to say the same thing to his men. She then told the Blood chief\nto go into the camp and take horses, and he went in and returned with\none horse.\n\n\"'It is now my turn,' said Pi\u00b4tamakan, and she went in and brought out\ntwo horses.\n\n\"The Blood chief went in and brought out two horses.\n\n\"Pi\u00b4tamakan went in and brought out four horses.\n\n\"The Blood chief went in and brought out two horses.\n\n\"Pi\u00b4tamakan went in and brought out one horse. And then she said to\nthe Blood chief: 'Our men are becoming impatient to go in there and\ntake horses. We will each of us go in once more, and then let them do\nwhat they can.'\n\n\"So the Blood chief went in for the fourth and last time, and came\nback leading four horses, making nine in all. And then Pi\u00b4tamakan went\nin and cut the ropes of eight horses, and safely led them out, making\nin all fifteen that she had taken. The warriors then went in, making\nseveral trips, and then, with all the horses that could be easily\ndriven, the big double party headed for home.\n\n\"On the next day, as Pi\u00b4tamakan and the Blood chief were riding\ntogether, he said to her: 'I love you so much that I can wait no\nlonger for my answer. Give it to me now. I believe that you are going\nto say, \"Yes, I will be your woman.\"'\n\n\"Said Pi\u00b4tamakan: 'I gave you your chance. It would have been yes had\nyou taken more horses than I did from the camp of the enemy. But I\ntook the most; therefore I cannot marry you.'\n\n\"That was her way of getting around saying 'no' to the chief. She had\nbeaten him, an old, experienced warrior, in the taking of the enemy's\nhorses, and he could not ask her again to become his woman. It is said\nthat he felt very badly about it all.\n\n\"Pi\u00b4tamakan now carried a gun when she went to war, and used it well\nin several fights with the enemy, counting in all three _coups_, each\none of them the taking of a gun from the man she herself killed. And\nthen, _haiya_! On her ninth raid she led a party against the\nFlatheads, and while she and all her men were in the camp, choosing\nhorses and cutting their ropes, the Flatheads discovered them and\nbegan firing, and she and five of her men were killed. And so passed\nPi\u00b4tamakan, virgin, and brave woman chief of our people. She died\nyoung, about seventy winters ago.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nOkan, his vision, is the name the Blackfeet have for the great lodge\nwhich they annually give to the sun, and for the four days of ceremonies\nattending its erection and consecration. In our vernacular it is the\nmedicine lodge. I asked Yellow Wolf this afternoon why this river was\nnamed Nat\u00b4-ok-i-o-kan, or, as we say, Two Medicine Lodge River, and he\nreplied that when the Blackfeet first took this great country from the\nCrows, they built a medicine lodge on the river, just below the buffalo\ncliffs. The next summer they built another one in the same place, and\nowing to that the river got its name.\n\n  [Illustration: AT UPPER TWO MEDICINE LAKE\n      Left to right: Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill, Yellow Wolf,\n        and the author, relating his killing of a grizzly at this\n        particular place, in the long-ago]\n\nYes, this was once the country of the Crows. But the Blackfeet saw and\ncoveted it. It was about two hundred years ago, as near as I can learn,\nthat they came into it from their original home, the region of Peace\nRiver and the Slave Lakes, and little by little forced the Crows\nsouthward until they had driven them to the south side of the\nYellowstone, or Elk River, as it is known to the various Indian\ntribes of the plains.\n\nPerhaps, in the first place, the Blackfeet coveted more than anything\nelse the cliffs on the Two Medicine,--just above Holy Family\nMission,--where the buffalo were decoyed in great numbers and stampeded\nin a huge waterfall of whirling brown bodies to death on the rocks\nbelow.\n\nThe Blackfeet call such a place--there were several of them--a\n_pi\u00b4skan_, a trap. Extending back from the cliff, for a mile or more\nout on the plain, were two ever-diverging lines of rock piles, like a\nhuge letter V. Behind these the people concealed themselves, and the\nbuffalo caller, going out beyond the mouth of the V, by certain antics\nand motions aroused the curiosity of the herd until it finally\nfollowed him into the V. Then the people began to rise up behind it,\nand the result was that, unable to turn either to the right or left,\nfrom fear of the two lines of shouting, robe-waving stampeders, it was\ndriven straight to the cliff and over it.\n\nWhen I first saw the place, there were at the foot of the cliffs tons\nand tons of buffalo horn tips, the most time-resisting of any portion\nof a buffalo's anatomy.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nLast night, while the pipe was going the rounds, I asked what had\nbecome of old Red Eagle's Thunder Medicine Pipe, and was told that it\nwas still in the tribe, Old Person at present being the owner of it.\nSaid Two Guns: \"That is one of the most ancient and most powerful\nmedicines we have. Do you know how it came into our possession?\"\n\n\nTHE STORY OF THE THUNDER MEDICINE\n\n\"It was in the long ago. Our fathers had no horses then, but used dogs\nto carry their belongings.\n\n\"One spring, needing the skins of bighorn to tan into soft leather for\nclothing, the tribe moved up here to the foot of the Lower Two\nMedicine Lake, and began hunting. Many men would surround and climb a\nmountain, driving the bighorn ahead of them, their dogs helping, and\nat last they would come up to the game, often several hundred head,\non the summit of the mountain. The dogs were then held back, and the\nhunters, advancing with ready bow and arrows, would shoot and shoot\nthe bighorn at close range and generally kill the most of them.\n\n\"One day, while most of the men were hunting, three young, unmarried\nwomen went out to gather wood, and while they were collecting it in\nlittle piles here and there, a thunderstorm came up. Then said one of\nthem, a beautiful girl, tall, slender, long-haired, big-eyed, 'O\nThunder! I am pure! I am a virgin! If you will not strike us I promise\nto marry you whenever you want me!'\n\n\"Thunder passed on, not harming them, and the young women gathered up\ntheir firewood and went home.\n\n\"On another day these three young women went out again for firewood,\none ahead of another along the trail in the deep woods, and Mink\nWoman, she who had promised herself to Thunder Man, was last of the\nthree. She was some distance behind the others and singing happily as\nshe stepped along, when out from the brush in front of her stepped a\nvery fine-looking, beautifully dressed man, and said: 'Well, here I\nam. I have come for you.'\n\n\"'No, not for me! You are mistaken. I am not that kind; I am a pure\nwoman,' she answered.\n\n\"'But you can't go back on your word. You promised yourself to me if I\nwould not strike you, and I did not harm you. Don't you know me? I am\nThunder Man.'\n\n\"Mink Woman looked closely at him, and her heart beat fast from fear.\nBut he was good to look at, he had the appearance of a kind and gentle\nman, and--although thoughtlessly--she had made a promise to him, a\ngod, and she could not break it. So she answered: 'I said that I would\nmarry you. Well, here I am, take me!'\n\n\"Her two companions had passed on; they saw nothing of this meeting.\nThunder Man stepped forward, and kissed her, then took her in his\narms, and, springing from the ground, carried her up into the sky to\nthe land of the Above People.\n\n\"But the two young women soon missed her. They ran back on the trail,\nand searched on all sides of it, and called and called to her, and of\ncourse got no reply: 'She may have gone home for something,' said one\nof them, and they hurried back to camp. She was not there. They then\ngave the alarm, and all the people scattered out to look for her. They\nhunted all that day, and wandered about in the woods all night,\ncalling her name, and got no answer.\n\n\"The next morning Mink Woman's father, Lame Bull, made medicine and\ncalled in Crow Man, a god who sometimes lived with the people. 'My\ndaughter, Mink Woman, has disappeared,' he told the god. 'Find her,\neven learn where she went, and you shall have her for your wife.'\n\n\"'I take your word,' Crow Man answered him. 'I believe that I can\nlearn where she went. I may not be able to get her now, but I will\nsome time, and then you will not forget this promise. I have always\nwanted her for my woman.'\n\n\"Crow Man went to the two young women and got them to show him where\nthey had last seen Mink Woman. He then called a magpie to him, and\nsaid to the bird: 'Fly around here and find this missing woman's\ntrail.'\n\n\"The bird flew around and around, Crow Man following it, and at last\nit fluttered to the ground, and looked up at him, and said: 'To this\nspot where I stand came the woman, and here her trail ends.'\n\n\"'Is it so!' Crow Man exclaimed. 'Well stand just where you are and\nmove that long, shining black tail of yours. Move it up and down, and\nsideways. Twist it in every direction that you can.'\n\n\"The magpie did as he was told, and Crow Man got down on hands and\nknees, and went around, watching the shifting, wiggling, fanning tail.\nSuddenly he cried out: 'There! Hold your tail motionless in just that\nposition!' and he moved up nearer and looked more closely at it. The\nsun was shining brightly upon it, and the glistening black feathers\nmirrored everything around. They were now spread directly behind the\nbird's body, and reflected the tree-tops, and the sky beyond them.\nLong, long, Crow Man stared at the tail, the people looking on and\nholding their breath, and at last he said to Lame Bull, 'I can see\nyour daughter, but she is beyond my reach: I cannot fly there. She is\nup in sky land, and Thunder Man has her!'\n\n\"'_Ai! Ai!_ She did promise herself to him the other day, if he would\nspare us,' one of the two wood gatherers said, 'but she did not mean\nit; she was only joking. It is no joke!'\n\n\"Lame Bull sat down and covered his head with his robe, and wept, and\nwould not be comforted.\n\n\"Thunder Man took Mink Woman to sky land with him, and somehow, from the\nvery first she was happy there with him; she seemed to forget at once\nall about this earth and her parents and the people. It was a beautiful\nland up there: warm and sunny, a country just like ours except that it\nhad no storms. Buffalo and all the other animals covered the plains, and\nall sorts of grasses and trees and berry-bushes and plants grew there as\nthey do here.\n\n\"But although Mink Woman was very happy there, Thunder Man was always\nuneasy about her, and kept saying to his people, 'Watch her constantly;\nsee that she gets no hint of her country down below, nor sight of it. If\nshe does, then she will cry and cry, and become sick, and that will be\nbad for me.'\n\n\"Thunder Man was often away, and during his absence his people kept a\ngood watch on Mink Woman, and did all they could to amuse her; to keep\nher interested in different things. One day a woman gave her some\nfreshly dug _mas_,[2] and she cried out: 'Oh, how good of you to give\nme these! I must go dig some for myself!'\n\n    [2] _Mas._ I know not the English name for this edible root. The\n    French voyageurs' name for it was _pommes blanches_.\n\n\"'Oh, no! Don't go! We will dig for you all that you can use,' the\nwomen told her, but she would not listen.\n\n\"'I want the fun of digging them for myself,' she told them. 'Somewhere,\nsome time back, I did dig them. I must dig them again.'\n\n\"'Well, if you must, you must,' they answered, and gave her a digging\nstick, and cautioned her not to dig a very large one, should she find\nit, for that _mas_ was the mother of all the others, and was constantly\nbringing forth new ones by scattering her seed to the winds. She\npromised that she would not touch it, and went off happily with her\ndigging stick and a sack.\n\n\"Well, Mink Woman wandered about on the warm grass and flower-covered\nplain, digging a _mas_ here, one there, singing to herself, and thinking\nhow much she loved her Thunder Man, and wishing that he would be more\noften at home. He was away the greater part of the time. Thus wandering,\nin a low place in the plain she came upon a _mas_ of enormous size;\nactually, it was larger around than her body! 'Ha! This is the mother\n_mas_; the one they told me not to dig up,' she cried, and walked around\nand around it, admiring its hugeness.\n\n\"'I would like to dig it, but I must not,' she at last said to herself,\nand went on, seeking more _mas_ of small size. But she could not forget\nthe big one; she kept imagining how it would look out of the ground; on\nher back; in her lodge, all nicely cleaned and washed, a present for\nThunder Man when he should return home. She went back to it, walked\naround it many times, went away from it, trying to do as she had been\ntold. But when halfway home she could no longer resist the temptation:\nwith a little cry she turned and never stopped running until she was\nbeside it, and then she used the digging stick with all her strength,\nthrusting it into the ground around and around and around the huge\ngrowth and prying up, and at last it became loose, and seizing it by its\nbig top leaves, she pulled hard and tore it from the ground, and rolled\nit to one side of the hole.\n\n\"What a big hole it was! And light seemed to come up through it. She\nstepped to the edge and looked down: upon pulling up the huge _mas_\nshe had torn a hole clear through the sky earth! She stooped and\nlooked through it, and there, far, far below, saw--\n\n\"Why, everything came back to her when she looked through it: There\nit was, her own earth land! There was the Two Medicine River, and\nthere, just below the foot of its lower lake, was the camp of her\npeople! She threw away her digging stick, and her sack of _mas_, and\nran crying to camp and into Thunder Man's lodge. He was away at the\ntime, but some of his relatives were in the lodge, and she cried out\nto them: 'I have seen my own country; the camp of my people. I want to\ngo back to them!'\n\n\"Said Thunder Man's relatives to one another: 'She has found the big\n_mas_, and has pulled it up, and made a hole in our sky earth! Now,\nwhat shall we do? Thunder Man will be angry at us because we did not\nwatch her more closely.' Thinking of what he might do to them in his\nanger, they trembled. They tried to soothe Mink Woman, but she would\nnot be comforted; she kept crying and crying to be taken back to her\nfather and mother.\n\n\"Thunder Man came home in the evening, and upon learning what had\nhappened, his distress was as great as that of Mink Woman, whom he\nloved. When he came into the lodge she threw herself upon him, and\nwith tears streaming from her eyes, begged him to take her back to\nher people.\n\n\"'But don't you love me?' he asked. 'Haven't you been happy here?\nIsn't this a beautiful--a rich country?'\n\n\"'Of course I love you! I have been happy here! This is a good\ncountry! But oh, I want to see my father and mother!'\n\n\"'Well, sleep now. In the morning you will likely feel that you are\nglad to be here, instead of down on the people's earth,' Thunder Man\ntold her. But she would not sleep; she cried all night; would not eat\nin the morning, and kept on crying for her people.\n\n\"Then said Thunder Man: 'I cannot bear to see--to hear such distress.\nBecause I love her, she shall have her way. Go, you hunters, kill\nbuffalo, kill many of them, and bring in the hides. And you, all you\nwomen, take the hides and cut them into long, strong strips and tie\nthem together.'\n\n\"This the hunters and the women did, and Thunder Man himself made a\nlong, high-sided basket of a buffalo bull's hide and willow sticks.\nThis and the long, long one-strand rope of buffalo hide were taken to\nthe hole that Mink Woman had torn in the sky earth, and then Thunder\nMan brought her to the place and laid her carefully in the basket,\nwhich he had lined with soft robes: 'Because I love you so dearly, I\nam going to let you down to your people,' he told her. 'But we do not\npart forever. Tell your father that I shall soon visit him, and give\nhim presents. I know that I did wrong, taking you from him without his\nconsent. Say to him that I will make amends for that.'\n\n\"'Oh, you are good, and I love you more than ever. But I must, I must\nsee my people; I cannot rest until I do,' Mink Woman told him, and\nkissed him.\n\n\"The people then swung the woman in the basket down into the hole she\nhad torn in the earth, and began to pay out the long rope, and slowly,\nlittle by little, the woman, looking up, saw that she was leaving the\nland of the sky gods. Below, the people, looking up, saw what they\nthought was a strange bird slowly floating down toward them from the\nsky. But after a long time they knew that it was not a bird. Nothing\nlike it had ever been seen. It was coming down straight toward the\ncenter of the big camp. Men, women, children, they all fled to the edge\nof the timber, the dogs close at their heels, and from the shelter of\nthick brush watched this strange, descending object. It was a long, long\ntime coming down, twirling this way, that way, and swaying in the wind,\nbut finally it touched the ground in the very center of the camp circle,\nand they saw a woman rise up and step out of it. They recognized her:\nMink Woman! And as they rushed out from the timber to greet her, the\nbasket which had held her began to ascend and soon disappeared in the\nfar blue of the sky.\n\n\"All the rest of that day and far into the night, Mink Woman told her\nparents and her people about the sky gods and the sky earth, and even\nthen did not tell it all. Days were required for the telling of all\nthat she had seen and done.\n\n\"Not long after Mink Woman's return to the earth and her people,\nThunder Man came to the camp. He came quietly. One evening the door\ncurtain of Lame Bull's lodge was thrust aside, and some one entered.\nMink Woman, looking up from where she sat, saw that it was her sky god\nhusband. He was plainly dressed, and bore a bundle in his arms:\n'Father!' she cried; 'here he is, my Thunder Man!' And Lame Bull,\nmoving to one side of the couch, made him welcome.\n\n\"Said Thunder Man: 'I wronged you by taking your daughter without your\npermission. I come now to make amends for that. I have here in this\nbundle a sacred pipe; my Thunder pipe. I give it to you, and will\nteach you how to use it, and how to say the prayers and sing the songs\nthat go with it.'\n\n\"Said Lame Bull to this man, his sky god son-in-law, 'I was very angry\nat you, but as the snow melts when the black winds[3] blow, so has my\nanger gone from my heart. I take your present. I shall be glad to\nlearn the sacred songs and prayers.'\n\n    [3] The \"Chinook\" wind. It is generally accompanied by dense black\n    clouds that obscure the mountains.\n\n\"Thunder Man remained for some time, nearly a moon, there in Lame\nBull's lodge, and taught the chief the ceremony of the medicine pipe\nuntil he knew it thoroughly in its every part. 'It is a powerful\nmedicine,' Thunder Man told him. 'It will make the sick well; bring\nyou and your people long life and happiness and plenty, and success to\nyour parties who go to war.'\n\n\"And as he said it was, so it proved to be, a most powerful medicine\nfor the good of the people.\n\n\"Thunder Man's departure from the camp was sudden and unexpected. One\nevening he was sitting beside Mink Woman in Lame Bull's lodge, and all\nat once straightened up, looked skyward through the smoke hole, and\nappeared to be listening to something. The people there in the lodge\nheld their breath and listened also, and could hear nothing but the\nchirping of the crickets in the grass outside. But Thunder Man soon\ncried out: 'They are calling me! I have to go! I shall return to you\nas soon as I can finish my work!' And with that he ran from the lodge\nand was gone. And Mink Woman wept.\n\n\"Who can know the ways of the gods? Surely not us of the earth.\nThunder Man promised to return soon, but moons passed, two winters\npassed, and he came not to Lame Bull's lodge and his woman. But soon\nafter he left so suddenly, Crow Man returned from far wanderings and\nheard all the story of the god and Mink Woman. He made no remark about\nit, but spent much time in Lame Bull's lodge. Then, after many moons\nhad passed, he said to the chief one day: 'Do you remember what you\nonce promised me? When your daughter so suddenly disappeared you\npromised that if I would even find her, or tell you whither she had\ngone, you would give her to me when she was found. Well, here she is:\nfulfill your promise!'\n\n\"'But she is no longer mine to give. She now belongs to Thunder Man,'\nthe chief objected.\n\n\"'Let me tell you this,' said Crow Man: 'You promised to give her to\nme if I would even tell you where she had gone. I did that. And now,\nas to this Thunder Man, he will never return here because he knows\nthat I am in the camp, and he fears me. So you might as well give me\nyour daughter now, as you will anyhow later.'\n\n\"'Ask her if she will marry you. I agree to whatever she chooses to\ndo,' Lame Bull answered.\n\n\"Crow Man went outside and found Mink Woman tanning a buffalo robe: 'I\nhave your father's consent to ask you to marry me. I hope that you\nwill say yes. I love you dearly. I will be good to you,' he told her.\n\n\"Mink Woman shook her head: 'I am already married. My man will soon be\ncoming for me,' she answered.\n\n\"'But if he doesn't come, will you marry me?' Crow Man asked.\n\n\"'We will talk about that later. I will say now, though, that I like\nyou very much. I have always liked you,' she replied.\n\n\"More moons passed, and as each one came, Crow Man never failed to ask\nMink Woman to marry him. She kept refusing to do so. But after two\nwinters had gone by, and Thunder Man still failed to appear and claim\nher, why, her refusals became faint, and fainter, until, finally, she\nwould do no more than shake her head when asked the great question.\nThen, at last, in the Falling Leaves moon of the second summer, when\nCrow Man asked her again, and she only shook her head, he took her\nhand and raised her up and drew her to him and whispered: 'You know\nnow that that sky god is never coming for you. And you know in your\nheart that you have learned to love me. Come, you are now my woman.\nLet us go to my lodge, my lodge which is now your lodge.'\n\n\"And without a word of objection Mink Woman went with him. Ai! She\nwent gladly! She was lonely, and she had for some time loved him,\nalthough she would not acknowledge it.\n\n\"It was a good winter. Buffalo were plentiful near camp all through\nit, and Crow Man kept the lodge well supplied with fat cow meat. He\nand Mink Woman were very happy. Then came spring, and one day, in new\ngreen grass time, Thunder Man was heard approaching camp, and the\npeople went wild with fear; they believed that he would destroy them\nall as soon as he learned that Mink Woman had married Crow Man. They\nall crowded around his lodge, begging him to give her up, to send her\nat once back to her father's lodge.\n\n\"But Crow Man only laughed: 'I will show you what I can do to that sky\ngod,' he told them, and got out his medicines and called Cold-Maker to\ncome to his aid. By this time Thunder Man was come almost to camp; was\nmaking a terrible noise just overhead. But Cold-Maker came quickly,\ncame in a whirling storm of wind and snow. Thunder Man raged, shooting\nlightning, making thunder that shook the earth. Cold-Maker made the\nwind blow harder and harder, so that some of the lodges went down\nbefore it, and he caused the snow to swirl so thickly that the day\nbecame almost as dark as night. For a long time the two fought,\nlightning against cold, thunder against snow, and little by little\nCold-Maker drove Thunder Man back: he could not face the cold, and at\nlast he fled and his mutterings died away in the distance. He was\ngone!\n\n\"'There! I told you I could drive him away,' said Crow Man. 'Mink\nWoman, you people all, rest easy: Thunder Man will never again attempt\nto enter this camp.' And with that he told Cold-Maker that he could\nreturn to his Far North home. He went, taking with him his wind and\nstorm. The sun came out, the people set up their flattened lodges, and\nall were once more happy.\n\n\"And Lame Bull, he retained the pipe, and found that its medicine was\nas strong as ever. And from him it had been handed down from father to\nson and father to son to this day, and still it is strong medicine.\n\n\"Kyi! That was the way of it.\"\n\n  [Illustration: MOVING CAMP FROM TWO MEDICINE\n      The end of the procession]\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nPU-NAK\u00b4-IK-SI (CUTBANK)\n\n\n\n_July 18._\n\nDown came our lodges this morning, and to-night we are camped in\nCutbank Canyon, just below the great beaver ponds some six or seven\nmiles from the head of the stream. When I first saw these ponds, years\nand years ago, they were dotted with beaver houses, and at dusk one\ncould see the busy woodcutters swimming from them in all directions to\nget their evening meal of willow or quaking aspen bark, preparatory to\nbeginning their nightly work of storing food for winter use. I never\nkilled a beaver, but I have torn down beaver dams in order to watch\nthe little animals repair them. Beavers have a language as well as\nmen: there was always a chief engineer who told the workers just what\nto do, and he himself rectified their mistakes.\n\nWe are encamped right on the main war road of the Blackfeet into the\ncountry of the West Side tribes. Once, when camped here with the Small\nRobes (I-nuk\u00b4-siks), the band, or gens, of which I was a member, I saw\na party of our young men make their preparations and start westward on\na raid. They gathered in a sweat lodge with an old medicine man, who\nprayed earnestly for their success while he sprinkled the hot rocks\nwith water, and dense steam filled the place. And at dusk, carrying in\npainted rawhide cylinders their war finery, and in little sacks their\nextra moccasins, awl and sinew for repairs, and their little paint\nbags, they stole out in single file from the camp and headed for the\nsummit of the range.\n\nEvery evening, during their absence, the old medicine man rode all\nthrough the camp, shaking his medicine rattles, singing the song for\nthe absent, calling over and over each one's name, and praying for his\nsafe return.\n\nAnd then, one morning some two weeks later, they came into camp with a\nrush, driving before them sixty or seventy horses that they had taken\nfrom the Kootenais. And two carried a slender wand from which dangled\na scalp. They came in singing the song of victory; and then the war\nchief shouted: \"A multitude of the enemy are on our trail. Break camp,\nyou women, and move down river. Take your weapons, you men, and turn\nback with us!\"\n\nWe took our weapons. We mounted our horses and rode like mad up the\nold war trail, and within a half-hour sighted the enemy, forty or\nfifty of them, strung out in a long, straggling line, according to the\nstrength and speed of each one's horse. We exchanged a few shots with\nthe lead riders; one fell; the rest took their back trail, and how\nthey did go up the steep incline to the summit, and over it. We did\nnot pursue them: \"Let them go!\" Bear Chief shouted. \"We have many of\ntheir horses; we have scalped three of them; let them go!\"\n\nWe \"let them go!\" and, indeed, that was the wiser way: they could have\nmade a stand at the summit and shot us down as fast as we came on.\n\nThe old war road! How many of my people have traveled over it, some\nof them never to return. It was along this road that Pi\u00b4tamakan,\nvirgin woman warrior, led her warriors in what was to be her last\nraid! But how many, many times our people have come rushing homeward\nover it, singing their songs of victory, waving the scalps they have\ntaken, and driving before them great bands of the horses of the Pend\nd'Oreilles, the Snakes, the Nez Perc\u00e9s, and other tribes of the\nColumbia River watershed.\n\nThe names the Blackfeet have given to the four world directions are\nmost significant of their entry into this Missouri River country.\nNorth is _ap-ut\u00b4-o-sohts_: back, or behind direction. South,\n_ahm-ska\u00b4-pohts_, is ahead direction. East is _pi-na\u00b4-pohts_:\ndown-river direction; and west is _ah-me\u00b4-tohts_: up-river direction.\nI have told why the Two Medicine was so named, when the Blackfeet came\ninto the country from the Far North, and drove the Crows before them.\nThis river they named Pu-nak\u00b4-ik-si (Cutbank), because its narrow\nvalley for a long way up from its junction with the Two Medicine is\nwalled in by straight-cut cliffs.