CHAPTER TEN A LONG JOURNEY
Nothing went wrong while we were getting ready for the long trip to market, and finally everything was in shape to pack up. Our camp by this time was very large, for Indians had been coming in every few days until there were fully a thousand of them, and there must have been as many as five thousand horses. When we took the trail, I could not see half of the long string of pack animals.
We had twenty pack horses for our own family, loaded with buffalo robes, elk and deer skins, and our camp outfit. Washakie had a fine big tepee of elk hides made so it would shed rain. It could be divided in two parts. Sometimes if we were going to stop just one night, we would put up only half of it; but if we made a longer camp, we would set up the whole wigwam.
After we were well started, I noticed that the Indians broke up into small bands. That night there were only twenty-five tepees left in our camp. Washakie said that it was better to travel in small parties, for we could make better time and get better pasture for our horses.
In two or three days we reached the big river where I had come near choking the papoose to death with my rope. It was quite wide and the current was very swift where we forded it. When we got in the deepest place, mother’s horse stumbled over a boulder and fell, and away went mother down the stream; for she could not withstand the swift current. I saw her going and started after her, but I could not catch her until she was carried into the deep, quieter waters. My horse was a good swimmer, and I was soon at her side. I pulled her to the bank and tried to help her out of the water, but the willows were so thick at this place we had a hard time getting on land. Washakie hurried to the rescue.
“You came nearly going to the Happy Hunting Grounds that time, mother,” he said.
Washakie thought that we had better stop there so that mother could put on dry clothes and get over her scare, for he was afraid it would make her sick. We pitched camp for the night by a grove of cottonwoods near the river.
Just before dark an Indian came running in and told Washakie that the Crows had overtaken a small bunch of our Indians and had killed them and taken all their horses. Washakie ordered the War Chief to take every one of our warriors and follow the Crows clear into the Crow country if necessary to punish them. The War Chief told his men to get ready for a long trip, and the women and children to hide in the willows until they heard from them. I never saw greater excitement among the squaws and papooses than we had that night. They were bawling, and yelling, and rushing everywhere.
“Come on, Yagaki,” called mother, “let us get into the brush.”
“Not much,” I said, “I am going with the warriors to kill Crows.”
Mother grabbed me by one arm and Hanabi by the other, and mother began to cry and say to Washakie,
“Make him come; make him come.”
Washakie laughed and said that I was just fooling, that I hadn’t lost any Crows. He said that he was going to guard the camp.
“So am I,” I said. With that mother let me go. I ran and caught my pinto pony, put my saddle and a few buffalo robes on him and went with mother and Hanabi down the river. When we reached the rest of the crowd, I could hear the papooses howling like a pack of young coyotes.
“What is the use of hiding and making such a racket?” I asked. “If the Crows have any ears they can hear this noise for five miles.”
Mother said that it made no difference for the Crows did not dare to come into the brush after us.
“Are the Crows as big cowards as our Indians?” I asked.
She said that they were.
“Then there is no danger,” I said; “we had better go to sleep.”
It was not long before we heard Washakie call for us to come back.
“There,” I said; “another scare is over with no Crows at all. I shall never hide again.”
When we got to camp we learned that a few Crows had chased some of our Indians and had fired a few shots at them, but nobody had been killed, and not even a horse had been stolen. About fifty of our young warriors were following the Crows; but I knew that they would never overtake them.
E. S. Curtis
Indians traveling.
The next day we packed up early and hit the trail pretty hard. For several days we headed south. We left the Piupa, or Snake River, and crossed over the mountains. Finally we came to a place called Tosaibi, which I learned later to be Soda Springs, in southeastern Idaho. We could not use the water of these springs, so we went on a short distance and camped on a good-sized river which the Indians called Titsapa; this was the Bear River.
They said that this stream ran into a big salt lake that reached nearly to my old home. That started me to thinking about my dear father and mother, my brothers and sisters I should like so much to see, and I could feel the tears running down my cheeks. Mother saw them and came and sat down by my side.
“Yagaki,” she said, “I fear you do not like to live with us.”
“Why do you say that?” I asked.
“What are you crying about?”
I told her that I was thinking of my white mother.
“Am I not as good to you as your own mother?” she asked.
I told her that she was. But I could not help wanting to see my white mother and my people just the same.
We followed down the Titsapa for one day’s travel and there we stayed for three days. At this place part of our band was going to leave us and make the journey to Salt Lake City to sell our robes and buckskins and what furs we had. I wanted to go with the party, but mother would not let me. Hanabi and Washakie went. They took twelve pack horses very heavily loaded and also two young horses to sell if they got a chance. They left mother and me with the camp outfit and sixty-four head of horses to look after. Those that were not going to Salt Lake City intended to go off northwest and strike the head of another river, about four days’ travel away, and stay there till the others returned.