\n\n  [Illustration: OUR CAMP ON CUTBANK RIVER\n      On left is O-nis-tai\u00b4-mak-an (Wonderful Runner), and on right,\n        Ki-nuk\u00b4-sa-po-pi (Little Plume Mountain)]\n\nThe Cutbank River Valley, like those of all the other streams of the\ncountry, has been the scene of many a fight between the Blackfeet and\ntheir enemies, in which the Blackfeet were generally the victors. A\nremarkable instance of an old woman's bravery occurred just below here\nsome forty years ago.\n\nA few lodges of the Kut\u00b4-ai-im-iks, or Never Laughs band of the\nBlackfeet, in need of the skins of elk and bighorn for making\n\"buckskin\" for light clothing and moccasin tops, were here hunting,\nand one evening all the men gathered in old Running Crane's lodge for\nprayers with his beaver medicine. An old woman, named Muk-sin-ah\u00b4-ki\n(Angry Woman), was sitting in her lodge by herself because there had\nnot been room for her in the crowded beaver medicine lodge. But she\nwas listening to the distant singing, and saying over the prayers at\nthe proper time, her heart full of peace and love for the gods.\n\nAs she sat there at the back of the lodge, she suddenly noticed that\nthe doorway curtain in the upper part was being slowly pulled aside to\nthe width of a hand, and in that small space an eye glared at her for\na time, and then the curtain dropped back to place.\n\n\"That was the eye of an enemy,\" she said to herself. Her heart\nthrobbed painfully; and for the time her thoughts were confused. Then,\nsuddenly, some one, perhaps the sun himself, told her to take courage.\nShe took courage: she stole out of the lodge to see what that enemy\nwas doing. There was a moon; bright starlight; the night was almost as\nlight as day; and she had no more than left the lodge than she saw the\nman walking here, there, examining the buffalo runners, the best and\nswiftest horses of the people, all picketed close to the lodges of\ntheir owners. Whenever the man's back was toward her, she hurried her\nsteps; got closer and closer to him; and then, suddenly, she sprang\nand seized him from behind and shouted: \"Help! Help! I have seized an\nenemy!\"\n\nIn the beaver medicine lodge the men heard her and came running to\nher relief. She had the man down; he was struggling to rise; but the\nsun must have given her of his power: she held him firmly until they\ncame, and they seized him, and White Antelope stabbed him to death. He\nwas a Gros Ventre.\n\n\nHOW MOUNTAIN CHIEF FOUND HIS HORSES\n\n\"Nephew, listen! Magic took place here in the long ago,\" said Yellow\nWolf as we sat around his lodge fire this evening.\n\n\"The Ah\u00b4-pai-tup-i[4] were hunting on this Cutbank stream, every day\nor two moving nearer and nearer to the mountains. At one of their\ncamping-places some distance below here, Mountain Chief lost his two\nfast buffalo runners, and although all the young men of the camp\nscattered out to look for them, they could not be found. Camp was\nmoved nearer to the mountains, and after a few days moved again, this\ntime to this very place where we are now encamped.\n\n    [4] Ah\u00b4-pai-tup-i (Blood People). One of the twenty-four gentes of\n    the Pi-kun\u00b4-i, or \"Piegan\" Blackfeet.\n\n\"The loss of the two buffalo runners was all that Mountain Chief could\nthink about. As they could not be found, he felt sure that some enemy\nhad stolen them.\n\n\"There was a Kootenai Indian visiting in camp, and one day he entered\nMountain Chiefs lodge, and said to him: 'You are grieving about the\nloss of your two fast horses. Now, if you will do as I say, perhaps I\ncan find them for you.'\n\n\"'Whatever you ask, that shall be done,' Mountain Chief told him.\n\n\"'First, then, you must give me a robe, a good bow, and a quiver of\narrows,' said the Kootenai.\n\n\"'They are yours; there they are: my own weapons, that robe. Take them\nwhen you want them,' said the chief.\n\n\"'I will take them later,' said the Kootenai. 'And now, call in your\nleading men.'\n\n\"Mountain Chief went outside and shouted the names of the men he\nwanted: a medicine man; several old, wise men; some warriors of great\nname. They came and were given seats in his lodge, each man according\nto his standing in the tribe. Said the Kootenai then: 'I have a sacred\nsong that I want you all to learn. I will sing it over three or four\ntimes, then you sing it with me.'\n\n\"He sang the song. It was low in tone, and slow; a strange and beautiful\nsong that gripped one's heart. But it was not hard to learn; after the\nKootenai had sung it over four times, all there could sing it with him.\n\n\"Then the Kootenai told Mountain Chief to have the women build for him a\nlittle lodge there inside the big lodge. This they did by leaning the\nsticks of two tripods against one of the poles of the lodge, their lower\nends making a half-circle, and then covering them with buffalo leather.\nInto this little enclosure crept the Kootenai, taking with him a bird\nwing-bone whistle, and a medicine rattle, and as soon as he was inside\nhe ordered the women to smooth down carefully the leather coverings so\nthat he would be in the dark. He then said to the people, sitting there\nin the big lodge: 'We will now sing the song four times. It is a call\nsong to all living things: the birds, the animals, the trees, the\nrocks--yes, even they have life. All will come when we sing this song,\nand we will question them as to the whereabouts of the two missing\nhorses.'\n\n\"They sang the song four times, and then the Kootenai, alone in his\ndark little lodge, sang another song, keeping time to it with his\nrattle, and the people, listening, heard outside the sighing of the\nwind through a big pine tree, although no such tree was near; and the\nKootenai questioned the pine tree, and it answered that it had no\nknowledge of the missing horses.\n\n\"Then, at his summons, came the different birds and the animals; one\ncould hear outside the flutter of their wings, the tread of their\nfeet; and the Kootenai questioned them, and one by one they answered\nthat they had not seen the horses. Came then a big rock, hurtling down\nthrough the sky and through the smoke hole of the lodge right into\nthe fireplace, scattering ashes and coals all around the lodge, and\nfrightening the people sitting there. And the Kootenai questioned it,\nand it answered that it knew nothing of the lost horses.\n\n  [Illustration: STREAM FROM UNNAMED GLACIER POURING INTO CUTBANK\n    CA\u00d1ON]\n\n\"'Let us sing the sacred song again,' the Kootenai called out from his\ndark little lodge, and the people sang it with him, not once, but four\ntimes. The Kootenai then blew his whistle four times, four long, loud\nwhistles. At the time there was no wind, but soon they heard, far off,\nthe roar of an approaching wind of terrible force. Said the Kootenai\nthen: 'I have called him, he is coming, Old-Man-of-the-Winds: be not\nafraid; he will not harm you.'\n\n\"He came with dreadful whirlwinds of his making. Winds that shook the\nlodge, and made the lodge ears hum with the noise of that of a hundred\nswarms of bees. And then, suddenly, the wind fell, and outside the\npeople heard this wind god ask: 'Why have you sung--why have you\nwhistled for me--what is it you want to know?'\n\n\"The Kootenai answered: 'Mountain Chief, here, has lost his two best\nhorses. Fast buffalo runners they are; both black; one with a white\nspot on his side. I called you to ask if you have seen them anywhere?'\n\n\"'No, I have not seen them,' Old-Man-of-the-Winds answered. 'As you\nknow, I belong on the west side of this Backbone-of-the-World. It is\nfrom there that I start the winds that blow over your country. I have\nbeen no farther out than here. No, I have not seen the horses.'\n\n\"'Now I am depressed,' the Kootenai exclaimed. 'I did not expect to\nlearn much about this from the birds, the animals, trees, and rocks,\neven the bumblebee could tell me nothing; but I felt that you would\nsurely know where the two horses are!'\n\n\"'Well, I have a friend who can tell you what you want to know,' said\nOld-Man-of-the-Winds. 'He is Red-Top Plume. He lives in the clouds; he\ncan see the whole country; undoubtedly he can tell you where those\nhorses are.'\n\n\"'He is a stranger to me. How shall I find him--this Red-Top Plume?'\nthe Kootenai asked; and all the people held their breath, waiting to\nhear the answer. Here was sacred talk; talk of a man with a god, and\nabout gods: they could hardly believe that it was real, that which\nthey were hearing.\n\n\"Answered Old-Man-of-the-Winds: 'Watch the clouds. When you see one of\nthem turning from white to red, as the sun goes down to his lodge on\nhis island in the great sea, you will know that Red-Top Plume is there\nabove you. That red cloud is his plume. Yes, when you see that, sing\nyour song again four times; blow your whistle again four times, and he\nwill answer you.'\n\n\"And with that the wind suddenly started to blow from the east, and\nOld-Man-of-the-Winds went with it back to his western home, and they\nheard him no more.\n\n\"From his dark little lodge in the big lodge, the Kootenai called out\nto Mountain Chief: 'Go, stand outside your lodge, watch for a cloud\nturning red, and when you see it, come inside and tell me that it is\nthere above us.'\n\n\"Mountain Chief went outside. He looked up and saw but a few small,\nwhite, slowly drifting clouds in the sky. There were four of them\nstraight above him. These drifted toward one another, and he cried\nout: 'A sign! A sacred sign! Four small clouds are getting together\nto make one large cloud!'\n\n\"And at that all the people in the lodge cried out: 'The sacred number!\nOh, sun! Oh, Above People all! Pity us! Pity us all! Allow us to survive\nall dangers! Give us long life and happiness!'\n\n\"And then, as the sun was setting, Mountain Chief cried out: 'The four\nare now one large cloud, and its edge is beginning to turn red! Ai!\nThe red, the sacred color, spreads over it!'\n\n\"His voice trembled. Himself, he trembled; for he knew that he was\nlooking--not at an ordinary cloud, but at Red-Top Plume himself, the\ngreat cloud god!\n\n\"'Come in! Come in!' the Kootenai cried to him. And he went back into\nthe lodge and joined in the singing of the sacred song. Four times\nthey sang it, oh, how earnestly! The Kootenai then blew his wing-bone\nwhistle four times. Followed a silence; the people scarcely daring to\nbreathe. And then they heard outside, in a deep and beautiful voice:\n'I am Red-Top Plume! Why have you called me here?'\n\n\"'Red-Top Plume! God of the clouds! Pity us!' the Kootenai answered.\n'It is a matter of horses; of two fast buffalo runners; both black;\none with a white spot on its side. We have lost them. Have you--oh,\nhave you seen them anywhere?'\n\n\"'That is a small thing to call me down about,' the sky god answered;\n'but, since I am here, I will tell you what I know: Yes, I have seen\nthem. I saw them just now as I came down to earth. They are standing\nbeside the spring just up the hill from where you camped when you lost\nthem.'\n\n\"'Ah! Ah! Ah!' the people exclaimed in hushed voices. And the Kootenai,\nquestioner of gods and unafraid, cried out: 'Red-Top Plume! Sacred\nplumed god of the clouds! You are good to us. Tell us, now, what we can\ndo for you--what sacrifice to do?'\n\n\"But he got no answer. Red-Top Plume had gone--gone back to his home\nin the sky, and the people, rushing out from the lodge, looked up and\nsaw him moving slowly eastward, his beautiful plumes redder than ever.\nAnd while the Kootenai and Mountain Chief and the other warriors made\nsacrifice to him, some young men mounted their horses and rode back to\nthe camping-place where the two horses had been lost, and lo! they\nfound them near the spring where Red-Top Plume had told that they were\nstanding.\"\n\n\n\n_July 22._\n\nEven in my day the many beaver dams in this wide canyon were in good\nrepair, and the ponds were dotted with inhabited beaver lodges. There\nare few of the little woodcutters here now, but in time to come, under\nthe sure protection of the supervisor of this Glacier National Park,\nthey will become as numerous as they were before the white man came.\n\nTalk about beavers to-night brought out a most interesting story by\nTail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill. Said he: \"Beavers build a great\ndam, often working moons and moons to complete it. Then, when it is\nfinished, and a great pond created, they build their lodges in the\nbacked-up water, and cut their winter supply of cottonwood, willow,\nand quaking aspen, which they tow out in convenient lengths and sink\nin deep water around the lodges.\n\n\"Now, after a few winters, they have to move on and build another\ndam-and-pond, for they will have used up all the available trees and\nwillows around the first pond. But that is still their pond, the clan\nthat built it, and in time, when a new growth of food trees has sprung\nup around it, they return there, repair the dam, build new lodges, and\nremain as long as the young trees last.\"\n\n\nWHITE FUR AND HIS BEAVER CLAN\n\n\"Away back in the ancient days, when our first fathers were able to\ntalk with the animals, a beaver chief named White Fur, with his\nfamily and his relatives, built a big dam on this river. You can\nstill see the remains of it, willow-grown, and it still backs up some\nwater, a pond as large in extent as the camp of our tribe. But in the\nold days that dam extended from one side to the other of the valley,\nand the water it backed up was more than a pond: it was a small lake.\nAbove here, there is a swift stream of white water rushing down the\nnorth side of the valley from great ice banks in the mountains. Well,\njust below its junction with the river is where White Fur built the\ndam.\n\n\"Time passed. The sons of other beaver clans came and married the\ndaughters of White Fur's clan, and took them off, and the sons of his\nclan went out and found wives and brought them home. The clan\nincreased; the pond became full of lodges; the trees were cut in\ngreater number each succeeding summer. So it was that, when the ice\nwent out one spring, White Fur went around and around the pond,\nexamining the remaining food trees, and saw that there remained only a\nfew more than enough for the coming winter. It was no more than he\nexpected; his last hurried look around, just before the freeze-up in\nthe fall, had warned him that the food supply was getting small.\n\n  [Illustration: THE BEAVER DAM]\n\n\"He went home, and called a council, told what he had learned on his\nround, and then said:--\n\n\"'We must move out from here as soon as the ice breaks up next spring,\nand when we go we must know just where we are going; we cannot afford\nto lose time hunting for a good place to make a new home. Now, who\nwill start out on discovery?'\n\n\"'I will!' his eldest son, Loud Slap, first answered. He was so named\nbecause he could tail-slap the water louder than any one else in the\nwhole gens.\n\n\"Now, Loud Slap was White Fur's favorite son, and next to himself the\nbest, the wisest dam-builder in the gens. The chief wanted to keep him\nat home, for going on discovery was very dangerous. But for very shame\nhe could not order him to remain and let some other take the risk. So,\nwith sinking heart, he said: 'You spoke up first, my son, so you shall\nbe the first one to look for a new home for us. I have had a dream, and\nI want you to find out if it told me truth: Go down this river a little\nway beyond the edge of the pines, look north, and you will see a big\nridge with a low gap in it. Go up through that gap, and down the other\nside, and you will soon come to a small branch of a good-sized stream;\nlook at all the branches of that stream for a good home for us, and come\nback and tell us all about it. Make that crossing through the gap in the\ndaytime, for then the most of our enemies, the mountain lion, the fisher\nand the wolverine, the wolf and the coyote, are generally asleep. Night\nis the time that they do their murdering work.'\n\n\"'As you say, so I will do,' Loud Slap answered.\n\n\"And the next morning, some time before daylight, he started down\nriver on his dangerous trail of discovery. Below his pond there were\nother ponds; and as he swam through them many of the beavers living\nin them asked him where he was going.\n\n\"'Out on discovery; our food trees will last us only this coming\nwinter; we have to find a new home,' he answered them all.\n\n\"On he went, through the last of the ponds, down the river, swimming\nfast, so very fast that his big webbed hind feet, swiftly kicking,\nmade the water foam past his breast. He had started out too early;\nwhen he passed the last of the pines, daylight was still some time\noff, so he dived under a pile of driftwood, then crawled up into it,\nfound a good resting-place on one of the logs and went to sleep, sure\nthat none of the prowlers could reach him there.\n\n\"The sun shining down through the little openings in the driftwood\npile awakened him. He slipped down into the water, made a dive, and\ncame up out in the middle of the river. Near by was a high, sloping\nbank bare of trees and brush; he swam to shore, climbed it, looked\nnorth, and saw the big ridge and the big, low gap in it. He looked all\naround; no animals were in sight except a few elk, and he knew that\nthey would not harm him: he began waddling toward the gap.\n\n\"The sun was hot. Loud Slap's legs were short; his body fat and heavy;\nthere was no water; he soon became very tired and thirsty, and the top\nof the gap seemed to be a long way off. More and more often he had to\nstop and rest, but he kept saying to himself: 'I will not give up! I\nwill not give up!'--and at last he arrived at the top of the gap.\nClose up to the top on the other side were thick, cool groves of\nquaking aspen and willows; as far as he could see, the valley below\nhim and its far side was one green growth of trees, and he knew that\nsomewhere down there was water, plenty of it. Down he went, oh, how\neasily, on the steeper places just pushing a little with his hind feet\nand sliding along on his belly. He soon came to a small stream of\nrunning water and drank and drank of it, rolled over and over in its\nshallowness until wet all over, and then he followed it down. Other\nlittle streams came into it, and at last it became so deep that he\ncould swim. After a time he came to where this stream joined a much\nlarger one, and he turned and went up it, and away up in the timber\nfound where a dam could be built that would form a very large pond,\nand best of all the quaking aspens and willows were everywhere there\ngrowing so closely together that they formed a food supply that would\nlast a number of winters.\n\n\"That night Loud Slap slept in a hole that he dug in a bank of the\nstream. This is the one which we long ago named Ki-nuk\u00b4-si\nIs-si-sak\u00b4-ta. I understand that the white people have another name\nfor it.[5]\n\n    [5] Ki-nuk\u00b4-si Is-si-sak\u00b4-ta (Little River). By the whites named\n    Milk River.\n\n\"Early next morning Loud Slap came out of his hole, cut down a small\nquaking aspen, and ate all he wanted of its bark. He then swam down\nthe stream, turned up its little fork, and before the sun was very\nhigh left it and took his back trail up through the gap, and before\nnoon was going down the long slope to Cutbank River. The going was\neasy. But one thing troubled him: the risk that he ran traveling there\nin that open, waterless country. Whenever he came to a patch of buck\nbrush or a clump of tall grass, he would sit up and look all around to\nsee if any enemy was near; and then he would go on, keeping as close\nto the ground as possible. Twice he saw a coyote in the distance, and\nsat motionless until the animal moved on out of sight. And then, when\nalmost to the river, sitting up and looking out from a brush patch, he\nsaw a wolverine coming straight toward him. He trembled; he shivered.\n'Now is my end come!' he said to himself, and imagined how it was\ngoing to feel to be bitten and clawed and torn to death. Because of\nhis helplessness, because he could in no way defend himself, he wept;\nbut silently.\n\n\"On came the wolverine, sniffing the ground; sniffing the rocks; the\nweed growths; and once, when he turned and looked back, Loud Slap\nthrew himself flat there in the brush; he had not dared move before.\nThe wind was from the southwest; the wolverine was coming from the\nwest, and that was one thing in Loud Slap's favor. But on which side\nof that patch of brush would he pass? If to the north, then he would\nscent the beaver-odor trail, follow it, and all would be over. If he\npassed to the south of the patch, and not too close, then all would be\nwell. From where he lay, flat on the ground in the brush, Loud Slap\ncould see nothing but the brush stems in front of his nose; but\npresently he heard, close to the patch and to the west of it, the\nsniff! sniff! sniffle! of his enemy. He closed his eyes; his body\nshook with fear; he could almost feel strong, sharp-fanged jaws\nclosing upon his neck! The suspense was terribly hard to bear! And\nthen, after what seemed to be a whole moon of time, he heard the\nsniffling close in front of him; then faint and fainter off in the\ndirection of the river; and presently he opened his eyes, little by\nlittle rose up, and looked out from his hiding-place. Lo! Wolverine\nhad come close, _close_ to the brush patch, and south of it, and then\nhad turned, and was now walking slowly toward the river! 'My enemy\npasses! I survive!' Loud Slap said to himself, and would have sung had\nhe dared. Oh, yes, beavers sang in those days, as you shall learn.\n\n\"Loud Slap watched the wolverine go on down the valley, and then\nwaddled to the river as fast as he could work his legs. How good it\nfelt, that plunge into the cool water from the bank! and, once into\nit, he made it foam as he swam homeward against the swift current.\nLong before night he climbed the dam of the upper pond, and a little\nlater entered his father's lodge. 'Ha! Back so soon! What found you,\nmy son?' old White Fur asked.\n\n\"'A fine stream there on the other side of the gap. A place to dam a\nlarge pond. Plenty of food bark trees,' Loud Slap answered, and then\ntold carefully all about the place, and about his narrow escape from\nthe wolverine. Then his mother went swimming from lodge to lodge of\nthe gens, calling all the heads of the families, and when they had\ngathered in White Fur's lodge he told again of his find and of the\ndangers of the trail. All went home pleased that he had found such a\ngood place for a new home for them.\n\n\"White Fur and his whole gens worked very hard that summer to get in\nsufficient food bark sticks for the winter supply. They had to drag\nthe last of them a long way to water, and they kept at it long after\nthe snow came, and until the ice and cold weather prevented further\ncutting. The trails they left in the snow, just before the pond froze\nover, were a sure call to their passing enemies, and they halted and\nlay in wait beside them, and killed in all five of the members of the\ngens, one of them Loud Slap's oldest son. A lynx was seen to spring\nupon him and carry him off, as he was going out to finish cutting down\na large tree.\n\n\"The winter passed. When spring came, there was still considerable\nfood bark untouched on the underwater piles, but, oh, how glad the\nbeavers were to be able to swim about again, and eat fresh bark from\nliving tree branches. All were anxious to start at once for the new\nhome across the ridge, but White Fur would not permit it. From the\npressure of the winter snows the dead grass of the past summer lay\nflat: 'We must wait until the new grass grows high enough to conceal\nus,' he said, 'and then we will go.'\n\n\"Of course, he meant those that would be able to go: females with\nnewborn young were to remain where they were until the young should be\nold enough to travel, and then they were to cross the ridge and join\ntheir mates. The new grass came, and when it was a little higher than\nthe top of a beaver's back, old White Fur and Loud Slap led all those\nwho could go, about fifty of them, down the river on the way to the\nstream beyond the gap. White Fur had already talked with the chief who\nlived in the next pond below, and he had promised to keep all\nnewcomers from occupying the pond that White Fur and his gens were\nleaving for a time.\n\n\"The travelers saw no enemy on the trail up through the gap, and, upon\narriving at the place that Loud Slap had discovered, were well pleased\nwith it. That very evening, after a heavy meal of bark, they began\nwork on the dam, and by morning had much willow brush laid, butts to\nthe current, across the stream. Night and day, with little rest, they\ntoiled to complete the dam, of sticks and stones and sod and earth,\nand within two moons' time they finished it, and had a pond large\nenough and deep enough for the lodges of the gens, and all the food\nsticks they would need to sink for winter use. Then, one evening, came\nthose who had been left behind, came with their strong and half-grown\nyoung, and all began at once to cut and bring in and sink the winter\nfood supply. Long before winter set in they had stored more than they\ncould possibly use, and from that time until the ice formed they did\nnothing more than strengthen the dam, and eat and sleep, and play\nabout in the water.\n\n\"The winter passed, and more young were born. Came and went another\nwinter, and in the spring more young were born. There were now in the\ngens many two, and three, and some four-year-olds, both male and\nfemale, and they could not mate with one another; something had to be\ndone for them. Old White Fur called a council, and there was much talk\nabout it. Some favored sending scouts away down the Little River to\nlearn if there were any beaver colonies along it. Others, and the\ngreater number, declared that the unmarried males should take the\ntrail through the gap down to Cutbank River, find mates in the\ndifferent gens having ponds along it, and tell the unmarried males\nthere to come over and take wives from White Fur's gens. It was\ndecided that this should be done, and one morning more than forty\nyoung males started for Cutbank River.\n\n\"Days passed; and yet more days, and no wife-seeking beavers came to\nthe pond on Little River. 'Something is wrong,' White Fur told Loud\nSlap.\n\n\"'_Ai!_ Something is wrong. If none come within four days' time, I\nshall go over to the Cutbank ponds and learn what the trouble is.'\n\n\"The four days passed, and no stranger, not one, came. On the fifth\nmorning Loud Slap once more took the trail for Cutbank, saying to\nWhite Fur as he left, 'If I do not return within four days' time, then\nsend some one over to learn what the trouble is, for I shall be dead.'\n\n\"Down the river went Loud Slap, and up the little fork, and thence\nalong the trail through the gap in the ridge. He moved along very\ncautiously, keeping a sharp lookout in all directions, and seeing\nnothing to alarm him. After passing through the gap he saw, on a ridge\nto the east, a number of wolves following a small band of buffalo, and\nthat pleased him, for, seeking food there, they would not be likely to\nturn and cross his trail. He hurried on down the slope.\n\n\"Suddenly, when near the river, a whirl of wind brought a dreadful\nodor to his nostrils; an odor of dead and decaying flesh. He stopped,\nsat up, looked sharply ahead, saw nothing to alarm him, went on a\nshort distance, and came upon a scene that made him shiver; that made\nhim mourn: there, on the trail and on both sides of it, lay his\nyouthful kin who had gone out to seek wives! There they lay, their\nbodies swollen and bursting, every one of them mangled and torn,\nseveral half eaten by their enemies, wolves probably, that had\ndiscovered and killed them all! One look at them was enough; he\nhurried on, weeping, and plunged into the river.\n\n\"Upstream he went, faster than he had ever swam before, and soon\nentered the lower one of the beaver ponds. Straight to the chief's\nlodge he swam, and dived down to the entrance, and went up into the\nbig and comfortable grass-floored home.\n\n\"'Ha! Loud Slap! It is you! Welcome you are! Sit youth and give us the\nnews!' the chief cried out.\n\n\"Loud Slap greeted him and gave the news, and both wept over the death\nof so many of their kind. The chief's wife went out and spread the\nnews, and there was mourning in every lodge in that pond.\n\n\"The chief then gave Loud Slap bad news. Said he: 'In the early part\nof this moon came to us a visitor from the big pond at the head of the\nlake on the next stream south of this river.' He meant, of course,\nthe great beaver pond just above Lower Two Medicine Lake.\n\n\"'Yes?' said Loud Slap,--'yes?'\n\n\"'Ah! He came and visited us and our kin in the other ponds, and gave\nno reason for his coming, and soon went home. But in a few days' time\nhe returned with all his gens, and they are many, and took possession\nof the upper pond, your pond, and at this time they are repairing the\ndam and backing the water up into the new growth of food trees, which\nare as thick as they can stand. We told him, we all told him, this\nchief,--Strong Dam is his name,--that he should not take the pond, as\nit belongs to you, to your father, White Fur, and his gens. But he\nsaid that he did not care who owned it, he had taken it, and would\nhold it, fight for it against all comers.'\n\n\"'Ha! Is it so!' Loud Slap cried. 'We will see about that! Say nothing\nto any one that I have been here. Tell your people to keep my visit\nsecret from all above here. I go to bring my kindred over, and we will\ndrive that Strong Dam and his gens back whence they came, or kill\nthem all.'\n\n\"Loud Slap went back to his Little River home the next day, and told\nall that he had seen and learned. All mourned and mourned for their\ndead, and their hearts burned with anger against Strong Dam and his\ngens. Said White Fur: 'I am old, old. But I can still fight! We will\ngo over to our pond to-morrow. I will lead you, and we will teach that\nStrong Dam and his relatives something; we will send them crying back\nto their pond above the lake!'\n\n\"They started the next morning, all the males, and even females that\nwere without young; and they were many, those who were waiting for\nmales of other gentes to come and marry them. Old White Fur led them\nacross to the river without mishap, and up to the first pond, where\nthey visited, and rested, and ate their fill of fresh, green bark. And\nthere some of the females met young unmarried males who wanted to mate\nwith them; and they answered, 'We will marry you, but first you must\nfight for us; you must help us drive that Strong Dam and his gens\nfrom our pond.'\n\n\"'And is that all you ask?' they replied. 'We are only too glad to\nhelp you. Who would not fight for his sweetheart should not have one!'\n\n\"This gave White Fur something to think about; and after a time he\nsaid to Loud Slap: 'Go, now, on a secret mission: visit the ponds of\nour friends above here, and say to the unmarried males that our young\nfemales here will marry them, but they must first help us drive Strong\nDam from this river.'\n\n\"'Ai! That is a good plan,' said Loud Slap; and he started at once to\ncarry it out. Late that night he returned, and reported that all the\nyoung males had agreed to the proposal, and would join White Fur and\nhis kin when they came along.\n\n\"'Let us start now,' said White Fur; and the advance began, and by the\ntime he reached the dam of his own old pond, he had a large following.\n\n\"There was a young man lying there on the dam, a far-back ancestor of\nours who had gone there to get his medicine dream; his vision. He was\nawake; and when, in the bright moonlight, he saw that big, old,\nwhite-furred beaver come up on the dam, and a hundred and more beaver\nfollowing, he could not believe his eyes, and cried out: 'Am I really\nand truly awake, or is this a medicine vision?'\n\n\"'Hush! Keep still,' old White Fur told him. 'What you see is real. We\nare come to fight and drive off those here who have stolen our pond\nand our new growth of food trees. Just you keep still: we want to\nsurprise them. If you see that they are beating us, then give us help.\nWhen all is over, I will give you a medicine that will insure you long\nlife and happiness.'\n\n\"The young man--No Otter was his name--made signs that he would keep\nquiet. And he sat there and watched more than a hundred beavers cross\nthe dam close in front of him, and slide quietly into the pond, and\neven then could hardly believe that he was not dreaming.\n\n\"As they entered the water that great war party of beavers swam out in\nall directions for the shores of the pond, where, scattered all\nalong, Strong Dam and his kin were already cutting the young trees\nfor winter food. And as he watched and listened, the young man heard\nsuddenly a great commotion and squealing all along the shore: the\nfighting had begun. Then, almost at once, the attacked and the\nattackers took to the water, and the whole surface of the pond was as\nif it had been struck by a tornado. It boiled, and eddied, and foamed,\nand shot high in spray, and with it all was the slap! slap! slap! of\nbeaver tails as the animals struggled and clinched, and floundered and\nbit, all over its long length and width. And soon beavers, frightened\nand gasping for breath, and bleeding from many wounds, began to pass\non each side of the young man over the dam, and drop into the stream\nbelow and disappear in its swift current. And some, unable to climb\nit, and bleeding from many wounds, died there at the edge of the dam\nand sank. The water was red with their blood. One of them, crawling\nout, staggered right up against the young man, and gasped, and died,\nand he put out his hand and felt of it, its wet coat, the warm but\nnow breathless body, and then for the first time was he sure that what\nhe was witnessing was real, and no dream.\n\n\"The fight was over. The last of the enemy had been killed, or had\nfled down river, and White Fur and his party gathered on the dam. Not\nall were there: some of them lay dead on the bottom of the pond or\nsorely wounded on the shore. White Fur directed that they should be\nhelped into the cool lodges, where they would be safe from the\nprowlers, and there cared for and fed. That done, said White Fur to\nthe young man: 'You have seen a great sight this night. Had we needed\nyour help I know that you would have given it.'\n\n\"'Yes, you had but to call, and I would have been with you,' the young\nman answered.\n\n\"'I know it,' said White Fur, 'and just for your good-will I shall\ngive you a strong medicine, and teach you the songs that go with it.\nBut I cannot do this here; you will have to go home with us, to our\npond on the next stream to the north.'\n\n  [Illustration: BIGHORN COUNTRY. HEAD OF CUTBANK RIVER]\n\n\"They went there the next day, leaving behind the newly married\nfemales and their mates to care for the wounded and make them well.\nAnd on the way up through the gap and down to the pond, White Fur and\nLoud Slap told the young man the story of their lives and their\ntroubles, just as I am telling it to you. And upon reaching the pond\non Little River, No Otter remained there a long time with the beavers,\nthe old chief and his son, Loud Slap, giving him a medicine beaver\ncutting and teaching him the beaver songs. It was a good medicine. He\ntook it home with him, and kept it, and made ceremony with it, and\nsang the songs as he had been taught to do, and because of that he had\ngreat success at war, and in curing the sick, and he lived to great\nage.\n\n\"Kyi! So ends my story.\"\n\n\n\n_July 25._\n\nYesterday Guardipe, or, as I prefer to call him, A\u00ed-is-an-ah-mak-an\n(Takes-Gun-Ahead), climbed with me to the top of White Calf Mountain.\nThere, on the extreme summit of the rough crested mountain, we came\nupon five bighorn, all ewes, and not one of them with a lamb beside\nher. During the lambing season here this year there was a continuous\ndownpour of rain and sleet and snow, in which the newborn young\nundoubtedly perished.\n\nBut how tame those five ewes were! We walked to within fifty yards of\nthem, and they gazed at us curiously, now and then nervously stamping\nthe rock with one or the other of their fore feet. And then they\ncircled around us, twice, and finally walked off toward the eastern\npoint of the mountain, often stopping to look back at us, and finally\ndisappeared behind some rock piles.\n\nAt the same time Kut\u00b4-ai-ko-pak-i (No-Coward-Woman--as my people have\nnamed my wife) was having her own experience with the game in this\nPark. With Miss L----, a Boston friend, she was sitting near the edge\nof a high, almost cutbank at the edge of the river, when she heard the\nslow, heavy, twig-snapping tread of an animal back in the brush. She\ngave her friend a nudge, and pointed in the direction of the sounds,\nand the two watched and listened. And presently they saw the brush\nshaking as the animal forced its way through it, and then, half\nrevealed and half concealed in more open brush, they saw a big grizzly\ncoming straight toward them! Right near where they sat a dwarf juniper\ngrew at the edge of the high bank, several of its limbs overhanging\nit. Without speaking a word, and trembling as though they had ague,\nthey crept to the tree, grasped one of the limbs, and tenaciously\ngripping it let themselves down over the edge of the bank. And\nthen--the limb broke with a loud snap and down they went along the\ngravelly incline, so steep that they could get no foothold, over and\nover, head first, feet first, and sideways, and landed in the river\nwith a loud splash. But they did not mind that: what were bruises and\na wetting compared to being mauled by a grizzly? They forded the\nwaist-deep stream and arrived dripping but safe in camp, and were\nglad to be there!\n\nAlthough this Glacier National Park is only five years old, the game\nanimals within it have already become very tame. The bighorn and the\nRocky Mountain goats no longer flee from parties traversing the\nmountain trails, and the deer and elk and moose have become almost as\nfearless as they are. As for the bears, they are continually trying to\nbreak into the meat-houses of the different camps. Undoubtedly these\nmountains and forests within the next ten years will fairly be alive\nwith game. And as to trout, the supply is increasing instead of\ndecreasing. In this Cutbank stream alone there have been caught this\nseason in the neighborhood of two thousand trout, weighing from a\nfourth of a pound up to four pounds, but since the 1st of April\nseventy thousand young trout, from the Anaconda hatchery, have been\nput into it.\n\n  [Illustration: CUTBANK RIVER. A GOOD TROUT RIFFLE]\n\n\n\n_July 27._\n\nLast night, in Black Bull's lodge, we had more tales of the long ago\nin this Cutbank Valley. Would that I had the time to collect all the\nBlackfeet legends of the various places in their once enormous\ndomain. From the Saskatchewan to the Yellowstone, and from the Rockies\nbetween these two streams, eastward for about three hundred miles,\nthere are tales of adventure, of camp-life, and wonderful legends, for\nevery mountain, stream, butte, and spring within that great area. Said\nBlack Bull last night:--\n\n\"I will tell you a story that my grandfather told me. It happened in\nthe days of his fathers' boyhood, and it is called\n\n\n\"THE STORY OF THE BAD WIFE\n\n\"One summer in that time the people, having made new lodges, moved up\nhere on Cutbank River to cut new lodge poles, and to gather\nweasel-eyes,[6] which grew in great quantities back on the high\nmountain slopes.\n\n    [6] Ap-ah a-wap-spi. Weasel-eyes: huckleberries.\n\n\"At that time one of the best-liked young men of the tribe was Falling\nBear. He was a very brave and successful warrior, and very kind-hearted:\nhe took it upon himself to keep three or four old widows and several\nold and helpless men supplied with all the meat and skins they could\nuse, and even gave them gentle horses for packing and riding whenever\ncamp was moved. At the time the people moved up here on Cutbank, he had\nbeen married but a short time. He had fallen in love with Otter Woman,\nthe most beautiful girl in the tribe, and with her father's and mother's\nconsent, and to their great joy and pride, had set up with her a lodge\nof his own. No word had been so much as whispered against Otter Woman;\nshe was believed to be as good and pure as she was beautiful of face and\nform.\n\n\"The tribe had not been here many days when Falling Bear decided to go\nto war. Many of the warriors, some of them much older than he, wanted\nto go with him, but he told them all that this time, because of a\ndream, a vision he had, he would take no one but his woman. He made\nfull preparation for the war trail, had a sacred sweat with an old\nmedicine man, who was to pray for him during his absence, and then,\nwith his woman, he took the Cutbank trail for the country of the West\nSide tribes, all of them enemies of the Blackfeet.\n\n\"Traveling with great caution, and only at night, he passed through the\ncountry of the Flatheads, and came to the plains country of the Nez\nPerc\u00e9s. There he struck the trail of a big hunting party of people, and\nfollowed it, and soon found that he was gaining upon them; one early\nmorning he came upon their camping-place which they must have left on\nthe previous afternoon, for in some of the fireplaces there were still\nlive coals deep down in the ashes.\n\n\"Now, on the night before he had lost his tobacco, and his desire to\nsmoke was strong within him. So he said to his woman, 'You go around\non that side of the big camping-place and examine every lodge site for\ntobacco leavings, and I will search this side for it.' They parted and\nbegan their quest.\n\n\"The camp had been pitched partly in an open, grassy park, and partly in\nthe timber surrounding it; and because of that Falling Bear and his\nwoman were often out of sight of each other. At one of these times Otter\nWoman was examining a lodge site and fireplace back in the timber, and,\nhappening to look off to one side, she saw hanging on some brush a fine\nshield, some beautiful war clothes, and a large fringed and painted\nmedicine pouch. She well knew that these had been spread out to sun by\nthe campers and forgotten, and that some one would be coming back for\nthem, and was about to go after Falling Bear to come and take them when\nshe heard the tread of an approaching horse. So near was it that she had\nnot time to run and hide. She stood still, staring, and almost at once\nthere came in sight, on a black-and-white pinto horse, the handsomest\nyoung man that she had ever seen. He was so handsome that to look at him\ngave her a yearning pain in the heart for him. Just one look, and she\nhad fallen in love with him! She didn't want to fall in love with him;\nshe just couldn't help it!\n\n\"He, this Nez Perc\u00e9, checked up his horse and sat quiet, staring down\nat her, and no doubt thought her the handsomest woman he had ever\nseen. Suddenly she began making signs to him. What a wonderful thing\nthat silent language is! All the tribes of the plains know it. Just by\nthe use of their hands they can express their every thought to one\nanother.\n\n\"Signed she: 'My man is over there! Be quiet. I will go to him, somehow\nget his weapons from him, then hold him. You come quickly when I cry\nout, and kill him, and I will go with you; will be your woman.'\n\n\"Of course, nothing could have pleased the Nez Perc\u00e9 more than that.\nTo kill an enemy and take his beautiful woman, what a big _coup_ that\nwould be! He signed to the woman that what she proposed was good, and\nslid from his horse and tied it to a tree, then signed to her to go,\nand he would follow, keeping out of sight.\n\n\"The woman crossed the big camping-ground and found her man: 'I have\nmade a great find,' she told him. 'On some bushes over there are\nhanging beautiful war clothes, a shield, weapons, and a medicine\npouch. Leave you your weapons and things here, and come with me, and\ntake them.'\n\n\"'But why should I leave my weapons? One should never be without\nthem,' he objected.\n\n\"'Because from here goes the trail we are to follow, and you will have\nall you can do to bring here what I have found,' she explained.\n\n\"He didn't see any sense in leaving his weapons, but took her word and\nlaid them down, along with his medicine pouch, and his war clothes in\ntheir _parfl\u00e8che_ (painted cylinder), and followed her out into the\nopen park. 'The things are right across there in the brush,' she told\nhim, pointing to the place, and then gradually dropped back to his\nside, and then a step behind him. Then, as they came near the brush on\nthe far side, she suddenly seized him, endeavoring to squeeze his arms\nclose to his side, so that he could not use them, and at the same time\nshe called out to the Nez Perc\u00e9 to come to her assistance. He had been\nwatching, and was already coming as fast as he could run.\n\n\"Falling Bear, of course, saw at once the intentions of the two, and\nas quick as a flash of lightning made up his mind what to do. He only\nhalf struggled with the woman, now grasping his neck with one hand and\narm, and beating his eyes and face with the other hand. She was fast\nblinding him, but he stood the pain of it until the Nez Perc\u00e9, with\nwar club raised, was but a step or two away. He then broke loose from\nthe woman, kicked backward, his foot striking her in the stomach and\nknocking her over, and then he sprang at the Nez Perc\u00e9, seized the arm\nand hand that held the war club high, and struggled with the man for\npossession of it. He wrenched it away from him, and with it struck him\na hard blow on the head, and he fell, his skull crushed in, and died.\nThe victor scalped him with his own knife, took his war club and his\nbow and arrows, and then turned to the woman.\n\n\"She lay where she had fallen, trembling at what she had done, wishing\nthat she had not done it. 'Get up. If you spoke truth, if there are\nwar clothes and other things over there, lead me to them,' Falling\nBear told her.\n\n\"She arose, still trembling, but now with some hope that he was not\ngoing to kill her, and led him to the place. His eyes were swelling shut\nso fast that one was entirely closed, but he could partly use the other.\nHe looked at the things there on the brush: 'Ah! Here are the war\nclothes, the shield, the medicine pouch, but where are the weapons?'\nhe asked.\n\n\"The woman did not answer. What could she say? There had been no\nweapons left on the brush. Falling Bear laughed a laugh that made her\nshiver, and told her to gather up all that was there and follow him.\nHe unfastened the horse and led it across the camping-place, she\nfollowing, and he had her take up his own weapons and things and\nfasten them to the saddle. He then mounted the horse, and told her to\nlead it and take the back trail home. Before he had ridden far his\nother eye closed; he was, for the time, wholly blind; but not afraid.\nHe kept close possession of all the weapons, and made the woman do\neverything that he wanted done. She minded his every word.\n\n\"Traveling again at night, and hiding in the brush during the daytime,\nthe two passed safely through the country of the Flatheads, and crossed\nthe mountains. On the morning that they approached the camp here on\nCutbank, Falling Bear had partly recovered the use of one eye. The other\nwas still swollen shut; it seemed to have been poisoned by the woman's\nfingernails.\n\n\"When so near the camp that they could plainly see the lodges, Falling\nBear told the woman to go on in and tell her relatives to come to him;\nthat he would await them right where he was. They soon came out to\nhim, his father-in-law and his brother-in-law, and when they saw his\nscarred face and swollen eyes, they cried out: 'Oh, what has happened\nto you? Have you been in a fight with a mountain lion?'\n\n\"'Worse than that,' he answered; 'this was done to me by the one I\nmost loved and trusted.' And then he told them all about it, and\nconcluded by giving them the horse and all the things that he had\ntaken from the Nez Perc\u00e9.\n\n\"When he finished his awful tale the two men, listening closely, were\nso overcome with shame and grief that for a time they could not speak.\nBut at last Falling Bear's father-in-law said: 'I have made up my mind\nwhat to do. Come! Let us go on into camp.'\n\n\"They went in; Falling Bear to his own lodge--in which his father and\nmother lived. His woman was not there; she had gone to her father's\nlodge. He was glad that she had gone there; he never wanted to see her\nagain. His father asked him to give the story of his war trail, and he\nanswered that he had nothing to say. He was so sick at heart that he\ncould not talk.\n\n\"Arrived in his own lodge, and finding his daughter, Otter Woman,\nthere, Falling Bear's father-in-law told her to go out for a time; and\nwhen she was gone he told her mother all that she had done, and then,\ncalling in their son, the three agreed upon the way the bad wife\nshould be punished. They called her in and told her to braid her hair\nnicely, and to put on her best clothes. And while she was doing that,\nher father and mother and brother painted their faces black and let\ndown their hair.\n\n\"As soon as Otter Woman was dressed, her father said to her: 'We will\nnow go outside, and you will mount the Nez Perc\u00e9 horse. I will lead\nit, your mother and brother will follow, and we will go all through\nthe camp, stopping here and there to tell the people all about the\ngreat wrong you did your man.'\n\n\"'Oh, no, no! Not that!' Otter Woman cried. 'I am ashamed enough as it\nis! I am sorry that I did it! I don't know how I came to do it; I shall\nnever, never do such a thing again!'\n\n\"'You spoke the truth there,' said her father. 'No, you will never do\nit again!' And he ordered her to go out ahead of them and mount the\nhorse. She did so and sat upon it, head cast down, looking neither to\nthe right nor left nor ahead: shame was with her. Holding the horse's\nrope, the old man shouted: 'Listen, people, listen.' And when a crowd\nhad gathered he told them what his daughter had done to her good man,\nand the people groaned with shame that one of their tribe could be so\nbad of heart. Some even wept at the horror of it.\n\n\"From one part of the camp to another the old man led the little\nprocession, stopping often to tell the shameful story, until all knew\nit. And then at last he led the horse out into the center of the great\ncircle of the lodges, and told his daughter to dismount. She did so,\nand, drawing his knife, he stabbed her in the heart and she fell and\ndied. Said he then to his wife: 'Get women to help you; drag that body\nfar off and leave it, and never let me hear again the name of her who\nwas once my daughter!'\n\n\"And the women did as he said. Never again did any one mention Otter\nWoman in his presence.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\"Ai! A sad story! A story to give one bad dreams! Let us have one of\nmore cheerful nature before we go to bed,\" said Stabs-by-Mistake.\n\n\"An Old Man story, then,\" said Two Guns. \"All are laughable.\"\n\n\"Elder brother, tell us the story of Old Man and the woman,\" said\nBlack Bull to Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill.\n\n  [Illustration: BLACK BULL AND STABS-BY-MISTAKE (right) NEAR LOWER\n    END OF CUTBANK CA\u00d1ON]\n\n\"Ai! That I will,\" the chief answered.\n\nBut before I set down the story, I must explain Old Man.\n\nOld Man (N\u00e4p\u00b4-i) was the god who created the world, and all life upon\nit, and he was _the_ god of the Blackfeet until, some centuries back,\nthey got from some southern tribe another religion, of which the sun\nis the principal god. However, they still pray to Old Man, as well as\nto the gods of the later religion, although in time a great many\nstories have grown up about Old Man that make him appear to be more of\na buffoon than a god. An interesting point about the word _n\u00e4p\u00b4-i_ is,\nthat, while it is the term for an old man, its real meaning is dawn,\nor the first faint, white light that gives birth to the day. And so,\nin common with the ancient Mexicans, various tribes of the plains, the\nAryans and other ancient races of the Old World, the original religion\nof the Blackfeet was the worship of light personified.\n\nLet us have now, the old chief's story of\n\n\nOLD MAN AND THE WOMAN\n\n\"Having created the world, the animals, grass, trees, all life upon\nit, Old Man realized that by having men live by themselves, and women\nby themselves, he had made a mistake. He saw that they should live\ntogether. The camps of the two sexes were far apart: the women were\nliving here at the foot of the mountains, in Cutbank Valley, and the\nmen were away down on Two Medicine River. Each camp had a buffalo\ntrap, and subsisted wholly upon the buffalo that were decoyed into it.\n\n\"As I have said, Old Man saw that he had made a mistake in keeping men\nand women apart. In fact, he found that he himself wanted a woman; so\nhe went to the men and said: 'You shall no longer live by yourselves.\nCome! We will go up to the camp of the women, and each of us get one\nof them.'\n\n\"The men were more than glad to do that; it was what they had been\nhoping to do for a long time; so they hurried to put on their best\nclothes, and neatly braided their hair, and then started off with Old\nMan for the women's camp. When they came in sight of it, Old Man told\nthem to stop right there, and he would go ahead and plan with the\nwomen just what should be done. They sat down, and he went on to the\nwomen's camp. Himself, he had on his old, soiled clothes; his fine\nclothes he had left back with the men.\n\n\"Arrived in the camp, he found only two or three women there; the\nwoman chief and all the others were down at the buffalo trap,\nbutchering the animals that they had that morning decoyed into it.\nWhen he told the few women that he found why he had come, he greatly\nexcited and pleased them, and they started at once to run and tell the\nothers to hurry up from the trap and meet the men.\n\n\"'But wait. Not so fast. I want a word with you,' Old Man called out;\nand when they came back to him, he asked: 'What kind of a woman is\nyour chief?'\n\n\"'Everything that is good, and kind and brave, that is our chief,'\none answered. And another said: 'Ai! She is all that, and more; and\nshe is the most beautiful woman of us all!'\n\n\"This pleased Old Man. He said to himself, 'That is the woman for me.\nI must have her.' And to the waiting women he said: 'It is right that\nchief woman should mate with chief man. You women are to come to us,\nand each select the man you want. Now, tell your chief woman that the\nchief man is brave and kind and handsome, and that she shall select\nhim for her man. She will know him by the way he is dressed. He wears\nbuckskin shirt and leggings, embroidered with porcupine quills, and a\ncow-leather robe with a big porcupine-quill embroidered sun in the\ncenter of it. You tell her to take him for her man!'\n\n\"'We will do so!' the women cried, and started off for the buffalo\ntrap as fast as they could run.\n\n\"Old Man hurried back to the waiting men, and hurriedly put on his\nfine clothes, the ones that he had described to the women.\n\n\"Trembling with excitement, and out of breath from their long, swift\nrun, Old Man's messengers arrived at the buffalo trap and told their\nwonderful news,--that men had come to marry them; that each woman was\nto choose the man that she thought would best suit her. The butchering\nof the animals ceased at once, and the women started for their camp to\nput on their good clothes and recomb their hair. They wanted to appear\nas neat and clean and well dressed as possible, before the men. Yes,\nall ran for their camp, all except the chief woman. Said she: 'I\ncannot leave here until I finish skinning this spotted medicine calf.\nGo, all of you, and I will join you as soon as I can.'\n\n\"The work took more time than she thought would be required, and when\nshe arrived in camp with the valuable skin, she found all the other\nwomen dressed and impatient to go and choose their men. 'Oh, well, it\ndoesn't matter how I look,' she said. 'I am chief; I have a name; I\ncan go choose my man dressed just as I am. How did you say the man\nchief is dressed?'\n\n\"They told her again what he wore, according to what the messenger\nman had told them, and she said: 'I'll choose him. Chief, I suppose,\nmust mate with chief.'\n\n\"And so she went right on with the others, wearing her butchering\ndress, all stiff with blood and grease from the neck down to the\nbottom of the skirt; and her moccasins were even more foul than the\nskirt. Her hands were caked with dried blood, and her hair was not\neven braided.\n\n\"Their chief leading, the women approached the waiting men, all of\nthem standing in a line, and singing a song of greeting. Old Man stood\nat the head of the line, very straight and proud, and of fine\nappearance in his beautiful new porcupine-embroidered clothes. By\nthese the chief woman recognized him from afar, and said to herself:\n'He is a fine looking man. I hope that he will prove to be as good of\nheart as he is good to look at.' And, leading her women, she walked\nstraight up to him and laid a hand on his arm: 'I will take you for my\nman,' she told him.