When mother and I went to packing up for our return, we found that we did not have pack saddles enough for all of our camp outfit. Besides our tepee, bedding, clothing, and utensils, we had sixteen sacks of dried meat and two sacks of service berries. This was too much for our eight pack saddles. Mother said that we could get along if we had two more saddles so I told her to use mine for one and I would ride bareback. She did not like to do this, but she finally consented, and another boy let us have his saddle, so we packed ten horses. This took a good deal of time each morning.
After three days of slow traveling we reached the head of a stream which they called Tobitapa; the whites now call it the Portneuf River. There were fifteen squaws, about thirty-five papooses, and three old men Indians in our camp.
Washakie thought it would take them fifteen days to go to Salt Lake City and get back to where we were. I asked mother whether she was not afraid that the Crows would come and kill all of us while they were gone.
“No,” she said, “the Crows never come this far south.”
Then I asked her why she did not want me to go to Salt Lake City with the others. She said that she could not take care of so many horses without me to help, and she was afraid, too, that the white men would take me away from her.
“Is that the reason Washakie does not like to take me with him when he goes among the whites?” I asked her.
She told me that Washakie said that if I ever got dissatisfied and wanted to go home, he would give me my horse and a good outfit, and see that I got home safe. “But,” she said, “I hope that you will never want to go away, for I believe it would kill me if you should leave me.” I told her not to worry because I thought that I should always stay with her. It always made her seem happier when I would tell her that. If she ever saw me look unhappy, she would turn away and cry. She did everything she could to make me happy, and I tried to be kind to her.
Mother was afraid that I would get sick from not having bread and milk to eat, for I told her that was what I always had for supper when I was home. She thought that eating meat all the time would not agree with me and would make me unhealthy. Often she would have fried fish and fried chickens or ducks for supper. When I first went to live with her, she made a small sack and tied it to my saddle. She would keep this sack full of the best dried fish when we were traveling, so that I could eat if I got hungry; for she said that I could not go all day without eating anything, as the Indians often did. Every morning she would empty my lunch sack and refill it with fresh food. She soon found out what I liked best, and she always had it for me; so you see I had plenty to eat, even if I was with Indians; and that is more than a great many white children had at that time.
I was very healthy while I was with the Indians. I think the reason was that I did not like their way of doctoring. When any of them got a cold, they would dig a hole two or three feet deep by the side of a cold spring. Into this hole they would put a few cobblestones. Then they would build a fire in the hole, get the stones right hot, and then scrape the fire all out. The sick person had to get into the hole with a cup of water, and after being covered with a buffalo robe, he would pour the water on the hot rocks and make a steam. This would make him sweat like sixty. When he had sweated long enough some one would jerk off the robe and he would jump into the cold water of the spring. As soon as he got out of the water, they would throw a buffalo robe around him, let him sweat awhile, then they would cool him off gradually by taking the robe off a little at a time while he quit sweating. He was then supposed to be well.
Dr. T. M. Bridges
Indian sweat house covered; fire in foreground.
One chilly day I was out hunting chickens, and was quite a distance from camp when a heavy rainstorm came and soaked me through before I could get home. That night I coughed and coughed so that nobody in our tepee could sleep. The next day mother wanted to dig a hole for me. I told her that I did not want a hole dug for me until I was dead. She begged me to take a sweat.
“Not much,” I said, “no more of your jumping into springs for me.” I had not forgotten how they tried to cure my sore legs with a salt-springs bath.
She said that it would not hurt me. But I told her that I was played out and I would not do it.
“Well,” she said, “you need not jump into the cold water. The heat of the rocks and the steam from the ground will sweat you enough.”
“You had better do it,” said Washakie, “before you get sick in bed.”
“All right,” I said, “go to digging.”
Very soon she had the hole dug and everything ready, then she said, “Come now, pull off your clothes and get in here.”
“Pull off nothing,” I said.
“You must,” she said.
“Jerk them off,” urged Washakie; “I will hold this buffalo robe over you so that you will not be seen.”
Dr. T. M. Bridges
Framework of an Indian sweat house.
So off came my clothes and into the hole I went. I got over the rocks just the way an old sitting hen does over her eggs. Mother gave me a cup of water and I poured it over the heated boulders. She stood there to keep the robe over the hole and kept asking me if I was sweating. I told her that I was getting wetter than a fish; but for some cause she kept me for quite a while, then she jerked off the robe and whack! three or four buckets of cold water came all over me. Oh, I jumped out of that hole in a hurry!
Washakie stood there with the robe, threw it over me, carried me into the tepee and put me to bed. Then he threw more robes over me, and how I did sweat! It was rough doctoring, but it cured my cold all right.
This was after Washakie and his party had got back from Salt Lake. They were gone twenty-two days instead of fifteen. Washakie had disposed of his robes and skins at a good price, and he had sold the two horses, so he came back pretty well outfitted for the winter. He had twenty-four blankets, a lot of calico, some red flannel for the tongues of moccasins, some underclothing for me, and about a peck of beads of all colors and sizes. The beads were to swap for tanned buckskin, and the blankets for buffalo robes. He brought me a butcher knife, a new bridle, two pounds of candy, and a lot of fishhooks. I felt “heap rich” and very happy.
“Away we went to the bottom.”