\n\n\"But Old Man shrank back, his face plainly showing his loathing of\nsuch a bloody and greasy, wild-haired woman.\n\n\"'I take you for my man,' the woman chief repeated; and then he broke\naway from her hold and ran behind his men: 'No! No! I do not want you,\nbloody, greasy woman,' he cried, and went still farther off behind his\nmen.\n\n\"The woman chief turned to her followers: 'Go back! Go back to that\nlittle hill and there wait for me,' she told them. And to the men she\nsaid, 'Remain where you are until I return. I shall not be gone long.'\nAnd with that she turned and hurried to her camp. Her women went to\nthe hill. The men remained where they were.\n\n\"Down at her camp the chief woman took off her old clothes and bathed\nin the river. Then she put on her fine clothes, a pair of new\nmoccasins, braided her hair, scented herself with sweetgrass, and\nreturned to her women. She was now better dressed than any of them,\nand they had told Old Man the truth when they said that she was\nbeautiful of face and form: she was the most beautiful woman of them\nall.\n\n\"Again she led her women to the line of waiting men. Again Old Man\nstood first, stood at the head of them. But she passed him by, as\nthough she did not see him, and he, with a little cry, ran after her,\ntook her by the arm, and said: 'You are the woman for me. I am the\nchief of the men: you must take me!'\n\n\"She turned upon him, and her eyes were like fire. She tore his hand\nfrom her arm, and cried: 'Never touch me again, good-for-nothing,\nproud-and-useless man. I would die before I would mate with you.'\n\n\"And to her women she said: 'Do not, any of you, take him for your\nman.' And with that she turned and chose a man. The others then, one\nby one, took their choice of the men. When all had chosen, there was\none woman who had no man; all had been taken except Old Man. She would\nnot have him, and became the second wife of one of the men. The\nchoosing over, all started for the women's camp. Old Man, now very\nsad-hearted, was for following them; but the chief woman turned and\nmotioned him off. 'Go away. There is no food for you, no place for\nyou in our camp,' she told him; and he went away, crying, by himself.\n\n\"And that is what Old Man got for being so proud.\"\n\n\n\n_July 30._\n\nWe break camp and move northward to-morrow. For the past two days some\nof us have been riding about on this \"Backbone-of-the-World,\" as the\nBlackfeet call the Rocky Mountains, and we have ridden our horses\nwhere, in former times, nothing but a bird could go. The Park\nSupervisor and his engineers and miners and sappers have blasted out\ntrails over the highest parts of the range, making it easy and safe\nfor tenderfeet tourists to view the wonders of this sub-Arctic,\ngreater than Alpine range of mountains. One of the most impressive\nviews is from the summit of the trail from Upper Two Medicine Lake to\nCutbank River. The Dry Fork Trail, it is called. At its extreme height\nthe trail is along a mountain crest about thirty feet in width. Mr.\nL. W. Hill graphically described the stretch the other day, when,\nafter crossing it, he said: \"On its east side one can spit straight\ndown three thousand feet into a lake, and on the other side cast a\nstone that will go down much farther than that!\"\n\nIndeed, the view of the mountains and cliffs and canyons from that\nheight is so grand, so stupendous and impressive, that one cannot find\nwords to describe it all.\n\nOn another day we went over Cutbank Pass and down the west side of\nthe range, far enough to get a good view of the Pumpelly Glacier,\nand see the huge ice blocks break from it and drop from a cliff\nmore than two thousand feet in height. They strike the bottom of\nthe canyon with a reverberating crash that can be heard for miles.\nJust below this glacier, down Nyack Creek three or four miles, is a\nfine alkaline spring and clay bed where, in other days, old\nTail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill and I were wont to go for\nbighorn, goats, deer, and elk. All these animals came to it in\ngreat numbers, and drank the waters, and ate great wads of the\nsalty mud. We once killed a large grizzly there, whose late autumn\ncoat was as black as that of a black bear.\n\n  [Illustration: STABS-BY-MISTAKE, SUN WOMAN, AND HER SON, LITTLE\n    OTTER IN CUTBANK CA\u00d1ON]\n\nThis afternoon we have had further talk about the naming of these\nmountains. For a wonder, the topographers have not taken away the\noriginal name for the outer mountain on the north side of this Cutbank\nValley: we find on the map that it is still White Calf Mountain. It\nwas named for one of the greatest chiefs the Montana Blackfeet ever\nhad. As a young man, fresh from his first war trail, he witnessed the\nsigning of the treaty between his people and the representatives of\nthe United States, at the mouth of the Judith River, in 1855, so he\nmust have been born in 1836 or 1837. As a warrior, his rise to fame\nwas rapid, and many are the stories told of his indomitable bravery in\nfacing the enemy. In later years, because of his great interest in the\nwelfare of his people, he became their head chief. He died in\nWashington, in 1903, while there on tribal business.\n\nThe right names of the other mountains walling in this valley are as\nfollows: The unnamed mountain next west from White Calf Mountain is\nAhk\u00b4-sap-ah-ki (Generous Woman); Mount James is Ah\u00b4-kow-to-mak-an\n(Double Runner); Mount Vorhis is O-nis-tai\u00b4-na (Wonderful Chief). The\nwest one of the Twin Buttes is Little Plume; the east one is\nO-nis-tai\u00b4-mak-an (Wonderful Runner). And, as I have said, the outer\nmountain on the south side of the valley is Muk-sin-a\u00b4 (Angry Woman).\nAll but the last one were named for old-time great chiefs and warriors\nof my people, and we intend that they shall be so named on the\nofficial maps, even if we have to petition the House of\nRepresentatives and the Senate, in Washington, to make the change! And\nyou, my readers, lovers of these grandest mountains of our country,\nwill you not be with us in this perfectly proper request?\n\nSaid Takes-Gun-Ahead to me this afternoon: \"Who are these white men,\nJames, and Vorhis, for whom the mountains were named? Were they great\nwarriors, or presidents, or wise men?\"\n\nI had to confess that I had never heard of them.\n\n\"Huh!\" he exclaimed. And \"Huh!\" all the others, even the women,\nechoed.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\nKI-NUK\u00b4-SI IS-SI-SAK\u00b4-TA (LITTLE RIVER)\n\n\n\n_August 2._\n\nWe moved over here on Little River--or, as the whites have named it,\nMilk River--day before yesterday, and made camp at the lower edge of\nthe great body of timber in which the stream has its source. We are\nhere on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation, and several miles from the\nboundary line of the Glacier National Park. The state game laws do not\napply to the reservation, hence we have the right to hunt upon it when\nand where we please.\n\n  [Illustration: BIG SPRING PAINTING AUTOBIOGRAPHY ON THE FLESH SIDE\n    OF A TANNED ELK-SKIN]\n\nYesterday Takes-Gun-Ahead and I oiled our rifles and started out after\nmeat. We went up the river, passing the old beaver dams that White Fur\nand Loud Slap built in the long ago, and presently, in the dense\ngrowth of pine, cottonwood, and willow, came upon old and fresh\ntracks of deer and elk. We followed for a time the trail of four or\nfive elk, and left it to take the very fresh trail of a moose.\nTakes-Gun-Ahead was in the lead, and within ten minutes he saw the\nanimal not fifty yards away, standing partly concealed behind a clump\nof willows and watching our approach. Its head was in plain view, and\nhe fired and struck it just at the base of the ear, and it fell, gave\na convulsive kick or two, and was dead when we got to it. It was a\nthree-year-old bull, and carried a very ordinary set of antlers,\nvelvet-covered and still soft at the points. I dressed the carcass\nwhile my companion went back for a horse, and before noon we had real\nmeat--_ni-tap\u00b4-i-wak-sin_--in camp. We distributed it among the\nlodges, and there was great rejoicing. Later in the day, Two Guns and\nBlack Bull brought in a fine buck mule deer, and at sunset Big Spring\nreturned with the meat and skin of a yearling ram that he had killed\non the outer point of Divide Mountain. It was like old times,--the\ncamp red with meat,--and we all felt rich and happy.\n\nThe killing of the moose in this particular place brought out a lot\nof reminiscences of happenings here on Little River in other days, and\nof them all I think that Takes-Gun-Ahead's story was the best. As the\npipe went the first round after our feast of roast moose ribs in Black\nBull's lodge, said he: \"I will tell you the story of\n\n\n\"OLD MAN AND THE WOLVES\n\n\"One day in that long ago time, Old Man was wandering along the edge\nof this forest, having come over from Cutbank way. He was feeling very\nlonely, and wondering what he could do to have a more lively time,\nwhen, as he approached the river here, probably right where we are\ncamped, he saw a band of six wolves sitting on the bank, watching him.\nHe stopped short, watched them for a time, and then approached them,\nwhining out: 'My younger brothers! My younger brothers! I am very\nlonely! Take pity on me: let me be a wolf with you!'\n\n\"As I have said, the wolves were six: the old father and mother,\ntheir two daughters, and their sons, Heavy Body and Long Body. The old\nfather wolf answered Old Man. 'Just what do you mean?' he asked. 'Is\nit that you want me to change you into a wolf--that you want to live\njust as we do?'\n\n\"'I want to live with you, hunt with you,' he answered, 'but I don't\nwant to be changed wholly into a wolf. Just make my head and neck to\nlook like yours, and put wolf hair on my legs and arms, and that will\nbe about enough of a change. I will keep my body just as it is.'\n\n\"'Very well, we will do that for you,' said the old wolf; and he took\na gray medicine and rubbed it on Old Man's head and neck and legs and\narms, and made the change. 'There!' said he. 'My work is done. I would\nlike to have made you all wolf, your body as well as the rest of you,\nbut you will do as you are; you are quite wolf-like. And now, let me\ntell you something about our family. My old wife and I don't hunt\nmuch. Your two younger brothers there are the runners and killers, and\ntheir sisters help in the way of heading off and confusing the game.\nYour younger brother there, Long Body, is the swiftest runner, but he\nhasn't the best of wind. However, he generally overtakes and kills\nwhatever he chases. Your other younger brother, Heavy Body, is not a\nfast runner, but he has great staying power, never gets winded, and in\nthe end brings down his game. And now you know them. Whenever you feel\nlike hunting, one or the other of them, as you choose, will go with\nyou.'\n\n\"'You are very kind to me,' said Old Man. 'I am now very tired, but\nto-morrow I shall want to hunt with one or the other of them.'\n\n\"'We are also tired; we have come a long way; it is best that we all\nrest during this night,' said the old wolf; and he led the way up to\nthe top of a high ridge on the north side of the valley, where all lay\ndown.\n\n\"'But why rest out on top of this barren, windy place, instead of in\nthe shelter of the timber?' Old Man asked, his teeth beginning to\nchatter from the cold.\n\n\"'We never rest in the timber,' the old wolf replied. 'There enemies\nwould have a good chance to take us unawares. Here we can see afar\neverything that moves, and as one or another of us is always on watch,\nwe can keep out of danger. Also, we can look down and see the\ndifferent kinds of game, and make our plans to chase what we want,\nhead it off, tire it out, and kill it. We always, summer and winter,\ndo our resting and sleeping on high places.'\n\n\"Before the night was far gone, Old Man became so cold that he\ntrembled all over, and, try as he would, he could not keep his jaws\ntogether.\n\n\"'You annoy us with your tremblings, and your teeth chatterings; you\nkeep us from sleeping,' the old wolf complained.\n\n\"'Well, I shall not annoy you long,' Old Man answered, 'because I\nshall soon freeze to death!'\n\n\"The old wolf aroused his wife and children: 'This tender-bodied elder\nbrother of ours is freezing. I suppose we have to protect him. Lie\ndown in a circle around him and cover him with your tails,' he told\nthem.\n\n\"They did so, and he was soon overcome with heat: 'Take your\nill-smelling tails from my body; I am wet with perspiration!' he\ngasped. They removed their tails and he soon began to shiver. 'Put\nthem back! I freeze!' he cried; and they did as he commanded. During\nthe night he had them cover him many times with their tails, and as\nmany times remove them. He passed a miserable night, and so did the\nwolves, for he kept them from sleeping.\n\n\"At break of day all arose, and, looking down into the valley, saw a\nlone, buck mule deer feeding farther and farther away from the timber.\nThey made a plan for capturing it. They all sneaked around into the\ntimber, and then Long Body and Old Man crept down the valley until the\nbuck saw them and ran, and then they chased it. Long Body soon pulled\nit down, and Old Man came up in time to seize and break its neck, and\nfelt very proud of himself. The other wolves soon came to the kill,\nand all feasted. The carcass lasted them two days.\n\n\"Again and again they went to the top of the ridge to pass the night,\nand Old Man soon became so used to the cold that he did not need tail\ncovering. When the deer was eaten, they killed another one, and then a\nbuffalo bull, which lasted them some days. Then, after two failures in\nchasing antelope and some hungry days, Long Body killed a big bull\nelk, just outside the timber here. They were several days eating it,\nbut at last all the meat and the soft bones were finished, and nothing\nbut the backbone and the hard leg bones remained. Said the old wolf\nthen: 'We must be saving of what we have left, for it may be some time\nbefore we can make another killing. To-day we will take turns chewing\nthe upper bone of a hind leg.'\n\n\"They gathered in a small circle with one of the bones, noses to the\ncenter, and the old wolf said to Old Man: 'Now, while this chewing is\ngoing on, bone splinters are bound to fly. You must keep your eyes\ntight shut until it comes your turn to chew, else you may get a\nsplinter that will blind you.'\n\n\"Old Man did as he was told. The old wolf began the chewing, and\nafter gnawing off the end of the bone, and getting a little of the\nmarrow, called out to his wife that it was her turn to chew and passed\nher the bone. And so from one to another it went around the circle\nuntil Long Body got it, and Old Man's turn came next. His curiosity\nnow got the better of him: he just had to see what was going on, and\nslowly opened one eye, the one next to Long Body. All the wolves had\ntheir heads to the ground or resting on their fore paws, and all--even\nLong Body, busily chewing the bone--kept their eyes tight shut. 'Huh!\nThis is a queer way to feast,' Old Man said to himself, and just then\na splinter flew from the bone and struck his open eye, not putting it\nout, but causing him great pain and making him very angry. 'I will pay\nhim for that!' he thought, and waited his turn at the bone, becoming\nmore and more angry as he waited.\n\n\"'Your turn, Old Man,' said Long Body after a time, and passed him the\nbone. Old Man took it, chewed it for a time, looking sharply at all\nthe wolves. All had their eyes tight shut, so, raising the bone as\nhigh as he could, he brought it down with all the force of his arm\nupon Long Body's head and killed him. The other wolves, hearing his\ntwitching, as he died, opened their eyes, saw him dead, and Old Man\nstaring in horror at what he had done.\n\n\"'Oh, what have you done! You have killed your younger brother!' the\nold wolf cried.\n\n\"'I didn't mean to,' Old Man answered. 'When he was chewing the bone\nhe let a splinter fly, and it struck me in this eye. I meant to punish\nhim a little for being so careless, but I did not mean to kill him. I\nmust have struck harder than I thought to do.'\n\n\"'You had your eyes open! It was your fault that you got the\nsplinter!' the old wolf said; and then he and all the rest began\ngrieving for their dead.\n\n\"All the rest of that day, and all through the night, they howled and\nhowled, and Old Man thought that he would go mad from the mournfulness\nof it all. He was very sorry--he hated himself for what he had done in\nhis anger.\n\n\"The mourning-time over, the wolves dug a hole in the ground and\nburied Long Body, and then scolded Old Man. 'Had you killed my son\nintentionally,' the old wolf concluded, 'we would have had your life\nin payment for his life. As it is, we will give you one more trial:\nsee that such an accident as that never again occurs!'\n\n\"'Younger brother,' said Old Man, 'I am grieving and very restless\nbecause of what I have done. I want to be moving; to be doing\nsomething. Let Heavy Body go with me up in this pine forest, and we\nwill try to kill something.'\n\n\"The old wolf remained silent for some time, thinking, and at last\nanswered: 'Yes, I will allow him to go with you, and remember this: if\nanything happens to him, we shall hold you responsible, and great will\nbe your punishment!'\n\n\"The two started off, and Old Man said to his partner, 'In some ways I\nam wiser than you. I have this to say, and you must heed it: Whatever\nyou start after, be it deer or elk or moose, and no matter how close\nyou may get to it, if it crosses a stream, even a little stream that\nyou can jump, stop right there and turn back. Mind, now, even if a few\nmore leaps will get you to the animal's throat, you are not to make\nthose leaps if it crosses a stream. Should you keep on, death in some\nform will get you.'\n\n\"'How do you know this?' Heavy Body asked.\n\n\"'I may not tell you all that I know,' Old Man replied. 'I have given\nyou the warning; heed it.'\n\n\"They went farther up in the timber, and after some nosing of trails\nstarted a big bull moose, and took after it, Heavy Body running far in\nthe lead. He was fast gaining upon it, was almost at its heels, when\nit jumped into a wide, long pond, really a widening of the creek, and\nstarted swimming across it to an island, and from that to the other\nshore. Heavy Body thought of Old Man's warning, but said to himself:\n'He doesn't know everything. I must have that moose!' And into the\nwater he went and started swimming toward the island. And just as he\nwas nearing it a water bear sprang from the shore, and killed him,\nand dragged him to land, and Old Man appeared at the edge of the pond\njust in time to see the bear and her two nearly grown young begin\nfeasting upon her kill. With a heart full of rage and sorrow, he\nturned back into the timber and considered how he could revenge the\ndeath of Heavy Body.\n\n\"Two mornings later, just before daylight, Old Man came again to the\nshore of the pond, and close to the edge of the water took his stand\nand gave himself the appearance of an old stump. Soon after sunrise\nthe old water bear, coming out from the brush on the island, saw it,\nsat up and stared at it, and said to herself: 'I do not remember\nhaving seen that stump before. I suspicion that it is Old Man, come to\ndo me harm. I saw him right there when I killed the wolf.'\n\n\"She stared and stared at the stump, and at last called out her young,\nand said to one of them: 'Go across there and bite, and claw that\nstump. I believe that it is Old Man. If it is, he will cry out and run\nwhen you hurt him.'\n\n\"The young bear swam across and went up to the stump, and bit, and\nclawed it, and hurt Old Man. He was almost on the point of giving up\nand running away, when it left him and went back to the island and\ntold the old one that the stump was a stump, and nothing else. But the\nold one was not satisfied. She sent the other young one over, and it\nbit and clawed Old Man harder than its brother had, but he stood the\npain, bad as it was, and that young one went back and also said that\nthe stump was just a common old stump and without life.\n\n\"But the old water bear was not yet satisfied. She went across\nherself, and bit and tore at the stump with her claws, and what Old\nMan had suffered from the others was nothing compared to what he\nendured from her attack. He stood it, however, and at last, satisfied\nthat her children had been right, that this was a stump and nothing\nelse, she left it and started back for the island. Then it was that,\njust as she was entering the water, Old Man picked up the bow and\narrows he had made during the two days back in the timber and shot an\narrow into her, well back in the loin; but she dove under water so\nquickly that he could not see whether he had hit her or not. She swam\nunder water clear around back of the island, and went ashore where he\ncould not see her. He turned, then, and went away back in the timber,\nand slept all the rest of the day and all of the following night.\n\n\"Early the next morning he was approaching the pond by way of the\nstream running from it, when he saw a kingfisher sitting on a limb of\na tree overhanging the water, and looking intently down into it:\n'Little brother, what do you there?' he asked.\n\n\"'The old water bear has been shot,' the bird answered. 'She bathes in\nthe water, and clots of blood and pieces of fat escape from the wound,\nand when they come floating along here I seize them, and eat them.'\n\n\"'Ha! So I did hit her!' Old Man said. 'How badly, I wonder?'\n\n\"He went on up the shore of the stream, trying to think of some way to\nget complete revenge for the death of Heavy Body, when he heard some\none out in the brush chanting: 'Some one has shot the old water bear!\nI have to doctor the old water bear! Some one has shot the old water\nbear! I have to doctor the old water bear!'\n\n\"He went out to see who this might be, and found that it was the bull\nfrog, jumping about and making the chant after every jump. He went to\nhim and asked if the bear was much hurt?\n\n\"'There is an arrow in her loin,' the frog answered, 'and as soon as I\nfind a certain medicine plant, I shall pull the arrow out and apply\nthe crushed plant to the wound. I believe that I can save her life.'\n\n\"'That you never will,' Old Man said, and fired an arrow into him, and\nkilled him. He then took his skin, put it on, tore up a handful of a\ngreen plant, and swam to the island. As soon as he reached the shore\nhe began chanting as the frog had done: 'Some one has shot the old\nwater bear! I have to doctor the old water bear!' And so, chanting and\njumping, he followed a trail into the brush and came upon the old\nbear and her two young. She was lying on her side, breathing heavily,\nand her eyes were shut. Old Man bent over her, and, firmly grasping\nthe arrow, shoved it in until it pierced her heart, and she gave a\nkick and died! He then picked up a club and killed the two young.\n'There! That ends the water bear family. I was crazy ever to have made\nher and her husband!' he exclaimed.\n\n\"Casting off the frog skin now, he with great difficulty floated the\nthree bears from the island to the shore of the pond. There, a short\ndistance back from it, he found a bowl-shaped depression in the\nground. Into this he dragged the carcasses of the bears, after\nskinning them and taking off all the fat from their meat and insides,\nand then he tried out the fat and poured the oil over them, completely\ncovering them and filling the depression. He then called the animals.\n'All you who would be fat, come bathe in this oil,' he shouted. And on\nall sides the animals heard and began to come in. The bears--real\nbears, the grizzly and the black--came first and rolled in the oil,\nand ever since that time they have been the fattest of all animals.\nThen came the skunk; next the badger; after him the porcupine, and\nrolled in the oil and got fat. The beaver came and swam across the\noil. All that part of him above the water as he swam--his head and the\nforward part of his back--got no fat, but all the rest of his\nbody--his sides, belly, and tail--became extremely fat. Last of all\nthe animals came the rabbit. He did not go into the oil, but, dipping\na paw into it, rubbed it upon his back between his shoulders and upon\nthe inside of each leg. That is why he has no fat on other parts of\nhis body.\n\n\"'Well, there!' Old Man exclaimed, after the rabbit had gone. 'I have\ndone some good. I have avenged the death of my wolf partner and have\nmade fat many of my younger brothers!' And with that he started off\nseeking more adventures.\n\n\"Kyi! My story ends.\"\n\n\n\n_August 4._\n\nNot for many years, I am sure, have my relatives and friends here been\nso happy as they are just now. Instead of beef or no meat of any\nkind, as is generally the case with them when at home,--some die every\nwinter from want of food,--they have now in every lodge real meat;\nmeat of moose and elk and bighorn, and so are living much as they did\nin the days before the white men overran their country and killed off\ntheir game.\n\n  [Illustration: SUN WOMAN, DAUGHTER OF TAKES-GUN-AHEAD AND WIFE OF\n    STABS-BY-MISTAKE]\n\nA happy heart sharpens one's wits. All day yesterday, as I knew, my\ntwo old relatives, Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill and Yellow Wolf,\nwere considering what other one of the tribal stories about the Little\nRiver country would most please me. I had told them that I could not\nput them all down--could use only two or three of the most interesting\nones. And so, when we all gathered in Yellow Wolf's lodge last\nevening, and the pipe was lighted and started on the round of our\ncircle, he said that it had been decided that I should have the story\nof the rescue of a boy from the Crows, and that he would tell it. It\nwas called, he said, the story of\n\n\n\"NEW ROBE, THE RESCUER\n\n\"In the long ago, before our forefathers had taken this country from\nthe Crows, they were one summer camping and hunting on the Big River\nof the North.[7] Came the evening of a long, hot day, and a boy of\neight or nine winters--Lone Star was his name--failed to return to his\nparents' lodge. The chiefs ordered the camp crier out, and he went all\namong the lodges, shouting the news, and asking if any one had seen\nthe boy? None had; so then the chiefs ordered all the men and youths\nto go out and try to find him. All that moonlit night, and all the\nnext day, they searched the surrounding country, but got no trace of\nhim. Every alighting buzzard was marked down, but in every instance it\nwas found to be feasting upon the remains of game that the hunters had\nkilled. So then, although his body could not be found, most of the\npeople believed that the boy was dead. His beautiful sister, Red\nCloud Woman, and his father, Black Bear, thought otherwise; they\nbelieved that he had been stolen by the enemy, and publicly, all\nthrough the camp, the two went, the girl vowing that she would marry\nwhoever would find her brother, the old man adding that she had his\npermission to make the vow.\n\n    [7] Ap-ut\u00b4-o-sosts O\u00b4muk-at-ai (Big River of the North). The\n    Saskatchewan.\n\n\"There was in the camp a very poor young man, named New Robe. So poor\nwas he that he had never owned a new robe, nor a new shirt, nor\nleggins, nor even new moccasins. His father and mother were dead, and\nalways, as far back as he could remember, he had worn nothing but the\nused clothes the charitable had given him. He had never been to war,\nhad never done anything to make a name for himself, but now he was\neager to start in quest of the missing boy. He had long loved the\ngirl, but had never even spoken to her. He now went to her and said:\n'Tell no one about it. Just silently pray for me. I am going to travel\nfar in search of your brother.'\n\n\"Said the girl: 'This is not a time for me to hide my heart from you.\nI have watched you, loved you for a very long time. But what could I\nsay? Nothing. Well I knew that my people would not allow me to marry\none so poor as you. But now there is hope for us; somehow I believe\nthat this trouble is to be the means of bringing us together.' And\nwith that she kissed him, and he went quietly out from camp,\nunobserved by any one, and started southward on his quest.\n\n\"Many days later, in the valley of Old Man's River, New Robe came upon an\nold camp-ground of the enemy--Crows, of course, for that was then their\ncountry. From it he found that they had moved south, and he followed\ntheir trail, ever along the foot of the mountains, and knew that he was\nfast overtaking them. At the River-of-Many-Chiefs-Gathering[8] he found\nlive coals in the ashes of their abandoned fireplaces, and so, upon\narriving at the top of the ridge overlooking this stream, he was not\nsurprised to see the lodges of the great Crow camp here--right here\nwhere we are encamped to-night. They were set up in a great circle, and\nin the center of it was a huge lodge covered with old lodge skins: the\nCrows were having their medicine lodge ceremonies!\n\n    [8] St. Mary's River.\n\n\"As soon as night came and before the moon arose, New Robe descended\nthe hill and entered the camp. The people were all of them gathered at\nthe medicine lodge, singing and dancing, and fulfilling their vows to\nthe sun, so he went from one living lodge to another, looking into\neach for some sign of the missing boy. By the time he had made the\nround of the lodges of half of the circle it was midnight, and the\npeople were beginning to go home to sleep. He left the camp and went\nback on the ridge, having found no trace of the one for whom he\nsearched.\n\n\"The next night New Robe descended the ridge and searched the lodges\nof the other half of the circle, and found not what he sought. When he\nhad finished, the people were still gathered at the medicine lodge,\nand, desperate, and knowing well the great risk that he would incur,\nhe went toward it, and stood at the outer edge of the great crowd and\nwatched the ceremonial dancing of the different warrior clans. He kept\nhis face partly concealed with his old robe, and moved from place to\nplace around the outer circle of the people, and none observed him, so\nintent were they upon watching the dancers.\n\n\"At last, during a quiet interval between dances, he imagined that he\nheard some one groaning, but, look where he would, he could see no one\nin distress, nor could he locate the exact place from which the\ngroaning came. It was a light-voiced groaning, such as a child would\nmake; he felt sure that it came from little Lone Star, somewhere in\nthat great lodge, and in great pain. He left the place, went outside\nthe circle of lodges, and lay down.\n\n\"It was long past midnight when the people returned to their lodges.\nThen, as soon as the camp became quiet, New Robe returned to the\nmedicine lodge, and, listening, heard faint groaning and located it.\nIt came from the top of the center post, where all the sacrifices to\nthe sun were hung. He was sure then that it was no other than Lone\nStar up there, lashed to the post, a living sacrifice to the sun, and\nthere to die!\n\n\"Well he knew that there, within the lodge, were sleeping the women\nwho had vowed to build the great structure in honor of the sun. And\nthere, too, in his secret, walled-off little inner lodge, slept the\nmedicine man whose duty it was to drive back approaching thunderclouds\nand rain. He had to risk awakening them! He had at least to attempt to\nrescue the boy! So, casting off his robe, he climbed the outer wall of\nthe lodge, and from it crawled along one of the big long poles that\nslanted up to the center post. There he found Lone Star, firmly lashed\nto one of its forks, and so far gone that he could no longer even\ngroan.\n\n\"Silently, very carefully, New Robe unwound the lashing, and then,\nfastening an end of it under the boy's arms, let him down to the\nground. He then descended, and found that the boy was so numb that he\ncould not walk. There was but one thing to do then. He took the\nhelpless one upon his back, stole out of the lodge, and started with\nhim across the big camp-ground. Dawn had come. As he was passing the\ncircle of lodges, an early riser, a woman, saw him and with her\nshrieks aroused all the near-by sleepers. They rushed out, warriors\nand youths, the women following, and overtook him. He made no\nresistance. He could have left the boy and made his own escape, but he\nwould not do that. Several old warriors seized him and the boy, and\nhurried them to the lodge of the head chief, the women and the youths\nfollowing and crying out that they be killed. Inside the lodge, the\nchief motioned them to seats, and in signs asked New Robe what he had\nto say for himself.\n\n\"'I came not to harm you,' New Robe answered, 'nor to take from you\nanything that is yours. I came to find this boy, and take him back to\nhis mourning father and mother and sister. And where did I find him!\nTied to the center post of your medicine lodge, there to die from\nwant of water and food, a living but dying sacrifice to the sun! That\nwere too cruel a thing to do. I ask you not to put him back there. If\nhe is to die, I die with him. Shoot us, stab us, kill us in any way\nyou choose, so that our death be quick!'\n\n\"The chief gave him no answer to that. He counseled with the other\nchiefs for a long time, and at last signed to him: 'You are so brave\nthat we shall give you and the boy a chance for your lives. You are to\nremain here in this lodge to-day, to-night, to-morrow, and the\nfollowing night. My young men will keep watch on you, so do not\nattempt to escape. On the morning following your second night here,\nyou are to be given your chance to leave us unharmed. I shall not now\ntell you what that chance will be.' And then, turning to his men, he\ngave them certain orders, and they hurried from the lodge.\n\n\"During the two days and two nights, New Robe prayed as he never had\nbefore, prayed for strength and courage to succeed in whatever he\nshould be told to do. The people of the lodge treated him and the boy\nwell. They did not want for food, nor anything else that would make\nfor their comfort. Early in the morning after the second night, the\nchief signed to him: 'It is not my fault, nor the fault of my under\nchiefs, that you have to undergo this trial for your life and that of\nthe boy this day. My people were crying for your lives; they wanted to\ndrag you two out from here and fill your bodies with arrows. I did not\nwant them to do that; my council of chiefs did not want it done; so we\ncounseled together and hit upon a way to give you a chance for your\nlives. It is not an easy thing that you have to attempt, but I hope\nyou will succeed. And, whatever happens, believe this: I have done the\nbest for you that I could!'\n\n\"A little later, soon after the morning meal, the chief signed the two\ncaptives to follow him, and led them to the medicine lodge. In front\nof it were seven fresh buffalo bull heads which a number of men were\nskinning, and out in front of them, in a great half-circle, were\ngathered every man, woman, and child of the Mountain Crow tribe. New\nRobe wondered what was to be done with the seven buffalo heads; he\nsuspected that they were to be in some way used in his trial for life.\n\n\"'Come!' the chief signed, and led him and the boy to the entrance of\nthe medicine lodge. There they stood, the mark of many flashing, angry\neyes, and presently the skinners finished their work, and an old chief\nplaced the shining skulls in a line out from the doorway of the lodge,\neach one of them a long step distant from another.\n\n\"Again the head chief made signs to New Robe: 'There is your trial for\nlife,' he said. 'You are to take the boy on your back, and step from\none to the other of those skulls until you step upon the last one;\npass from it to the ground. If you succeed in doing that, you and the\nboy are free to go to your home, and none of my people shall harm you\non your way. But should you slip from a skull, and even so much as\ntouch the ground with your toe, to save your balance, then the\nwarriors standing out there will fall upon you, and kill you both.'\n\n\"New Robe looked long at the seven skulls, considering what he should\ndo. Being freshly skinned, he knew that they were very slippery. And\nthen, which would be safest, to step slowly, carefully, from one to\nanother, or make a run across them touching each one quickly, lightly?\nThey were far apart; too far for slow, deliberate stepping; he\nconcluded that the thing to do was to start running from the back of\nthe lodge, and go along the line of them as fast as he could with his\nburden. He signed to the chief that he would do that, and led the boy\nto the back of the lodge.\n\n\"While going there another thought came to him. He got back of the\nboy, and stooped, and while pretending to fix the young one's belt and\nleggins, kept spitting in two places upon the ground. He then stepped\nsquarely in each pool of the spit and then upon soft ground, and\ncoated his moccasin soles with the sandy earth. Then, suddenly\nswinging the boy to his back, and running swiftly across the lodge, he\nlit upon the first skull with his right foot, and went leaping on\nfrom one to another as fast as he could with the weight upon his back.\nThe third skull began to turn with him, and he made a weak leap from\nit, barely alighting upon the next. But it held firm and he made a\nsure leap from it to the next, and from that to the next, and then,\nstepping squarely upon the seventh, and last skull, passed from it to\nthe ground, and released the boy from his back.\n\n\"The crowd stood silent, sullen, watching him. The head chief came to\nhis side and spoke to them, and they suddenly broke out in loud\ncheers. The chief then signed to New Robe: 'There is one thing more\nyou are asked to do before we send you home. You do not have to do it,\nbut we hope that you will. Come with me!'\n\n\"They went to the lodge of a young chief, and when they were seated,\nthe chief signed to New Robe: 'My father, once a great chief, is an\nold man. He does not want to die of old age and long and painful\nillness, and he wants a chance to kill one more enemy before he dies.\nHe wants to fight you. If he kills you, then that will be good. If\nyou kill him, then you shall have his war horse and all his weapons,\nand I will give you a fine present, and you and the boy shall go to\nyour home in perfect safety. Now, what say you to that?'\n\n\"'I have no weapons,' New Robe objected.\n\n\"'Weapons you shall have,' the other replied. 'All the warriors of the\ncamp are anxious to loan you what they have. You shall go with me and\nexamine what they have until you find just what you want.'\n\n\"New Robe considered the matter. If he won out, what honor, what a\n_coup_ it would be to return to his people with the weapons and the\nwar horse of his enemy. If he lost, if he was killed--a sudden doubt\nstruck him, and he asked: 'If I fall, what will become of the boy?'\n\n\"'We promise you now,' the chiefs both answered, 'that in that case\nsome of us will take the boy to within sight of the camp of your\npeople, and send him safely to it.'\n\n\"'I take your word for that, and now give me weapons,' said New Robe.\n\n\"He was offered his choice of many bows and spears, war clubs and\nknives, but took only a short, lithe bow and a handful of\nwell-feathered arrows. Then, standing within the circle of the lodges,\nhe awaited the coming of the old chief. He soon appeared, wearing a\nbeautiful war costume and riding a sorrel pinto war horse. And now,\ndressed as he was, and easily controlling his fiery-tempered mount, he\ndid not seem to be so very old; at a distance one would have thought\nhim a young warrior. His weapon in hand was a long, scalp-tufted\nspear. On his back he carried a bow and otter-skin quiver of arrows,\nand in his belt, in a handsome sheath, quill-embroidered, was his\nknife. Said New Robe to himself: 'He looks strong, he is brave. Well,\nI too must be brave, and watchful.'\n\n\"Forth and back across the other side of the big circle rode the old\nman, singing a war song, brandishing his spear, keeping his prancing\nwar horse well in hand. And then, suddenly urging him forward, he came\nswift as the wind at New Robe. And he, dropping his tattered wrap,\nawaited his coming with ready bow. On he came, shouting his war cry,\nand when quite close New Robe let fly his long and heavy-shafted\narrow. It struck the old warrior fair in the ribs. He flinched, the\nmounting blood choked off his war cry, but on he came, and with a last\ngreat effort hurled his spear, and fell from his horse and died,--died\nwithout knowing that the weapon had passed high over New Robe's head!\n\n\"And then what a shout went up from all the people! Shouts of honor\nfor the old chief who had preferred death in battle instead of in his\nlodge, and shouts too for the young man who had so bravely faced him.\nNew Robe knew not what to do. He stood looking this way, that way,\nuncertainly. Then came to him the son of the old dead chief and signed\nto him to take the horse and the weapons of his enemy, and he did so.\nThen the young man brought to him another horse, a big and gentle\nblack: 'I said that I would give you something,' he signed, 'and here\nit is. The boy can ride it home. You may go now, both of you, and go\nwithout fear of pursuit: not a man in this camp shall follow you!'\nAnd without wasting any time the two mounted the horses and rode\nnorthward away from the camp.\n\n\"In the Blackfeet camp Lone Star's father and mother grieved more and\nmore for the loss of him, but his sister, Red Cloud Woman, would not\nbelieve that he was dead; had somehow faith that he was alive; that\nNew Robe would find him, and bring him safely home. And at last, when\nshe saw that her father and mother were likely to go mad from grief,\nshe told them that New Robe had gone in search of the boy, and that\nshe would marry him, even if he returned alone. Morning after morning\nshe went up on a butte close to camp and watched the great plain\nstretching away to the south, and all day long, and often on her couch\nat night, prayed for the safe return of brother and lover.\n\n\"And then, at last, after many, many days of worried watching, she saw\ntwo riders coming from the south across the plain, and, sure that they\nwere those she had been praying for, ran to meet them. They were the\nmissing ones. They sprang from their fine horses, and she kissed\nfirst her brother and then clung to New Robe: 'I am right now your\nwoman,' she cried, and kissed him again. 'And I am proud to be your\nwoman,' she went on, 'so take me up behind you and we will all ride\nhome!'\n\n\"She got up behind him on his prancing war horse, and as they rode in\nhe quickly told her of his adventures, and how, at last, he had fought\nand killed the old war chief, and for that had been given the two\nhorses and all the weapons and fine war clothes she saw. So it was\nthat, coming into camp, she had the tale of his brave deeds to shout\nto the people, and they, gathering close around, honored his name and\ngave him a chief's greeting. Yes, the poor orphan had within the\nlength of one moon become a chief, and had made a mourning father and\nmother happy. That very night he and Red Cloud Woman were given a\nlodge of their own, and their happiness was complete.\"\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\nPUHT-O-MUK-SI-KIM-IKS (THE LAKES INSIDE): ST. MARY'S LAKES\n\n\n\n_August 10._\n\nWe left Little River on the 5th, crossed the big ridge dividing the\nArctic and the Atlantic waters, and made camp here on the big prairie\nat the foot of the Upper St. Mary's Lake.\n\nIn the old days this great valley, hemmed in by gigantic mountains,\nwas my favorite hunting ground after the buffalo were exterminated and\nthere was no more sport to be had upon the plains.\n\n  [Illustration: CAMP NEAR LOWER END OF UPPER ST. MARY'S LAKE]\n\nHugh Monroe, or Rising Wolf, was, of course, the first white man to\nsee these most beautiful of all our Northern Rockies lakes; with the\nPiegan Blackfeet he camped at them in 1816, and long afterward, with\nhis growing family of hardy sons and daughters, this became his\nfavorite hunting and trapping ground. When, in the 1830's, that\nvaliant and much beloved missionary, Father De Smet, S.J., was\nvisiting the various tribes of this Northwest country, Monroe was\nengaged to take him to a conference with the North Blackfeet, then\ncamping on the Saskatchewan River. _En route_ they camped at the foot\nof the lower of these lakes, and there erected a large wooden cross,\nand named the two sheets of water, St. Mary's Lakes. Later on, the\nStevens expedition named them Chief Mountain Lakes, but that name did\nnot last. Monroe and his brother trappers were all Catholics, and they\ncontinued to use the name that the great priest had given them, and on\nthe maps they are St. Mary's Lakes to-day.\n\nDuring my long friendship with him, Monroe told me many stories of his\nadventures here in early days. This was his favorite mountain resort\non account of the great numbers of moose that inhabited the heavily\ntimbered valley and mountain slopes, and of the great variety and\nnumbers of fur animals that were found here. The valley swarmed with\nelk and deer; there were countless flocks of bighorn and goats on the\nmountains, and herds of buffalo everywhere along the lower lake, and\nbelow it; but Monroe liked best of all the flesh of moose, and killed\nlarge numbers of them every season that he camped here.\n\nHis method of catching wolves was simple and unique. He would build an\noblong, pyramidal log pen about eight by sixteen feet at the base, and\neight feet in height, the last layer of logs being placed about\neighteen inches apart. Easily climbing the slope of this, the wolves\nwould jump down through the narrow aperture at the top to feed upon\nthe quantities of meat that had been placed inside to decoy them, but\nthey could not jump out. Often, of a morning, the trapper and his sons\nwould find ten or more big wolves imprisoned in the trap, and, powder\nand ball being very costly, they would kill them with bow and arrows,\nskin them, and drag the carcasses to the river and cast them into it,\nthen take the hides home and peg them on the ground to dry. In this\nmanner they would often, in the spring, have several hundred wolf\npelts to pack in to Fort Benton for sale, and prime pelts sold at five\ndollars each, in trade. Their catch of beaver, otter, mink, martin,\nand fisher was also large.\n\nMonroe always camped at the foot of the lower lake, near the outlet,\nand was there more than once attacked by roving war parties of\nAssiniboines, Crows, and even the Yanktonais. The horses were kept at\nnight in a strong corral just back of the lodge, and in the daytime\nwere watched by some member of the family while they grazed on the\nrich prairie grasses. All the family--John and Fran\u00e7ois, the sons,\nMillie and Lizzie, the daughters--and even the mother had guns,\nflintlocks, and a good supply of powder and ball. Early one morning a\nlarge war party was discovered approaching the camp, sneaking from\nbush to bush, some crawling on all fours through the high grass.\nLizzie opened fire upon them and killed her man, and then the fire\nbecame general on both sides. But the Monroes, in their trenches\nsurrounding the lodge, had the best of it from the start, and\neventually made the enemy retreat with a loss of five of their\nnumber. Late the following night the Assiniboines crept in to make\nanother attack, but the Monroes were expecting them, waiting for them,\nand in the bright moonlight could take fairly accurate aim. They again\ndrove them off, with a loss of two more of their number, and that time\nthey kept going. Nothing more was seen of them. But for some days the\nMonroes did not venture far from their camp.\n\nI first saw the St. Mary's Lakes in October, 1882, in company with\nCharles Phemmister, James Rutherford, Charles Carter, and Oliver\nSanderville, all old plainsmen, good company, and best of hunters. We\noutfitted for the trip at the Old Agency, on Badger Creek, Blackfeet\nReservation, and started northward. There was no trail after leaving\nthe crossing of Little or Milk River, and we struck up country toward\nthe big gap in the mountains, in which we knew the lakes must lie, and\nthat evening camped on the shore of a large prairie lake that was\nblack with ducks. I shot a dozen or more of them as they flew over a\nlong point, and to my surprise and delight found that they were all\ncanvasbacks and redheads, and very fat from feeding upon the wild\ncelery beds of the lake. I named the sheet of water Duck Lake.\n\nThe next day we made a trail down the long hill, and camped at the\nfoot of the lower lake, close to the outlet. Then began two weeks of\nmost glorious sport. We shot elk, deer, and several grizzlies in the\nvalley, and bighorn on a mountain that I named Flat Top, and combed\nthat mountain from one end to another and on all sides for an animal\nknown to us as the Rocky Mountain ibex. We had seen several skins of\nthem, bought from the Stony Indians by Captain John Healy, of Fort\nWhoopup and Fort Benton fame, but none of us nor any man of our\nacquaintance--and we knew every trapper and trader in the country--had\never seen one of the animals alive. Of course we found none, as this\nsub-Arctic animal, which we later learned is a true antelope, and not\nan ibex or goat, seldom leaves the high cliff mountains for the outer\nand lower ones of the range. When, later, we did find them, we in our\nignorance named them Rocky Mountain goats, and that is the common name\nfor them to-day, despite the fact that they are antelopes.\n\nOn this first visit to the St. Mary's Lakes country I was so impressed\nby the grandeur of its mountains, the beauty of its many lakes, and\nits plenitude of game, that thereafter for many years it was, more\nthan anywhere else, my home. In 1883 I brought out to the lakes a good\nboat that I had had built for me at Fort Conrad, and with it learned\nthat both lakes were alive with whitefish and Mackinaw, Dolly Varden,\nand cutthroat trout. During the summer of this year I named Red Eagle\nMountain and Red Eagle Lake, after my uncle-in-law, Red Eagle, owner\nof the Thunder medicine pipe, and one of the most high-minded,\ngentle-hearted Indians that I ever knew. In the autumn of this year\nDr. George Bird Grinnell joined me, and we hunted around the lower\nlake, and went up Swift Current far enough to see what we thought\nwould possibly prove to be a glacier. We had not then time to learn\nif our surmise was correct. During our hunt Dr. Grinnell killed a\nlarge ram at long range, offhand, with one shot from his old Sharp's\nrifle, on the mountain next above Flat Top, and I therefore named it\nSingle-Shot Mountain.\n\n  [Illustration: AT THE NARROWS. UPPER ST. MARY'S LAKE]\n\nIn the summer of this year I also named Divide Mountain, because it is\nthe outermost mountain on the Atlantic-Arctic watershed. At the same\ntime I named Kootenai Mountain, also for a very good reason. Some\nmembers of that tribe were encamped beside me at the foot of the upper\nlake. I noticed often that they would ride out of camp at daylight and\nreturn at noon or a little later with all the bighorn or goat meat\nthat their horses could carry, and finally I asked them where they\nwent to make their killings so quickly.\n\n\"Come with me to-morrow and I will show you something,\" one of them\nanswered. And the next morning I rode with him up Red Eagle Valley and\npart way up a mountain, where we tied our horses and went on afoot for\na couple of hundred yards. Then, looking down into a _coul\u00e9e_, we saw\na dozen or more bighorn in the bottom of it and killed four of them.\nThey had been eating salty clay and drinking from a salt spring that\noozes from the ground there, so I named the place Kootenai Lick, and\nalso gave the mountain the name Kootenai. Thereafter I knew where to\ngo for bighorn when I wanted one.\n\nIn 1884 I named Almost-a-Dog Mountain, after one of the few survivors\nof the Baker massacre, which took place on the Marias River, January\n1, 1870. At that time Colonel E. M. Baker, with a couple of companies\nof cavalry from Fort Shaw, Montana, was trying to find the camp of Owl\nChild, a Piegan Blackfoot, and murderer of a settler named Malcolm\nClark, and arrest him. By mistake he struck the camp of Heavy Runner\nand his band of friendly Indians, and, although the chief came running\ntoward him waving his letters of recommendation and his Washington\nmedals, Baker ordered his men to begin firing, and a terrible massacre\nensued, the Indians firing not one shot in defense, as about all the\nable-bodied men were at the time on a buffalo hunt. When the firing\nwas over, two hundred and seventeen old men and women and children lay\ndead and dying in their lodges and in the camp. The soldiers then shot\nthe wounded, collected the lodges and property of the Indians in great\npiles, and set fire to them and departed.[9]\n\n    [9] The above is an extract from an affidavit by the late Joseph\n    Kipp, who was Baker's scout and guide at the time.\n\nIn the autumn of 1885 Dr. Grinnell, J. B. Monroe, and I made a trip up\nSwift Current River, and discovered and roughly measured the big\nglacier at the head of its middle fork, Dr. Grinnell killing a big ram\non the ice while we were traversing it and avoiding its deep\ncrevasses. That evening Monroe and I named the glacier in honor of Dr.\nGrinnell, and also named the mountain to the north of it after him. On\nthe following day we were joined by Lieutenant--now Major--J. H.\nBeacom, Third Infantry, and he gave my Indian name, Apikuni, to the\nhigh mountain between Swift Current and the South Fork of Kennedy\nCreek. Upon our return to Upper St. Mary's Lake, Dr. Grinnell named\nLittle Chief Mountain, Monroe gave Citadel Mountain its name, and I\nnamed Yellow Fish, Goat, Going-to-the-Sun, and Four Bears Mountains.\nYellow Fish (O-to-ko\u00b4-mi) was an Indian who often hunted with us, and\nFour Bears (Nis-su\u00b4-kyai-yo) was the Blackfeet camp crier, and a most\namusing man.\n\nIt was in 1886, I believe, that we three, and my old-time friend,\nWilliam Jackson, one-time scout for General Custer and General Miles,\ncut a trail to the head of the St. Mary's Valley and discovered the\ngreat sheet of ice which we named the Blackfeet Glacier. We at the\nsame time named Gun-Sight Pass, and named the peak just west of the\nglacier, Mount Jackson. It should be Sik-si-kai\u00b4-kwan (Blackfeet Man),\nJackson's Indian name. He was a grandson of Hugh Monroe, a real\nplainsman, and one of the bravest men I ever knew.\n\n  [Illustration: GOING-TO-THE-SUN MOUNTAIN]\n\nGoing-to-the-Sun has been climbed this day, and a flag has been\nplanted upon its summit, by Paul E. Walker, Esq., of Topeka, Kansas.\nOwing to a high cliff upon its upper shoulder, the mountain has always\nbeen considered unclimbable. But after long search, and with no little\nrisk, Mr. Walker finally worked out a way up the wall, and out upon\nthe extreme crest, and was undoubtedly the first man, white or red,\never to stand there. He reports that a magnificent view of the\nmountains and plains is to be had from the great height.\n\n\n\n_August 12._\n\nWe have more real meat in camp. Yesterday Black Bull went up under the\nnorth point of Flat Top Mountain, which is on the Indian Reservation,\nand killed two fat young rams. I went fishing, and in the first pool\nof the river below the upper lake, caught several two- and three-pound\ncutthroat trout. We had a great feast in the evening--roast bighorn\nribs, broiled trout, a quantity of blueberries, and so on.\n\nAfter the feast was over came story-telling time, and we heard this\nman's and that man's experiences in hunting in this vicinity in other\ndays, Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill relating a hard experience\nthat befell him when once wintering here with me. He was chasing a\nwounded elk on the slope of Single-Shot Mountain, and stepped upon a\nsharp, snow-covered knot that pierced his foot through and through,\nand kept him laid up for two months. Yellow Wolf then related an\nold-time tale, which incidentally gave the reason for naming these two\nsheets of water the Inside Lakes. He called it, he said,--\n\n\n\"THE STORY OF THE FIRST HORSES\n\n\"In that long-ago time when the people had only their great, wolf-like\ndogs for carrying their belongings, there were two very poor orphans,\na brother and sister, in the camp. The boy was very deaf, and because\nhe seemed not to understand what was shouted at him, he was believed\nto be crazy, and not even the relatives of his dead father and mother\ncared to have him in their lodges. One would keep him for a time and\ntell him to go, and then another relative would take him in for a\nshort time, and, getting tired of him, send him on to another lodge.\nAnd wherever he went, his beautiful young sister went with him. Often,\nin good weather, when camp was moved, the two would stay at the old\ncamp-ground, living on cast-away meat so long as it lasted, and then\nthey would overtake the camp and go into the nearest lodge, and at\nleast be sure of a meal. They were generally barefooted and always\nshabbily dressed. It was a hard life that they led. And because he was\nso deaf, and believed to be crazy, the boy had not even one playmate\nin all the camp, nor had his sister, for she knew that it was her duty\nto be always at his side. There came a time, however, when a childless\nwoman, wife of a great and rich chief, wanted the girl to raise as her\nown daughter, and after many days the boy persuaded her to be adopted,\nand he was left alone and more lonely than ever.\n\n\"Not long after this separation, the camp moved one day, and the boy,\nLong Arrow, remained at the old camp-ground to live there as long as\nhe could on the leavings of the people. At last he finished the last\nscrap of thrown away or forgotten meat and started to overtake the\ncamp. The day was hot, terribly hot, but despite that the boy traveled\nas fast as he could, often running, and perspiration streamed from his\nbody and his breath came short and fast in loud wheezes. Suddenly,\nwhile running, he felt something give way with a snap in his left ear,\nfelt something moving out from it, and reaching up he pulled from it a\nlong, round, waxy object that looked like a worm. He held it in his\nhand and ran on, and noted that with the left ear he could plainly\nhear his footsteps upon the trail. A little later something snapped in\nhis right ear, and began to move out of it, and he took from it\nanother worm-like substance, and keeping both in his hand, ran on. He\ncould now hear plainly with both ears, and so happy was he that he\nfelt almost as though he could fly.\n\n\"But that was not all the good that was to come to him that day. Early\nin the morning a hunter had left camp with his pack dogs, and had\ntaken the back trail in search of buffalo, and just before the boy\nappeared he had killed one, and was butchering it when he saw the boy\napproaching him. This hunter, Heavy Runner, was a chief, and one of\nthe kindest men in the whole camp. He had long thought to do something\nfor this boy, and now, when he saw him coming, he said to himself:\n'The time has come. I shall do something for him!'\n\n\"The boy came to him and his kill, and he shouted to him, at the same\ntime making signs: 'Sit you down, my boy, and rest. You are wet with\nsweat, and covered with dust. You must be very tired. Take this piece\nof tripe and eat it. And now let me tell you something: from this day\nyou are to be my boy. I adopt you. You shall have a place in my lodge;\ngood clothes; a good bed. Try to be good, and deserve it all. I am\ngoing to try to make a man of you.'\n\n\"'Heavy Runner, your kind words make me want to cry,' said the boy,\nhis voice trembling, tears dropping from his eyes. He swallowed\npainfully, brushed away the tears, sat up straight, and went on: 'I\nshall be glad to be your son. I will do all that I can to deserve what\nyou give me. And now, let me tell you something. As I was running away\nback there on the trail, and breathing hard, first in one ear, and\nthen in the other, something broke with a snapping noise and out came\nthese two worm-like things, and at once hearing came to me. I believe\nthat I could hear a mouse walking if he were away out there beyond\nyour kill.'\n\n\"'Now, that is good news, and a good sign!' Heavy Runner shouted. He\nwas not yet used to the fact that the boy could hear. Then,\nremembering, he said more gently: 'You take a good rest while I finish\nbutchering this animal and packing the dogs, and then we will each\ntake what meat we can carry and go home. Yes, boy, you have a home\nnow, and a good one.'\n\n\"That evening, when Heavy Runner told his woman that he had adopted\nLong Arrow, she made a great outcry: 'How could you, and without\nasking me, adopt that deaf, crazy boy?' she asked. And then, she\ncried, and said that she would not have him for a son, and ran from\nthe lodge. People gathered around and pitied her and said that she was\nright; that the boy was crazy and deaf and worthless, and would not\nmind, and as soon as he got good clothes he would run off and again\nlive at old campgrounds.\n\n\"After a time she went back to her lodge, and as soon as she entered\nit Heavy Runner said to her: 'Now, at once, cease your crying, and\ntake the anger from your heart. I have adopted this boy, and he is my\nboy. He is no longer deaf; he was never crazy. He is a good boy and I\nshall make a man, a chief of him. See that you treat him well, even if\nyou cannot love him. And believe this: if you do not treat him well,\nyou shall be the one to suffer. To-morrow morning, begin making some\ngood moccasins for him. I, myself, shall cut out his clothes, and he\ncan sew them.'\n\n\"So began a new life for Long Arrow. If the woman did not love him,\nshe at least treated him well. He did everything that he could think\nof to please Heavy Runner. He went hunting with him, and brought home\nheavy loads of the meat that he killed, and in every possible way was\nof use to him. And yet he was not satisfied; he kept saying to\nhimself: 'I want to do something great for this man who is so good to\nme!'\n\n\"Time passed. The boy grew up to be a fine young man; good of heart\nand of fine appearance; and at last Heavy Runner's woman loved him as\nthough he were her own son. But in one thing he was very different\nfrom the other young men of the camp: he made no close friends, and\nwhen not needed by Heavy Runner he wandered much by himself. Excepting\nhis sister, whom he frequently took for long walks, he had little to\nsay to any one, and so the people, all but she and his foster parents,\ncontinued to believe him crazy.\n\n\"One evening he said to Heavy Runner: 'Tell me. What must one do to\nbecome a chief?'\n\n\"'One must be very brave, must be fearless when facing the enemy, and\nof very kind heart; full of pity for the poor and the old and the\nsick, and always anxious to help them,' the chief replied.\n\n\"'Well, I want to become a chief. What is the first thing for me to\ndo?' he asked.\n\n\"'The first thing to do is to go to some far and dangerous place, and\nget your medicine. That is, something that will make you favored by\nthe gods, and bring you good luck in battle, and in all matters of\nlife,' Heavy Runner told him.\n\n\"'That I shall do,' said the young man, 'but, first, will you not call\nin the chiefs, and the medicine men and braves, and let me hear from\nthem where they went, and what they did to get their medicine? I shall\nthen have a better idea of what I am to do.'\n\n\"'We will have in our lodge full of them,' Heavy Runner said. And the\nnext morning he shouted out invitations for a smoke, asking only the\ngreat of the tribe to come to it. They came, filling the lodge, and\nthen, when the pipe was going the round of the circle, he told why he\nhad invited them to the smoke; asked them to give their experiences in\ntheir search for medicines.\n\n\"One after another they told their adventures; where they went; what\nthey did; what they saw; what narrow escapes from death they had. And\nat last it came Spotted Bear's turn. But he refused to give his\nexperience.\n\n\"'What,' he cried, 'tell that crazy youth about my adventure? Why, I\nwouldn't waste my breath on him!'\n\n\"'But he is a poor boy; he wants to know; you might tell it him in a\nshort way,' pleaded Heavy Runner.\n\n\"'Well, I will tell it; not for his benefit, for he is crazy, and\nwould not understand; but I will tell it so that you all may know what\nI did,' the surly one answered.\n\n\"'From this very place I traveled southward along the foot of the\nmountains. Seven days and seven nights I traveled, stopping only now\nand then for a short rest and sleeping very little, and on the morning\nafter the seventh night I arrived at the shore of a small lake. There\nI met a stranger man who asked me what I sought, and I told him that I\nwas wandering in search of a strong, a powerful medicine. \"Ah!\" said\nhe, \"in such a matter I cannot help you. Go on south for three days\nand three nights, and you will find a man who will give you what you\nseek.\"\n\n\"'I went on. Stopping only for short rests, and rarely sleeping, I\ntraveled south for three days and three nights from that place, and in\nthe morning after the third night arrived at a long, wide lake running\naway back in the mountains. I looked at it, looked at the mountains,\nturning this way, that way, and when I turned a last time, lo! there\nin front of me stood a man, fierce of face, dressed in beautiful\nstrange clothing, wrapped in a robe such as I had never seen before,\nand carrying a spear with a big, flint point.\n\n\"'\"What do you here?\" he asked. \"Are you not afraid to come to this,\nthe home of us gods of the deep waters?\"\n\n\"'I answered that I was not afraid; that I feared neither gods nor\nmen, nor any animal of the earth, the sky, or the deep waters. And at\nthat he cried out: \"You are brave! The brave shall be rewarded! Come\nwith me!\"\n\n\"'I went with him to his lodge. I am promised to secrecy; I dare not\ntell you where it was. He took me in and fed me, and gave me this robe\nthat I am wearing, this medicine robe, and taught me the prayers and\nceremony that goes with it. I asked him what kind of a robe it was,\nand he answered that it was the skin of an elk-dog;[10] an animal as\nlarge as an elk, and, like the dog, useful for carrying burdens. The\ngods, he said, rode them, guided them wherever they wanted to go.\n\n    [10] Po-no-ka-mi-ta (elk-dog). The horse.\n\n\"'Said I: \"May I have one of those elk-dogs to ride home?\"\n\n\"'\"No! They are only for the gods to use,\" he answered, and told me to\ngo. I came home. I have the robe. Here it is, proof of all that I have\ntold you. Ah! And this crazy youth would know where I went, what I\ndid! It is to laugh to think of his going there!'\n\n\"The pipe went a last round, and then the chiefs and medicine men and\nbraves went home. As soon as they were gone Long Arrow said to Heavy\nRunner: 'My chief, you know that I am not crazy. I feel that I must go\non adventure, and I want to go where Spotted Bear went, and prove to\nhim that I can go as far and face as many dangers as he did. Will you\nlet me go, and keep secret from every one whither I have gone and for\nwhat purpose?'\n\n\"'What you propose is just what I want you to do,' Heavy Runner\nanswered. 'You shall start to-morrow, taking with you all the\nmoccasins and other things you will need, and your foster mother and I\nwill tell no one anything about you.'\n\n\"At break of day the next morning, while all the people of the great\ncamp still slept, Long Arrow started on his journey of discovery.\nStraight south he went, by day and by night, resting and sleeping at\nlong intervals, and then only for a very short time. On the third day\nhe arrived at the small lake that Spotted Bear had mentioned, and\nthere met the man of that place, even as he had done.\n\n\"'What seek you?' the man asked.\n\n\"'Knowledge! Medicine! The way to become a chief!' Long Arrow\nanswered.\n\n\"'I cannot help you. Go on south for seven days and seven nights, and\nyou will come to a great lake, and there you will meet a man who can\nhelp you if he cares to do so. It may be that he will not even show\nhimself to you, but anyhow it is worth your while to go there and try\nto meet him.'\n\n\"Long Arrow went on for seven days and seven nights, resting and\nsleeping less than ever, eating nothing except now and then a piece of\ndry meat not so large as his hand. Early in the morning after the\nseventh night, exhausted, hardly able to drag one foot after the\nother, he came to the great lake, and some distance back from its\nshore fell down on the grass and fell into a sound sleep. It was late\nafternoon when he awoke, and, opening his eyes, he was surprised to\nsee a boy standing beside him. He was a beautiful child, by far the\nmost perfect of form and feature that Long Arrow had ever seen; so\nbeautiful that it did not seem possible he could be of this earth, a\nchild of the people of this earth.\n\n\"Said the boy to him: 'I have been waiting here a long time for you to\nawake. My father invites you to his home.'\n\n\"'I shall be glad to visit him,' Long Arrow answered, and sprang up,\nput on his weapons, and was ready.\n\n\"The boy led him straight to the shore of the lake, and there cried\nout: 'Do not be afraid, follow me!' And having said that, changed into\na snipe, entered the water and disappeared.\n\n\"Long Arrow was afraid, terribly afraid of the deep, dark water, and\nthe mystery of a place where a child could suddenly become a snipe.\nBut he said to himself: 'If I fail in my search for a medicine it\nshall be through no fault of mine,' and he entered the water. Lo! it\ndid not wet him; did not touch him. It parted before him and he went\non down the sloping, sandy bottom of the lake, and soon saw, close\nahead, a large, fine lodge, on which were painted in red and black the\nfigures of two strange animals. The boy, arrived at the doorway of\nthe lodge, changed suddenly from a snipe back to his natural self, and\ncried out: 'Follow me! Here you will be welcome,' and went in. Long\nArrow, following him, found himself facing a fine-looking man at the\nback of the lodge. He was sitting cross-legged on his couch, and wore\na beautiful black robe which entirely covered his legs and feet. 'You\nare welcome here, my son, be seated,' said the man, and told his wife\nto prepare food for his guest.\n\n\"Long Arrow looked about him. On all sides the lodge was hung with\nbeautiful shields, war clothes, weapons, handsomely painted and\nfringed pouches of sacred medicines, and a porcupine-quill embroidered\nbelt of such brilliant colors that it shamed the rainbow.\n\n\"The woman of the lodge soon set food before Long Arrow, and, having\nlong fasted, he ate largely. The man then filled and lighted a pipe,\npassed it to his guest, and said: 'I knew that you were coming, and I\nwondered if you would have the courage to follow my son from the shore\nof this lake down here to my lodge. Not long ago a man of your people\ncame here, but he was afraid; he would not follow my son. And there he\nmade a great mistake. I was going to give him the most valuable\npresent ever given by gods to men. As it was, I went out to him where\nhe sat far back from the shore, and gave him the tanned hide of an\nelk-dog, and sent him home. He was not worthy of a better present. But\nyou are different. I shall give you something of great value. Remain\nhere with us a few days. My son shall show you my band of elk-dogs;\nyou shall hunt and kill meat for us; and when you go, then you shall\nhave the great present.'\n\n\"The boy went out with Long Arrow and showed him the elk-dogs. They\ncame running from the timber out upon the open prairie at the foot of\nthe lake, and were a wonderful sight. They were far larger than an\nelk, of shining black color, had tails of long hair, and there was\nlong hair all along the top of their necks and hanging down their\nforeheads from between their restless ears. They were of all sizes,\nfrom suckling young to old males and females, and all were very fat\nand playful, even the oldest of them.\n\n\"'Young man of the earth,' said the boy, 'if you are wise and\nwatchful, these animals and my father's black robe and his\nmany-colored belt may be your present: the three go together. You have\nnoticed that my father always keeps his feet covered with the black\nrobe; that when he arises and goes out of the lodge he is very careful\nto keep the robe lowered around him, like a dragging woman's dress, so\nthat his feet cannot be seen. Well, you have but to see those feet,\nand anything that you ask for will be yours.'\n\n\"'I shall do my best to see those feet,' said Long Arrow.\n\n\"Several days passed. The old people of the lodge were very kind to\nLong Arrow, and he in turn did his best to please them, hunting most\nall of the time and bringing in much meat. And what time he was not\nhunting, he would sit close to the herd of beautiful elk-dogs and\nwatch them feed and play. When in the lodge he watched closely for a\nsight of the old man's feet, but he ever kept them closely covered.\n\n\"At last, one evening, the old man started to go out of the lodge,\nkeeping his robe well down upon the ground about him, but as he\nstepped over the low front of the doorway his right knee raised the\nrobe and Long Arrow saw his left foot; and lo! it was not a human\nfoot: it was the hoof, the round, hard hoof of an elk-dog! He gave a\ncry of surprise at the sight, and the old man, realizing what had\nhappened, exclaimed: 'Hai-yo! How careless of me! Well, it cannot be\nhelped, it must have been fated that he should see it!'\n\n\"He went on out, and upon returning took no pains to conceal his feet:\nboth of them and the ankles were those of the elk-dog.\n\n\"'Well, you have seen my feet, so you can now tell me what I shall\ngive you,' said the old man, as he resumed his seat.\n\n\"'Now, don't hesitate; speak right out; ask for the three things,'\nwhispered the boy.\n\n\"And Long Arrow, taking courage, answered: 'Give me three things:\nyour black robe, your many-colored belt, and your elk-dogs.'\n\n\"'Ha! You ask a great deal,' the old man cried, 'but, because you are\nbrave and good-hearted and not lazy, you shall have the robe and the\nbelt and a part of my band of elk-dogs. The robe and the belt are the\nelk-dog medicine. Without them you could never catch and use the\nanimals. There are many prayers and songs and a long ceremony that go\nwith them, and I have to teach it all to you. When you have thoroughly\nlearned them, then you shall go home with your presents.'\n\n\"Long Arrow was many evenings learning them all, but at last he could\nrepeat every one of them perfectly, and dance the dances as well as\nthe old man himself, and finally the latter told him one evening:--\n\n\"'You have done well. I am glad that my elk-dogs and my medicines are\nto be in your hands. You may start for home to-morrow. And now,\nlisten! Take good heed of what I am about to tell you.\n\n\"'When you leave here, wearing the black robe and the belt, you are\nto travel for three days and three nights and never once look back.\nWhen you rest, you are to face the north. Be sure, now, that,\ntraveling or resting, you never once look back. The elk-dogs will not\nat first follow you, but on the third day of your homeward journey you\nwill hear them coming behind you. Even then you must not look back,\nbut keep on walking. After a time they will come on right beside you,\nand with a rope that I shall give you, you will catch one of them and\nmount and ride it, and all the others will follow you. They will\nalways do that so long as you have the black robe. Lose that, and you\nlose your animals; they will become wild, and you will never be able\nto catch and train them.'\n\n\"'As you say, so shall I do,' Long Arrow answered.\n\n\"And early the next morning the old man gave him the robe, the belt,\nand a rope made from the head hair of buffalo bulls, and he started\nfor home, keeping ever in mind and obeying carefully the old man's\ninstructions. At times he had his doubts of the old man. Perhaps a big\njoke was being played upon him; the elk-dogs would not come on the\nthird day, nor any other day! But he would soon cast off such\nthoughts, and go on with renewed faith that all would be well with\nhim.\n\n\"And on the third day he heard behind him the thunder of many hard\nhoofs upon the hard plain; the occasional whinnying that he had\nlearned to love so well! And then, an old female leading them, the\nelk-dogs came close up beside him, and he caught and mounted one of\nthem, and rode on. How happy he was! He realized what this would mean\nfor himself and for the people. These elk-dogs would rapidly increase\nin number; there would soon be enough of them for all the people, and\nthen they would ride instead of walk, and their lodges and all their\nbelongings would be carried by the animals. 'And now I can do\nsomething for those who have been so good to me,' he said to himself,\nand rode on, singing the new songs that he had learned.\n\n\"It was late in the afternoon on the day that he approached the camp.\nAll the men had returned from the hunt; every one was outside the\nlodges, resting in the warm sunshine. The first to discover him gave a\nshout of surprise and alarm. All the people sprang up and stood gazing\nat the strange sight. They asked one another what the strange big\nblack animals could be? And was it really a man sitting astride one of\nthem?\n\n\"'It is some fierce god bringing his fierce animals to destroy us,'\nshouted Spotted Bear, the very man who had so contemptuously used Long\nArrow, who had not had the courage to follow the boy-snipe into the\nwater. Again he cried out: 'Surely it is an evil one coming to destroy\nus.' And he fled, and all the people fled with him and took to the\nbrush.\n\n\"Long Arrow rode into camp and dismounted at Heavy Runner's lodge, and\nall the elk-dogs came up and crowded around him and the one of them\nthat he had been riding. 'Heavy Runner! Heavy Runner!' he shouted. 'Be\nnot afraid! I am only your son, come back to you!'\n\n\"Heavy Runner heard the well-known voice and was no longer afraid. He\ncame hurrying from the brush, all the people following him, and they\nall crowded around Long Arrow and his strange animals. Said the youth\nthen: 'Only father and mother that I ever knew, I have brought to you,\nexcepting one female and one male, all these strange and useful\nanimals. As you see, they can be ridden; you will no longer have to\nwalk. Also, they will carry for you everything that is yours. I am\nglad that I can give them to you, both of you who have been so good to\nme.'\n\n\"'How generous of you!' Heavy Runner cried. But his wife could say\nnothing: she embraced Long Arrow and wept.\n\n\"'Where did you get the strange black ones?' a chief asked.\n\n\"'I will tell you all about it this evening; I am cautioned not to\ntalk about the gods in the daytime,' Long Arrow answered. And after\npicketing the animal he had ridden on good grass, and driving the\nothers out from camp, he went into the lodge and rested.\n\n  [Illustration: GOING-TO-THE-SUN CHALET, UPPER ST. MARY'S LAKE]\n\n\"That evening all the chiefs and warriors came into the lodge, Spotted\nBear with them, and he told all about his strange adventures, of his\nlife with the Under-Water People, and how the old man had given him\nthe elk-dogs, and the black robe and the belt that he wore. And, of\ncourse, he told about Spotted Bear's cowardice in failing to follow\nthe boy-snipe into the water, and he fled from the lodge, and his\nchieftainship dropped from him as he fled. Ever afterward he was no\nmore than a woman in that great camp; never again was he allowed to\nsit with the chiefs and warriors! And when Long Arrow had finished\ntelling them all about his wonderful adventures, the chief cried out:\n'We will move camp to that lake of the Under-Water People. They have\nmore elk-dogs; we will ask for them, give anything to obtain\npossession of such valuable animals.'\n\n\"They moved south to the lake, but, search as they would, could find\nno elk-dogs, nor did the boy-snipe nor any of the Under-Water People\nappear, although the medicine men made sacrifice to them and prayed\nthem to show themselves. They did discover, however, that above this\nlake was another and a longer one, hemmed in by still higher\nmountains, and so they named the two the Inside Lakes, and that is the\nname they bear to this day.\"\n\n\n\n_August 12._\n\nLast night we all gathered in Stabs-by-Mistake's lodge, and, while the\npipe was filled and refilled, and passed from hand to hand on many\nrounds, we had more tales, strange and weird, of the people of the\nancient days. One that our host told especially interested me, and\nhere it is, literally translated for your perusal. It was the story,\nhe said, of\n\n\n\"ONE HORN, SHAMER OF CROWS\n\n\"It was in the long ago time, when all three of our tribes, the\nBlackfeet proper, the Bloods, and we, the Pikun\u00b4i, whom the whites\nmistakenly call Blackfeet, were still living in the North country. The\ncamp of the Pikun\u00b4i was on Big River, close up to the foot of the\nmountains. One of the great chiefs of the tribe was One Horn. Very\nbrave he was, and very rich, for his band of horses numbered more than\na hundred head. He had two wives, sisters, but no children. Many\norphans called him father, for he had poor old couples care for them,\nand kept them all well supplied with meat and with skins for clothing.\nHe was a peculiar man, was One Horn. He seldom visited in other\nlodges, and was a man of few words; it was always difficult to get him\nto tell of his brave deeds.\n\n\"One summer night One Horn had an uneasy dream about his horses, and\nwith the first faint light of coming day arose, washed and dressed\nhimself, and took up his weapons and went out to see if his herd was\nanywhere in sight. He climbed to a little rise on the edge of the\nplain, saw them quietly feeding at a distance, and then saw something\nelse: two men asleep in a _coul\u00e9e_ close under the little rise. They\nwere, he thought, young men of the camp, watchers of the horse herds,\nand he concluded to surprise them and scold them for sleeping when\nthey should be watching the plains for the approach of enemies. More\nfrom habit than anything else, he drew his bow, fitted a war arrow to\nit, and then, creeping close to the sleeping ones, shouted: 'Awake!\nYou lazy ones, awake!'\n\n\"To his great surprise they were two enemies, who sprang up at the\nsound of his voice, and he shot one of them in the breast, and he\nfell, and as the other turned and ran, he fired an arrow at him and\nstruck him in the back, but he kept on running, the arrow dangling and\nswaying from his back, and he soon disappeared in the thick brush\nbordering the river. One Horn went back to camp and sent the warriors\nout to look for the wounded man, but they never found him.\n\n\"Although a very brave warrior, One Horn's voice was always for peace.\nHe thought much about the wars of tribe against tribe and the great\nloss of lives they caused, and wished that he could put an end to it\nall. He counted up the different tribes with whom his people were at\nwar--the Sioux, the Assiniboines, Cheyennes, Pawnees, Snakes,\nBannocks, Pend d'Oreilles, Flatheads, Nez Perc\u00e9s, Kootenai, and Crows.\nAnd the worst of them all were the Crows. He determined to go to the\nCrows and try to make peace between them and his people.\n\n\"Another thought came to him: It was best to say nothing to his people\nabout his plan, for many would make serious objection to it. If he\nsucceeded, they should know all about it upon his return. If he\nfailed, he would never tell them where he had been. So, one evening,\nhe gave his women orders what to do, and kept his horses close in\naround his lodge. Late that night, when all the camp was asleep, down\ncame the lodge, the pack and travois horses were quietly loaded, and\nhe and his women headed southward, he driving his big herd in the\nlead. The next morning the people found that they had a mystery that\nthey could not solve: One Horn was gone with all his belongings, gone\nwithout telling them one word of his intentions! Why had he left them\nso secretly, and whither had he gone? They never ceased talking about\nit and wishing that he would return; they felt safe when he was at\ntheir backs.\n\n\"Traveling south day after day along the foot of the mountains, One\nHorn and his women at last struck the River-of-Many-Chiefs-Gathering,\nand, following it up, came in sight of the big prairies at the foot of\nthe lower one of these Inside Lakes. It was then dusk, but not so dark\nbut what they could see that there was a big camp of people at the\nedge of the timber bordering the lake shore. Said One Horn, 'They must\nbe the ones I seek, the Mountain Crows. As soon as they sleep, we will\ngo on and put up our lodge near theirs.'\n\n\"Early the next morning an old man stepped out from his lodge, and saw\na strange lodge standing by itself just outside the circle of the big\ncamp. He looked at it a long time, and the growing light at last\nenabled him to see that there were two huge bears painted on its new\nwhite leather skin. He turned and hurried to the lodge of the head\nchief of the camp, aroused him, and cried: 'Here is a mystery;\nsomething to be looked into: just outside the circle of our camp a\nstrange lodge is standing. It belongs not to us Mountain Crows, nor to\nour brothers, the River Crows. I know that, for it has painted upon it\ntwo big bears, and neither of our tribes has that medicine.'\n\n\"The chief hurried to get up and dress, and so did others, and they\nsoon left their lodges and approached the strange lodge. There was a\nfire within it. Voices were heard in low-toned conversation. Close\naround a few horses were picketed, and farther out grazed a large band\nof them, mostly grays and blacks. It was evident that the owner of the\nlodge was a chief, a bear medicine man, a very rich man. The Crow\nchief thrust aside the door curtain of the lodge, and entered, the\nothers following. A fine-appearing man at the back of it gave them the\nsign for welcome, and motioned them where to sit. He lifted a big\nfilled pipe and lighted it, and passed it. The Crow chief smoked\nfirst, and then one by one those with him.\n\n\"Having passed on the pipe, the Crow chief signed to the stranger:\n'You are a Blackfoot?'\n\n\"'Yes, I am a Blackfoot,' One Horn answered. 'You are wondering why I,\nan enemy, have come here and set up my lodge beside you. You shall\nknow! I have come to try to make peace between your people and my\npeople. I am tired of all this war, and its wasting of men's lives,\nand making women and children mourn.'\n\n\"'You say well. Your talk deserves attention. Peace between us would\nbe good for us both. I will talk to my people about it,' said the Crow\nchief.\n\n\"And just then One Horn's women set before him and the other Crows\ndishes of rich berry pemmican, the best of dried meat and back fat,\nand they ate with the outside chief. Then they smoked again and went\nhome, the Crow chief saying that he would soon give a call for a\ncouncil, and would send for the Blackfoot to join in it.\n\n\"It was not until near sunset, however, that a youth came to invite\nOne Horn to the Crow chief's lodge. He found assembled there all the\nhead men of the tribe, and the chief told him that, after long talk,\nthey had decided that they, too, were tired of war, and would be glad\nto make peace with the Blackfeet.\n\n\"'But be not in a hurry to return home,' the Crow chief concluded.\n'Make us a long visit, and during it we will decide together where and\nwhen our two tribes shall meet to make this lasting peace treaty.'\n\n\"Answered One Horn: 'I shall be glad to camp here with you for the\nrest of this moon.' And all those present signed to him: 'Yes. Remain\nhere with us for a time.'\n\n\"One Horn and the Crow chief became friends. They hunted together,\nvisited often in each other's lodge, and together were invited to\nother lodges to feast and smoke, and join in the warriors' tales of\nraids and battles and adventures along far trails.\n\n\"The River Crows were at this time encamped just over the ridge from\nthe Inside Lakes, on Little River, and some of them came frequently\nto visit their Mountain brothers at the foot of the lakes. Among\nothers came a man who was always counting his _coups_. In a gathering\nof the warriors he would wait until all had told what they had done in\nwar against their enemies, and then he would count one _coup_, only\none, that was far greater than any of theirs.\n\n\"On a day when One Horn was visiting in the Crow chief's lodge, this\nman was one of the guests. The talk was of war, and after many there\nhad told what they had done, he said that, with a friend, he was\napproaching the Blackfeet camp, and they were discovered and\nsurrounded by all the warriors of the tribe. His friend soon fell, as\nfull of arrows as a porcupine is full of quills, but that he, charging\nthis way, that way, shooting arrows fast and killing many Blackfeet,\nmade them give way before him and he escaped from them, although\nwounded in the back. Later on, when safe from pursuit, he had drawn\nout the arrow, and still had it, proof enough of the truth of his\ntale.\n\n\"This man then turned to One Horn, and said, by signs, of course, 'We\nhave all of us here told about our fights, and now it is your turn:\ntell of your brave deeds.'\n\n\"'I have nothing to say that will interest you; mine have been just\nthe common experiences of those who go on raids. No, I have nothing to\nsay,' he answered.\n\n\"'But you must tell us one great thing that you have done,' the River\nCrow insisted.\n\n\"And again One Horn answered: 'What I have done would not interest\nyou. I have nothing to say.'\n\n\"The man then turned to the Mountain Crow chief and said: 'This is a\npoor kind of a friend for you to have! He has done nothing; he is no\nchief, he is a woman!'\n\n\"'I do not know for sure, but I think that he is a chief, that he has\na big war record,' the host answered him.\n\n\"And then the guests went their several ways, the River Crow laughing\nshrilly, contemptuously, as he left the lodge.\n\n\"It was not long after this that the River Crow came over again from\nLittle River, and again was one of a party of guests in the lodge of\nthe chief of the Mountain Crows. Once more the talk was of war, and\nwhen it came this man's turn to talk, he drew an arrow from his\nquiver, laid it on the ground in front of him, and said: 'There! No\none here, nor in the camp of the Mountain Crows and the camp of the\nRiver Crows, has ever equaled what that stands for. That is the arrow\nthat I drew from my back after my partner was killed, and I fought my\nway single-handed through the hundreds of Blackfeet warriors, killing\nmany of them, and so frightening them that they dared not pursue me.'\n\n\"One Horn leaned over, looked at the arrow, and gave an exclamation of\ndisgust: 'That is my arrow,' he signed. 'I know this man now. At dawn,\none morning, I discovered him and his partner asleep near our camp. I\ncrept up to them and shouted, thinking that they were our horseherd\nwatchers, and when they sprang up, I saw that they were enemies. I\nshot one of them dead. This man turned and ran, never even firing at\nme, and I shot an arrow into his back, but he kept on going and\nescaped from me in the brush! Yes. That is the very arrow I shot into\nhim!'\n\n\"'It is a lie! A big lie!' the River Crow said, and signed.\n\n\"For answer to that, One Horn went to the door of the lodge and\nshouted to his women to bring over his quiver of arrows. It was soon\nhanded in to him, and he said: 'I have here two kinds of arrows:\nhunting arrows and war arrows. Here are the war arrows.' And he laid\nthem beside the arrow in front of the boaster. All there saw at once\nthat they were exactly like it in every way, had the same private mark\njust back of the point. And suddenly, with jeers and cries of 'Liar!'\n'Coward!' they took handfuls of ashes and earth from the fireplace and\nthrew them in the River Crow's face and on his head, and he ran for\nthe door and was gone, leaving the arrow behind. One Horn picked it up\nand put it in his quiver, and said: 'That no doubt ends his lying\nbragging!'\n\n\"Some days after this exposure of his lying, the River Crow, watching\nhis chance, entered the lodge of the Mountain Crow chief and said to\nhim: 'That Blackfoot has shamed me. I was a chief, but now all people\nlaugh at me. I want revenge. Let me kill that friend of yours and I\nwill give you three of my best horses!'\n\n\"'What you ask is impossible!' the chief replied. 'He is my friend! We\nhave smoked together, have eaten together. I cannot allow you to kill\nhim. And for your lying you deserve what you got!'\n\n\"The River Crow sneaked away, but on the next evening, when none but\nthe chief and his women were at home, he came again. And this time he\nsaid: 'Let me do what I want to do; you know what that is; and I will\ngive you five of my best horses and my beautiful young daughter.'\n\n\"And this time the chief did not give him a short answer. He thought\nover the offer for a long time. He knew that it would be a terrible\nthing to betray his Blackfoot friend, but the temptation was great.\nHis women were getting old. He wanted that beautiful girl. And at\nlast he gave way to the temptation: 'It shall be as you wish,' he told\nthe man. 'All is arranged for to-morrow; we go with the hunters on a\nbig buffalo hunt, and there will be no chance for you to do what you\nwant to do. Come the day after to-morrow and I will help you--if you\nneed my help--to kill the Blackfoot.'\n\n\"Very early the next morning the hunters started out after buffalo,\nOne Horn taking with him one of his women to help in the butchering\nand packing in of the meat. They were no sooner gone than one of the\nCrow chief's women hurried to One Horn's lodge and told his other\nwoman all about the plan to kill him. She told it because she was\njealous; she did not want her man to take another wife!\n\n\"So it was that, when One Horn came home that evening, this wife ran\nto him and embraced and kissed him as though she would never let him\nout of her arms. This strong showing of love was unusual with her, and\nhe asked her the cause for it.\n\n\"'Because to-morrow you are to die, and sister and I are to become\nslaves. See now what you have done by coming to try to make peace with\nthese Crows!' And she told him all about the plot to end his life.\n\n\"But One Horn just laughed: 'Wipe away your tears and take courage,'\nhe told her. 'These Crows will not kill me, a bear medicine man, and a\nchief. They cannot kill me. I will show you to-morrow something that\nwill surprise you!'\n\n\"That night he kept his favorite war horse picketed close to his\nlodge, and the next morning he carefully dressed himself in his\nbeautiful war clothes, painted himself and his horse, took his bow and\narrows, his shield and spear, and rode into the center of the big\ncamp, and called upon the Crow chief to come out. He did come out,\nalso dressed for battle, and One Horn cried out to him, at the same\ntime making signs, so that he would be sure to understand, 'Your plot\nis discovered. So you and that River Crow are going to kill me. Where\nis he? Call him. I want to fight you both. I am a bear. I fight like a\nbear. Come! Hurry! Let us fight. Ha! I am going to fight my true\nfriend, the chief of the Mountain Crows, he who smoked and ate with\nme, he who was going to join me in making a lasting peace between our\ntwo tribes. Come! Let us fight! Shall it be on horseback or afoot? I\ngive you the choice.'\n\n\"The Crow chief gave him no answer. Some of the people, looking on,\nwere beginning to show their anger and shame at his betrayal of a\nfriend. He turned and went back into his lodge, and would not come out\nagain.\n\n\"While this was going on, several men had hurried to the River Crow\nman, stopping in the far end of camp: 'Your plan to kill the Blackfoot\nis discovered, and he is dressed and armed and mounted, waiting to\nfight you. He is like a raging grizzly, and his, you know, is the bear\nmedicine. What are you going to do?'\n\n\"The man did not answer them. He mounted his horse, and, hidden from\nOne Horn's sight by the lodges, struck out for the River Crow camp on\nLittle River, and fear was with him. He often looked back to see if\nhe were being pursued by this dreadful bear medicine man who had once\nwounded him, and was now so anxious to meet him face to face.\n\n\"One Horn rode back to his lodge. 'Take down the lodge, pack up\neverything. We will not stay another day with these treacherous\nCrows,' he told them, and rounded up and caught what horses were\nneeded for packing and riding.\n\n\"Just before they were ready to leave, the Crow chief sent one of his\nwomen to say to One Horn that he was sorry for what he had done, very\nsorry that he had ever listened to the River Crow, and wanted to make\nreparation. He wanted to give his Blackfoot friend ten head of horses.\n\n\"'Tell him that I will not accept anything from him,' One Horn\nanswered the woman. And he and his outfit started for the north and\nwere soon out of sight of the Crow camp.\n\n\"Some days afterward they arrived at the camp of their people on the\nBig River of the North, and had no sooner set up their lodge than One\nHorn called a council of the chiefs and told them where he had been\nand for what purpose.\n\n\"'Although I accomplished nothing, I am glad I went,' he told them. 'I\nnow know the Crows. They are liars all, and not to be trusted. I\nadvise that we begin a steady war against them.'\n\n\"The other chiefs agreed to that. Messengers were sent to the brother\ntribes, the Bloods and the North Blackfeet, and to the Gros Ventres,\nfriends of the Blackfeet, and the war was started. Little by little,\nsummer after summer, they drove the Crows southward, killing many of\nthem, and were not satisfied until they forced them to the country\nsouth of the Elk River,[11] where they have ever since remained. So,\nbecause of their treachery, the Crows lost a great and rich country.\"\n\n    [11] Po-no-ka\u00b4-\u012ds-i-sak-ta. Elk River; the Yellowstone River.\n\n\n\n_August 18._\n\n\nTHE ELK MEDICINE CEREMONY\n\nNot in many, many years have I been so affected as I was this morning.\nFor some days I have had a high fever, and have slept but little at\nnight. In-si-mak\u00b4-i (Growth Woman), Yellow Wolf's wife, had been\ndoctoring me with the good old remedy for fevers, sweet sage tea, but\nit seemed to have no effect. So Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill\nannounced that he would have his Elk Medicine ceremony for my benefit,\nand that he was sure that it would cure me of my illness. We had it\nthis morning, and to-night I have a normal pulse and the fever has\nleft me. I will not go so far as to say that it was his prayers that\ncured me,--prayers far better, far more earnest than those of any\nChristian preacher I ever heard,--but yet, I am well! To me, all\nreligions are nothing more than the codified superstitions of the\nages, but of them all, Christian and pagan, I like best the faith of\nthese, my people, faith that the sun is the conservator of all life\nand the orderly ruler of this, our earth. And what absolute faith they\nhave in their Sun-religion! Should Christians live as closely to their\nbeliefs as the Blackfeet do to the laws of conduct given them by their\nSun god, what a different, what a happy world this would be!\n\nBefore I relate the details of the ceremony, I must tell something of\nthe medicine itself.\n\nThe Blackfeet believe that, when they lie down and sleep, their\nshadows, or, as we say, their souls, their spiritualities, leave the\nbody and go on far adventure. Their name for this is Ni-pup\u00b4-o-kan (my\ndream; my vision); and when they awake they really believe that they\nhave experienced all the incidents of their dream, and relate them as\nhaving been of actual fact.\n\nWhen men and animals were first created, they had a common language,\nand the latter had the power to change themselves at will into the\nform of man. It was in that long ago time that a man seeking\nknowledge, and praying earnestly for it, was in his vision visited by\nan elk in the form of a man, whose name was Po-no-kai\u00b4-\u00fbt-s\u012dn-in-ah\n(Elk-Tongue Chief).\n\n\"I have heard you praying, asking for help. What is it you want?\nPerhaps I can help you,\" the elk man said.\n\nThe man answered: \"I seek some way to relieve my people from\nsickness; some way to give them long life and happiness. Help me if\nyou can do so.\"\n\nThe elk man answered: \"I can help you; I will help you. Through what\nwas given me in my vision I am in great favor with the sun, and all\nthe gods of the earth, the deep waters, and the blue above. That\nmedicine you shall have. I give it to you now!\" And having said that,\nhe gave the man a painted lodge, a medicine pipestem, beautifully\ndecorated with a down-hanging set of tail feathers of the sage hen,\nand wound with strips of the fur of the bear and various water\nanimals. And with it, wrapped in clean buckskins, were the skins of\nbirds and animals, all those that live upon the water and in the\nwater, and feed upon the life in the water, fish, and all the various\nwater insects. And having given the man all this, he taught him how to\nuse it, with all the prayers and ceremonies that go with it. The man\ntook all this to his home, and used it, and found that it was great\nmedicine, and ever since that time the Elk Medicine Lodge and the\nthings that go with it have been handed down from generation to\ngeneration, to this day.\n\nSo now we come to the ceremony that was given to-day for the curing of\nmy illness. It was my lucky day! Early in the morning Mr. Herford T.\nCowling, chief photographer for the United States Reclamation Service,\narrived at the Great Northern Railway Company's St. Mary's Camp and I\nwent to him and asked if he would take moving pictures of the\nceremony, provided the Indians were willing to have him do it. He\nenthusiastically replied that he would be very glad to take it all in\nwith his crank-machine, so I went to my people to ask if they would\npermit it to be done. They objected, saying that the ceremony was so\nsacred that even the presence of white people, antagonistic all of\nthem to their religion, would profane it. They did not count me. I was\none of them!\n\nSaid I: \"Listen, my relatives, and brothers all! We are all soon to\ndie, and as we pass away the whole of the old life goes with us. Your\nchildren, taken away from you by the whites, put in school and taught\nthe white men's religion and manner of living, will know nothing about\nthe way their fathers lived unless I put it all down in writing for\nall time to come. That I am doing. And how much more interesting it\nwill be if I can have pictures to go with it! Say yes! Let us have,\nwith this that you are to do to-day, the living pictures of it all!\"\n\nThere followed a long silence, all considering my request. Finally, my\nbest of friends, Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill, wiped tears from\nhis eyes, and said, brokenly: \"Ap-i-kun\u00b4-i is right. The whites take\nour children from us and teach them false beliefs. But they teach them\nto read, and it may be, that, after we have all gone on to the Sand\nHills,[12] they will read our brother's writings and see us as we\nwere, making our prayers to the gods, and, having read and seen the\npictures of it all, return to the one true faith. I say, let the\npicture man come!\"\n\n    [12] The Sand Hills (Sp\u00e4t-si-kwo). The drear after-life abode of\n    the Blackfeet. Their shadows there had a cold, cheerless imitation\n    of life.\n\n\"Ai! Ai! Let him come!\" all cried, and I sent a messenger for him.\n\nDuring the ceremony he took six hundred feet of it, and so for all\ntime to come is preserved the interesting ceremony of the Elk\nMedicine.\n\nThe ceremony is always given in a closed lodge, but this time we threw\nthe front of it wide open, so that the lens of that moving-picture\nmachine could take it all in.\n\nAs I have said, Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill is old, feeble,\nhalf-blind, and is himself unable to go through parts of the ceremony.\nSo, on the evening before this came off, he sent for Chief Crow and\nhis wife, living near, to help him out. Chief Crow is also a medicine\nman, his wife, of course, a medicine woman, and he owns the Seizer's\nmedicine pipe. Four other medicine men were there, all of them taking\npart in the ceremony. In each of the three tribes of the Blackfeet\nthere is a secret society of the medicine men, and the members help\none another in their ceremonies, and they and they only can dance with\nthe sacred symbols of their rites.\n\nWhen I went into the lodge the sacred medicines were hanging directly\nover the owner's couch, opposite the doorway. They were the sacred\npipestem and many skins of water animals and birds enclosed in various\nwrappings, and a buffalo rawhide painted pouch containing sacks of\nvarious colored sacred paints. On Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill's\nleft sat his medicine wife. I took my seat close to him on his right.\nBack of me, and all around the right side of the lodge from me, were a\nnumber of women. On the other side, opposite them, were the men and\nChief Crow's medicine wife.\n\nThe ceremony opened with a prayer by Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill,\nbeseeching the gods to look with favor upon what was to be done. Then his\nwife arose and undid the fastenings of the medicines, and slowly,\nreverently, laid them on the couch between her and her husband. The\nopening song then began, the song of Po-no-kai\u00b4-\u00fbt-s\u012dn-in-ah (Elk-Tongue\nChief). Oh, how I would like to inscribe that song here! Alice Fletcher\nsays--and I know that she is right--that all Indian music is\nclassical. But their tonal scale is far different from ours; we have not\none musical instrument that can reproduce it. Never, never lived a white\nman who could sing these Blackfeet songs. As a boy, year after year, I\ntried to sing them, and always failed; one has to take them in with his\nmother's milk in order to sing them correctly.\n\n  [Illustration: OPENING OF THE ELK MEDICINE PIPE CEREMONY\n      Left to right: The author; Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill;\n        his wife and the wife of Chief Crow, both medicine women;\n        Chief Crow, medicine man, lifting the sacred roll of the\n        medicine pipe; Medicine Weasel and Old Boy, singers]\n\nThe song ended. The medicine woman, with a pair of sacred red-painted\nwillow tongs, took a coal from the fire, placed it just in front of\nthe sacred medicines, and dropped upon it a pinch of sweet grass. It\nburned, and, as the perfumed smoke arose, she and her man grasped\nhandfuls of it and stroked their bodies, thus purifying themselves\nbefore handling the medicines. Then, all present joining in, they sang\nthe song of the real bear, the grizzly, while the medicine woman\nunfastened the outer wrapping of the medicine pipestem roll, which was\nbound with a strip of fur from a grizzly's back; and at the same time,\nin keeping with the time of the song, they made the sign for the bear,\nclosed hands held upon each side of the head, representing its wide,\nrounding ears.\n\nThat song finished, the song of the buffalo began, the medicine man\nand the medicine woman clenching their hands and alternately putting\none out before the other, representing the deliberate, ponderous tread\nof the animals as they traveled to and from the water. When that song\nwas finished--and it was one to stir one's inmost soul--another\nwrapping, bound with buffalo fur, was undone, and all present besought\nthe gods to have pity upon them.\n\nNext came the fourth and last song, the song of the beaver, chief of\nwater animals. And while it was being sung, the medicine woman\nunrolled the fourth and last wrapping, and the sacred medicine\npipestem lay in sight of us all. At that all the women gave shrill\ncries of triumph, of victory; and all the medicine men beginning a\nsolemn chant to the Sun, Chief Crow advanced, received from the\nmedicine wife of my old friend the sacred stem, and, extending the fan\nof feathers drooping from it, held it aloft and danced in time with\nthe song to the doorway of the lodge and back again, and returned the\nstem to my friend, who reverently took and embraced it, and made a\nshort prayer to the gods for the long life, good health, and happiness\nof us all, especially the little children of the tribe.\n\nNext came my part in the ceremony. My old relative and friend felt\naround in his medicine pouch, got out a small sack of _a-san\u00b4_, the\nsacred red paint, and painted my face with it, at the same time\nbeseeching the gods to give me, his brother, Ap-i-kun\u00b4-i, long life,\ngood health, and prosperity in all things. Then, having finished the\npainting and the prayer, he had his wife hand Chief Crow, his helper,\nthe long red-painted wooden flute that goes with the medicine, and the\nlatter, holding it aloft, danced with it almost to the doorway of the\nlodge, where he blew several soft, clear notes to the four corners of\nthe earth, and then returned the flute to the woman. This was the Elk\nMedicine whistle, for imitating the weird call of that animal, and was\nused just now to call him, the ancient Elk god, to give me his favor,\nhis pity. My friend then facing me, upon his knees began the thunder\nsong, in which all joined, and, spreading his blanket-clad arms wide\nto represent the thunder bird wings, hovered before me, fanned me with\nhis wings, the intent being to waft to me from him the sacred power.\nThat over, all arose, and passing in line from the lodge, Chief Crow\nleading, danced through the camp and back again, and the ceremony\nended.\n\nI cannot begin to express how I felt all through the ceremony. I\nhonored my people for their sincere faith, their reverence for their\ngods. And my thoughts went back to the time when they were the lords\nof these plains and mountains and knew not want. And not so very long\nago they were a tribe of three thousand members, and now they number\nonly eight or nine hundred, and those who have gone have mostly gone\nfrom want, from their susceptibility to disease because of lack of\nproper nourishment. Do you wonder that they feel bitterly toward the\nwhites, who have taken from them everything that made their life\nworth living?\n\n  [Illustration: ELK MEDICINE PIPE DANCE\n      Chief Crow leading the column and carrying the sacred stem]\n\n\n\n_August 27._\n\nBecause we were to-day to embark upon the deep, dark waters of this\nlake, we yesterday had a little ceremony on the shore, beseeching the\ndread Under-Water People to have pity upon us and allow us to pass in\nsafety over their domain. We had a little fire close to the water's\nedge, and having filled and lighted his pipe with a coal taken from it\nwith his sacred red tongs, old Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill\nsmoked and made his prayers, at the same time casting into the water a\nlittle sack of his medicines as a sacrifice to the gods. It was a\nshort ceremony, but satisfied even the most timid of the women that\nall would be well with them during their voyage upon the lake.\n\nAnd so, where we once had rude rafts of logs, lashed together with\nrawhide ropes, we this morning embarked in good boats and went all up\nthe beautiful lake, past Red Eagle, and Little Chief, and\nAlmost-a-Dog Mountains to the head of the lake, and looking back at\nthe slope of Milk River Ridge saw the far-apart, enormous footprints\nof Heavy Runner, keeper of the buffalo.\n\nAway back in ancient times, after Old Man had made buffalo and they\nhad increased and covered the plains, they had great desire to wander\nwestward and see what might be on the other side of the great\nmountains. The people--the Blackfeet--learning of this were greatly\ndistressed. The far side of the mountains, away west and still\nwestward to the shores of the Everywhere-Water, was the country of\ntheir enemies, many tribes of them, and should they get possession of\nthe buffalo herds they would never let them return. What to do about\nit they had no idea, so they called upon Old Man for help.\n\n  [Illustration: UPPER TWO MEDICINE LAKE\n      Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill (with pipe) propitiating the\n        dreaded Under Water People]\n\nSaid he: \"I made the buffalo to be plains animals, and here upon these\nplains they shall remain, and other-side tribes shall come to you and\nask permission to kill a few of them now and then. So, don't worry.\nGo home now and attend to your affairs. All shall be well with you.\"\n\nThe people went home. They saw that the buffalo remained upon the\nplains in apparently as great numbers as ever. But some of the\nhunters, to learn for sure if they were all there, ascended the\ndifferent passes of the mountains and went down the other side for\nsome distance. There were no buffalo, not even a few straggling bulls\non the other side, and they wondered how Old Man was keeping them\nback. They soon learned. In a vision it was revealed to an old\nmedicine man that a huge god, a man of enormous stature, was\npatrolling the mountains from far south to the everlasting snow of the\nnorth, and with a club driving the buffalo back eastward as fast as\nthey came anywhere near the summit of the range. And so it was that\nthe other tribes--those of the west--never got the buffalo.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nOn our way down the lake we passed the beautiful Sun Camp and the\nchalets of the Great Northern, perched upon the very spot where\nTail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill and I killed many a bighorn and\ngoat in times gone by. It was a favorite wintering place of the\nanimals, for the winds kept the steep mountain slope practically bare\nfrom snow. And passing the mouth of the creek just above the camp, I\nremembered that I had named it after Thomas, and Colonel Robert, and\nthe Honorable Cecil Baring, of London, with whom I often hunted back\nin the eighties. In those days there were many bighorn and goats, and\nnot a few grizzlies back in the basin at the head of the creek. And\nwhat amusing and sometimes exciting adventures we had with them! One\nmorning we espied a big \"billy\" goat on a ledge, and just as we saw\nhim he moved to the back side of it and lay down, showing only an inch\nor two of the top of his back.\n\n\"Who will go up and rout him out, so that I can get a shot?\" asked\nColonel Baring, and Jack Bean, of Yellowstone fame, volunteered.\n\nIt was to be a steep, almost straight-up climb, so Jack laid down his\nrifle and started without encumbrance of any kind. At last he reached\nthe shelf and stood up on it, and that \"billy\" came for him, head\ndown! And Jack! Never have I seen a man come down a dangerous cliff so\nfast as he did! And he kept coming, falling, sliding, rolling, and\nthen Colonel Baring fired and dropped the goat, and man and animal\ncame the rest of the way to the foot of the place together! We had\nbeen too much concerned for the safety of our friend to laugh, but\nwhen he at last stood up and faced us, bloody, half-naked, but not\nseriously hurt, we roared. But Jack never even smiled: \"Who would have\nthought that a blankety-blank goat would go for a fellow!\" he\nexclaimed; and he went to the creek to repair the damages to his\nperson.\n\nOn this day, halting here and there along the lake, we took some views\nof the scenery and of our people, and at sunset were back in our\nlodges. For some of us it is a last trip over the old, familiar\nground. My two old friends, Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill and\nYellow Wolf, must soon go on to their Shadow Land!\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nWe were not too tired to-night for story-telling, so, after the\nchildren had been put to bed and all was quiet, Takes-Gun-Ahead gave\nus the following, the story of tobacco, which is called\n\n\nNA-WAK\u00b4-O-SIS\n\n\"In that long ago time when the earth was young, and people had not\nlong been made, a man threw some weeds upon a fire and found that the\nodor, the smoke from their burning, was very pleasant. That night he\nhad a vision and learned that this plant was strong medicine; that,\nwhen smoked in a pipe, which his vision explained to him how to make,\nit would be the right thing with which to offer prayers to the gods.\nHe also taught the man the prayers and all the ceremony that went with\nthe prayers; and told him how to plant the weeds, from the seeds on\ntheir tops, so that he could always have plenty of it.\n\n\"This man was very much pleased with what he had learned. He went to\nhis three brother medicine men and told them all about it, and the\nfour of them formed a society of themselves and no others, for the\nraising of the weed and its proper uses. But they were very stingy\nwith this weed, which they named _na-wak\u00b4-o-sis_, and would only now\nand then give the people a leaf of it, although they raised large\nnumbers of the stalks in every summer time.\n\n\"A young man named Lone Bull was very anxious to become a member of\nthis medicine society, but because he had no medicines and knew not\nthe rites of it, he was told that he could not join it. At that time\nthe camp of the people was close under Chief Mountain. He left it,\nwith his woman and his pack dogs, and moved up to the river running\nout of the Inside Lakes, and there set up his lodge. Said he then to\nhis woman: 'I have come up here to get medicines; in some way to find\nthings that will enable me to become a raiser of _na-wak\u00b4-o-sis_. If I\ncan do that, I shall be of great help to the people. Now, then, I am\ngoing to hunt and collect all the medicine skins I can find, and you\nstay at home, take care of the lodge, gather wood, and cook what meat\nwe need. I shall bring in plenty of fat meat along with the skins.'\n\n\"The man went hunting every day, and the woman remained at home. One\nday, when the man was gone, she thought she heard singing; beautiful\nsinging; but look where she would she could see no singers. She spoke\nto the man about it when he came home that evening, and made him feel\nuneasy: 'If you hear it again, look about more carefully,' he told\nher.\n\n\"She heard it the next day, and this time located it, right under the\nlodge. She went out to the bank of the river and looked at the bank:\nthere, under the water, were beaver holes in it, and beaver cuttings\nupon the sandy bottom, and by that she knew that the lodge had been\nset up above a bank beaver's home, and that beavers were the singers.\nShe went back to the lodge, lay down and put her ear to the ground,\nand could then hear them plainly, and was pleased. Their singing was\nso good that it was all that she could do to stop listening to them\nand begin cooking the evening meal.\n\n\"When Lone Bull came home that night she told him what she had\nlearned, but he could hear nothing, although he put his ear close to\nthe ground. Nor could he hear the singing the next evening, nor the\nnext, although his woman could hear it plainly. So now the woman got\nher knife and cut a round hole in the ground, and Lone Bull laid his\nhead in it and could then hear the singing. He told her to make the\nhole deeper; larger. She did so, and cut clear through the ground, and\nlooking down he could see the beavers sitting in their home, singing\nbeautiful songs, and dancing strange and beautiful dances in time to\nthem.\n\n\"'Younger brothers, have pity on me!' he cried. 'Oh, my young\nbrothers, teach me your medicine!'\n\n\"They looked up and saw him, and one answered: 'Close the hole that\nyou have made, because the light disturbs us, and we will soon be with\nyou.'\n\n\"They soon came in through the doorway, four fine-looking men,\nbeautifully dressed. They had changed themselves from beavers to men.\nThey took seats, and then one of them said to Lone Bull: 'Elder\nbrother, what is it that you want of us? How can we help you?'\n\n\"Lone Bull told them what it was: his great desire to obtain\n_na-wak\u00b4-o-sis_ and grow it for the people.\n\n\"'We have that plant; like us it is from the water, a water medicine,'\nthe beaver man told him; 'but before you can use it you have much to\ndo, much to learn. You have to learn all our songs and prayers and\ndances and different ceremonies, and gather for the ceremonies a skin\nof every animal and bird that is of the water, one of each except the\nbeavers, and of them there must be two. You know these animals and\nbirds: otter, mink, muskrat; different kinds of ducks; the fish hawk,\nand all the other birds that get their food from the life of the\nwater. Why? Because there are two great life-givers of this world: the\nsun, which gives heat, and water, that makes growth, and in our\nceremonies the skins of these different animals are symbols of the\nwater.'\n\n\"'I shall collect them all, so teach me everything,' Lone Bull told\nthem. And they began that very night.\n\n\"Day after day Lone Bull hunted the animals and birds, brought in\ntheir skins for his woman to cure, and night after night the beavers\ntaught him their medicine, all the sacred prayers and dances and\nceremonies of it. And at last he knew them all thoroughly.\n\n\"Then, one night, the beaver chief handed him some stalks of\n_na-wak\u00b4-o-sis_, the top stems all covered with little round seeds.\n\n\"'These,' said he, 'are the children of the big-leaved plants; put\nthem into the ground and they will grow and make other plants that\nbear children. And now, I must tell you just how to plant: Gather a\ngreat, long, wide pile of old dry logs, dry brush and weeds, and set\nit afire. The heat from it will burn the ground, burn the sod, and\nmake everything soft under it. Then, when the place has cooled, gather\nfrom around badger holes, squirrel holes, and wherever you can find\nit, plenty of the brown earth they have thrown out, and mix it with\nthe burned black earth, so that it will not pack hard around the\nseeds, and keep them from coming up into the sunlight.\n\n\"'After you have taken all the seeds from the stems, you must put them\nin a sack and not touch them again with your hands. With an antelope\nhorn you will make row after row of little holes all across the burned\nground and only a hand apart, and with a buffalo-horn spoon drop a\nseed into each hole. When that is done, and it will require a long\ntime, you and yours are to dance along each row of seed, singing the\nsacred songs, your feet lightly pressing down the ground over the\nseed. At the end of a row you must step across to the next row, and\ndance backward on that one, and forward on the next, and so on until\nthe last row has been pressed down, and all your songs have been sung.\nThen you can go away from the place for a time. Return after one moon\nhas passed, and you will find that the young plants have grown above\nthe ground. Watch them, that insects do not destroy them. Give them\nwater if the rains fail you. They will grow all summer, and fade with\nthe ripening of the choke-cherries. Cut them then, care well for them,\nand you and your people will have a plenty for your winter smokes and\nceremonies. There! I have told you all!'\n\n\"It was planting-time then. Lone Bull moved right up to the foot of\nthe lower one of the Inside Lakes, and did everything that he had been\ntold to do, his wife helping him in every way. People hunting from\ndown Chief Mountain way came and saw his growing plants, and went home\nand told about them. The four medicine men just laughed. 'Ha!' They\ncried. 'He has no _na-wak\u00b4-o-sis_! He wanted to join us and we would\nnot let him into our society. He but plants some useless weed.'\n\n\"But later on, just as their planting was getting ripe, a terrible\nhailstorm came along and destroyed it all; every leaf was cut into\nfine pieces! They cried from grief! Then they said among themselves:\n'_Na-wak\u00b4-o-sis_ we must have or our medicines will be without power.\nIt may be that this Lone Bull really has the true plants: let us go up\nand see them.'\n\n\"They went, all the people with them, and saw that he had the sacred\nplants. The hailstorm had come nowhere near his place.\n\n\"Said they to him then: 'You have a big planting, and we will help you\ngather it, and you and we four will use it. You shall join us.'\n\n\"Lone Bull laughed long before he answered: 'I need no help from you.\nYou shall each have a little of my planting for your own use, and you\nshall pay me well for it. The rest, excepting what I need, I shall\ngive to the people, and hereafter they will always have all that they\nneed of the plants.'\n\n\"And as he said that he would do, so he did, and the people gave him\ngreat praise and honor for it all, and he lived to great age. Kyi! Why\nnot? He had the beaver--the water medicine! It is a powerful medicine\nto this day!\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nA visitor in our camp this evening told a tale that ill pleases us.\nThere is a tourist camp away up in Gun-Sight Pass, one of the most\nweirdly beautiful places in this whole country. There, the other day,\nan employee was putting up a table on which were painted arrows\npointing to the different mountains, the name of each peak alongside\nits particular arrow.\n\nA tourist standing near and watching the work suddenly exclaimed:\n\"Why, over there is a peak that has no name. Can you not name it after\nme?\"\n\n\"Certainly I can,\" the employee answered; and painted another arrow\nand inscribed beside it: \"Lehnert Peak.\"\n\n\"And over there is a fine waterfall,\" the tourist said. \"Will you\nplease name it after my little daughter?\"\n\n\"Sure!\" said the man; and painted another arrow pointing to \"Mary\nFrances Falls.\"\n\nEnough said!\n\n\n\n\nV\n\nIKS-I\u00b4-KWO-YI-A-TUK-TAI (SWIFT CURRENT RIVER)\n\n\n\n_September 1._\n\nWe moved up here the other day and made camp beside one of the most\nlovely lakes in all this Rocky Mountain country. In my time we called\nit Beaver Woman's Lake. It is now McDermott Lake. And what a name that\nis for one of Nature's gems! There are names for other lakes and peaks\nhere just as bad as that, but we shall have nothing to say about them\nhere. Only by an act of Congress can we get what we want done, and we\nhave faith that within a reasonable time all these mountains and lakes\nand streams will bear the names of the great chiefs, medicine men, and\nwarriors who traversed them before the white men came.\n\n  [Illustration: ICEBERG LAKE\n      Immense bergs are continually dropping into it from the live\n        glacier in background]\n\nSome of us--all excepting our two old men and the women--have been\nriding over the different trails here, viewing the glaciers and other\nplaces of interest, especially Iceberg Lake, where we saw a mass of\nice as large as a house part from the glacier, splash down into the\ndeep lake, and disappear, and after a time come up from the depths to\nthe surface and create another commotion of the waters. It was a grand\nsight!\n\nTail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill says that the lake with the\nunpronounceable white man's name--McDermott--should be called Jealous\nWomen's Lake; that away back in the days of his youth, when the\nKootenai Indians occasionally came to camp and hunt with the\nBlackfeet, he had a youthful friend of the mountain tribe who told him\nthe following story:--\n\n\nTHE JEALOUS WOMEN\n\n\"In those days a young Kootenai, good of heart, a great hunter, and\nvery brave, married twin sisters so alike that except for one thing\nthey could not be told apart: one was a slow, the other a very fast,\ntalker.\n\n\"In time the fast talker, named Marmot, became jealous of her sister,\nCamas, complaining all the time that she had to do the most of the\nlodge work, and that she was sure Camas said bad things about her to\ntheir man. Camas denied all this. 'I have never tried to place myself\nfirst with our man,' she said. 'We are twins; I love you dearly; our\nman's heart is so big that it holds us both in equal love. Now, be\nsensible! Cast out your bad thoughts for they are all wrong.'\n\n\"But Marmot persisted in believing that she was neglected; that her\nsister had all their man's affection; and she finally went to him with\nher complaint. He laughed. 'I love you just as much as I do your\nsister,' he said. 'Now, just think back and show me when and in what\nway I have shown that she is first with me!'\n\n\"Marmot sat down and thought. She thought a long time; remained\nsilent. The man was very patient with her; he waited for her answer,\nbut it did not come. At last he said: 'Well, you have thought a long\ntime. Have you found one thing in which I gave her preference?'\n\n\"'No, I haven't, but all the same I believe that you love her best,'\nMarmot answered; and got up and went about her work.\n\n\"The man shook his head, made no answer to that, and took up his\nweapons and went hunting down the river. At the time he was camped\nright here at this lake.\n\n\"The man had not gone far, moving slowly, carefully, through the\ntimber and brush along the river, when he heard ahead a great\nsplashing in the water, and, going closer, found that it was caused by\ntwo otters playing. They would chase each other in the water, then\nclimb the bank and go as swift as arrows from a bow down a slide that\nthey had made, and again chase and tumble each other over in the\nwater. The man crept closer to the slide, an arrow in his bow, another\nin his hand, and, watching his chance, shot one of the players. He\ntried to get the other, but it dived and was gone before he could fit\nthe other arrow to his bow: 'It is too bad that I didn't get the\nother. I would have liked a skin of these medicine skins for each of\nmy women,' he said to himself.\n\n\"He took the otter home and handed it to Camas. 'That is yours,' he\nsaid. 'There were two of them. To-morrow, Marmot, I will get the other\nfor you, and then you will each have a strong medicine skin.'\n\n\"Marmot said nothing, but looked cross.\n\n\"The man went hunting the next day but he could not find the other\notter. He searched the river for many days and could not find one.\n\n\"And as the days passed, Marmot became more and more angry, and\nfinally said to her sister: 'I have proof now that our man loves you\nbest. He gave you the otter; he does not even try to get one for me.\nHe hunts other animals every day, bighorn, goats, animals that live\nnowhere near the haunts of the otter.'\n\n\"'Now, don't be foolish!' Camas answered. 'You know as well as I do\nthat he has tried and tried to get the other otter for you. But at\nthe same time he has to get meat for us: that is why he hunts the\nmountain animals.'\n\n\"'Camas, the two of us can no longer live in this lodge,' cried\nMarmot. 'You are a bad woman! I hate you! I will fight you any way you\nsay to see which of us shall be our man's one wife!'\n\n\"Then it was that, for the first time, Camas became angry: 'We have no\nweapons to fight with,' she answered, 'but I propose this: We will\nswim this lake across and back and across and back until one of us\nbecomes tired and drowns! Now, crazy woman, what do you say to that?'\n\n\"'Come on! Come on!' Marmot cried, and ran to the shore and tore off\nher clothes. So did Camas, and the two rushed into the water and began\ntheir swim of hate. They crossed the lake; turned and came back;\ncrossed again and started back, Camas well in the lead. She reached\nthe shore in front of the lodge, dragged herself out on the shore, and\nturned. Her sister had gone down. There was not even a ripple on the\nstill water. Marmot was drowned. Hardly knowing what she did, she put\non her clothes and went into the lodge and cried and cried. The man\ncame home. She was still crying. He asked her where Marmot was, and\nshe cried all the harder, but at last told him all. Then the man\ncried. Together the two mourned for a long time, and searched the lake\nfor the body of the lost one, and could not find it. So they moved\naway from the unhappy place and returned to the camp of their people,\nbut it was a long time, a very long time, before they ceased mourning,\nand never again would they go anywhere near the lake.\n\n\"Yes, this is the Lake of the Jealous Women!\"\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\nNI-NA US-TAK-WI (CHIEF MOUNTAIN)\n\n\n\n_September 7._\n\nWe came up here the other day to the foot of this great landmark of\nthe country, and made camp beside a running spring in the edge of the\ntimber. The mountain is most appropriately named. It is the outer one\nof an eastward projecting spur of the range, and is higher than any of\nthe peaks behind it. A chief, a leader, should always be taller, more\nconspicuous in every way than his followers. This mountain gradually\nslopes up eastward from the one behind it to an altitude of 9056 feet,\nthen drops in a sheer cliff several thousand feet to its steep slope\nrunning down to the plain. From several hundred miles to the north,\nand an equal distance to the south, and from the Bear Paw Mountains to\nthe east, it can be plainly seen, grim, majestic, a veritable Chief of\nMountains, and for that reason the Blackfeet so named it in the long\nago.\n\nThe way to climb the mountain is by the long, narrow, and in places\ncut-walled ridge running up toward its summit from the west, and then\none has but one cliff to surmount, the one almost at its crest. Only\nmen and goats and bighorn can scale that cliff, but on the extreme\nsummit lies an old buffalo skull, taken there by a Blackfoot in the\nlong ago for a pillow rest while getting his medicine dream. There he\nfasted for days, and at last, in his weakened condition resulting from\nwant of food and water, got his vision, his medicine which was to be\nhis guardian through life. Who was it that came to him in his fasting\ndreams? Ancient Buffalo, perhaps; or, maybe, Morning Star. Whoever it\nwas, he went staggering down the mountain and to camp, absolutely\ncertain that he had found his guardian spirit, his medium for favor\nwith the greatest god of all, the Sun, supreme ruler of this earth.\n\n  [Illustration: EN ROUTE TO ICEBERG LAKE]\n\nWe are here again upon our own ground, the Blackfeet Reservation, and\nso once more have meat in camp, fat bighorn and fat mule deer, killed\nby our hunters. This was once a great wintering place for deer and\nelk, and, higher up, for bighorn. Some years ago a hunter,\nNa-mik\u00b4-ai-yi by name, trailed a band of elk around to the ridge\nbehind the mountain and up its narrow way until they came to the foot\nof the cliff near the summit and could go no farther. There they\nturned back toward him and he fired one shot and dropped the leader.\nThe others, afraid to try to dash past him, chose the one alternative:\nthey rushed to the high cliff there on the north side of the ridge,\nand sprang from it, and were all killed by the fall, eighty head of\nthem!\n\n\n\n_September 8._\n\nLast night, after our feast of _ni-tap\u00b4-i-wak-sin_ (real meat) we\ngathered in Yellow Wolf's lodge for a smoke and a talk, and our host\ngave us a little story that I must here set down, the story of\n\n\nTHE WISE MAN\n\n\"Here, under this mountain, the people were encamped and two of them\nwere Wise Man[13] and his woman. He was so named because he was\nalways finding out how to do useful things.\n\n    [13] Mo-k\u00fbk\u00b4-i In-ah.\n\n\"Up to the time of this encampment the people had had nothing to wear\nbut the plainest kind of garments, shirts, leggins, gowns, moccasins,\nall made of plain tanned leather of different kinds. Wise Man thought\nlong about this, and finally said to his wife: 'Let us move away from\ncamp for a time, and go farther into the mountains. I have a plan that\nI want to try by myself.'\n\n\"The next morning they packed their dogs and moved up to the foot of\nthe Inside Lakes, crossed the outlet, and made camp. Wise Man then did\nsome hunting, killed plenty of meat for his wife and the dogs, and\nbegan on his plan for making clothing more pleasing to the eye. He\nwent up on the high ridge between the lakes and Little River and dug\nan eagle trap. That is, he dug a pit somewhat longer and wider than\nhis body, and quite deep, and killed a deer and laid it beside the\npit, and slashed its body so that the liver protruded. He then got\ninto the pit, covered the top of it with willow sticks and grass, and\nwaited, hoping that eagles would see the deer and come to eat it. They\ndid come; he could hear the heavy swish of their wings as they sailed\ndown upon it; and as they were eating the liver he would cautiously\nreach up, grasp them by the legs, pull them down into the pit, and\nkneeling upon them crush out their life. In this way, one at a time,\nhe caught many eagles, and took them home as he caught them, and took\nfrom their bodies the tail feathers, the fluffy plume feathers, and\nothers that he thought would answer his purpose.\n\n\"They had a very rank, unpleasant odor, these feathers; so, when he\nthought that he had enough of them, he had his woman cover the floor\nof the lodge with a thick layer of sweet sage, upon which he carefully\nspread them. He then threw a quantity of sweetgrass upon the fire,\nand, running from the lodge, the two tightly closed it and kept the\nsmoke inside. This last they did three or four times until the\nfeathers lost their bad odor, and were perfumed with the pleasant\nodor of sweetgrass and sweet sage, both perfumes sacred to the gods,\nas they afterward learned.\n\n\"Winter was now come, and Wise Man began to hunt weasels, brown and\ncommon of appearance in summer, but white and beautiful in winter.\nThis was more difficult work than trapping eagles, but by setting many\nsnares he caught during the winter more than a hundred of them. He\nthen made a headdress of some of the eagle tail feathers, and\nsuspended from it a number of weasel skins, and along the seams of his\nshirt and leggins tied a number of the weasel skins. He then put on\nthe headdress and his ornamental clothes and stood up and asked his\nwoman how he appeared in them.\n\n\"'You seem to have become a different man,' she answered. 'You look\nvery brave, very handsome. The clothes are beautiful.'\n\n\"'They are of better appearance than they were,' he said, 'but I am\nnot yet satisfied. Perhaps I can improve them; but first I have to do\nsomething for you.'\n\n\"Wise Man put away his new clothes, and in old ones hunted elk,\ntaking from them their two tushes, and in the evening boring holes in\nthe soft part. Having collected two hundred, he sewed them in rows on\nthe breast and the back of his woman's new gown, and both saw that it\nwas then a handsome gown.\n\n\"Said the woman: 'There! We are now complete; we have fine appearance.\nLet us go home and show the people what we have done.'\n\n\"'No,' Wise Man answered; 'something is lacking, something that will\nmake our clothes really beautiful. I have done all that I can without\nhelp, and now I shall ask the gods to show me what more to do.'\n\n\"Perhaps it was the gods that directed his footsteps the next day. As\nhe was going through the timber he came upon the remains of a\nporcupine, its quills scattered all around upon the ground. He sat\ndown, took up some and examined them, and the thought came to him that\nthey could be dyed different colors and in some way sewed upon\ngarments and make them of brighter hue. He took all that he could\nfind, and killed several more porcupines, and carried home all the\nlong quills to his woman and told her his plan.\n\n\"Said she, 'I know that the yellow moss that grows on pine trees will\nstain anything a yellow that will not fade, that cannot be washed off.\nLet us seek for other colors.'\n\n\"They sought a long time, finding a green color in a certain wood, a\nred in the juice of a plant, and then they dyed the quills the three\ncolors. Meantime the woman had been trying different ways to fasten\nthe quills to leather, and now, by flattening them, turning in the\nends, and sewing them side by side with very fine sinew and with the\nfinest of bone needles, she succeeded in making long bands of them of\ndifferent designs in the various colors. She was a long, long time\nmaking them, but at last she made enough of the bands to sew onto the\narms of Wise Man's shirt, and down his leggins, and upon the neck\nfront-and-back of her gown. Each was so pleased with the appearance of\nthe other then that they kissed and almost cried with joy. Early\nthe following morning they packed up, crossed the river, and started\nfor the camp, still here at Chief Mountain. As soon as they came in\nsight of it they stopped, put on their fine clothes, and then went on.\nThe people saw them approaching, but not until they were right close\nto the camp were they recognized. Then what a crowd surrounded them,\nstaring at their beautiful garments, asking questions without end, and\nas soon as they learned how this had all been done, they began at once\nto gather material for similar clothing. And Wise Man, of course,\nbecame a great man in the tribe, for to him was due the discovery of\nthe way to make beautiful things.\"\n\n  [Illustration: GLACIER ON TRAIL TO ICEBERG LAKE]\n\n\n\n_September 9._\n\nAlthough nothing has been said, we have not been so cheerful as usual\nfor the past few days, for all have known that we must soon part and\ngo our several ways. Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill is a sick man,\nand Yellow Wolf but little better, so to-night we decided to break\ncamp in the morning. To-morrow night each family will be at home on\nCutbank, Willow Creek, Two Medicine, and Badger, all streams of the\nReservation, and I shall be upon my way to the Always-Summer-Land.\n\nWell, we have had a pleasant time these past two months, traveling and\ncamping along our old trails, and yet the evenings around the lodge\nfires have not been of unalloyed joy: all have been tinged with sad\nmemories of other days; of deep regret that the old days--days when we\nhad all this great country to ourselves--are gone forever. And so,\nto-night, after our quiet, last evening meal together, we had no\nstory-telling, no passing of the pipe; none had the heart for it; and\nI am writing these last words by the light of a dying fire, true\nsymbol of the passing of all things. And now, by its last, blue\nflicker, I write--\n\nTHE END\n\n\n\n\nTranscriber's Note\n\nNames may appear both in hyphenated and unhyphenated forms, e.g.\nPi\u00b4-ta-mak-an and Pi\u00b4tamakan. These are preserved as printed.\n\nBoth ap-ut\u00b4-o-sohts and Ap-ut\u00b4-o-sosts appear in the book, referring\nto 'North.' It is possible that Ap-ut\u00b4-o-sosts is a printer error, as\ncompass directions seem to end in ~ohts, but as the transcriber was\nunable to establish this as a certainty, it is preserved as printed.\n\nMinor punctuation errors have been repaired.\n\nThe following amendments have been made:\n\n    Page vii--Is-i-sak\u00b4-ta amended to Is-si-sak\u00b4-ta--Ki-nuk\u00b4-si\n    Is-si-sak\u00b4-ta (Little River)\n\n    Page 143--warror amended to warrior--It struck the old warrior\n    fair in the ribs.\n\nThe frontispiece illustration has been moved to follow the title page.\nOther illustrations have been moved where necessary so that they are\nnot in the middle of a paragraph.","title":"Blackfeet Tales of Glacier National Park","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":46491}