II
E-k[=u]s'-kini started on his last war trail from the Black-foot crossing (Su-yoh-pah'-wah-ku). He led a party of six Sarcees. He was the seventh man.
On the second day out, they came to the Red Deer's River. When they reached this river, they found it very high, so they built a raft to cross on. They camped on the other side. In crossing, most of their powder got wet. The next morning, when they awoke, E-k[=u]s'-kini said: "Well, trouble is coming for us. We had better go back from here. We started on a wrong day. I saw in my sleep our bodies lying on the prairie, dead." Some of the young men said: "Oh well, we have started, we had better go on. Perhaps it is only a mistake. Let us go on and try to take some horses anyhow." E-k[=u]s'-kini said: "Yes, that is very true. To go home is all foolishness; but remember that it is by your wish that we are going on." He wanted to go back, not on his own account, but for the sake of his young men—to save his followers.
From there they went on and made another camp, and the next morning he said to his young men: "Now I am sure. I have seen it for certain. Trouble is before us." They camped two nights at this place and dried some of their powder, but most of it was caked and spoilt. He said to his young men: "Here, let us use some sense about this. We have no ammunition. We cannot defend ourselves. Let us turn back from here." So they started across the country for their camp.
They crossed the Red Deer's River, and there camped again. The next morning E-k[=u]s'-kini said: "I feel very uneasy to-day. Two of you go ahead on the trail and keep a close lookout. I am afraid that to-day we are going to see our enemy." Two of the young men went ahead, and when they had climbed to the top of a ridge and looked over it on to Sarvis Berry (Saskatoon) Creek, they came back and told E-k[=u]s'-kini that they had seen a large camp of people over there, and that they thought it was the Piegans, Bloods, Blackfeet, and Sarcees, who had all moved over there together. Saskatoon Creek was about twenty miles from the Blackfoot camp. He said: "No, it cannot be our people. They said nothing about moving over here; it must be a war party. It is only a few days since we left, and there was then no talk of their leaving that camp. It cannot be they." The two young men said: "Yes, they are our people. There are too many of them for a war party. We think that the whole camp is there." They discussed this for some little time, E-k[=u]s'-kini insisting that it could not be the Blackfoot camp, while the young men felt sure that it was. These two men said, "Well, we are going on into the camp now." Low Horn said: "Well, you may go. Tell my father that I will come into the camp to-night. I do not like to go in in the daytime, when I am not bringing back anything with me."
It was now late in the afternoon, and the two young men went ahead toward the camp, travelling on slowly. A little after sundown, they came down the hill on to the flat of the river, and saw there the camp. They walked down toward it, to the edge of the stream, and there met two women, who had come down after water. The men spoke to them in Sarcee, and said, "Where is the Sarcee camp?" The women did not understand them, so they spoke again, and asked the same question in Blackfoot. Then these two women called out in the Cree language, "Here are two Blackfeet, who have come here and are talking to us." When these men heard the women talk Cree, and saw what a mistake they had made, they turned and ran away up the creek. They ran up above camp a short distance, to a place where a few willow bushes were hanging over the stream, and pushing through these, they hid under the bank, and the willows above concealed them. The people in the camp came rushing out, and men ran up the creek, and down, and looked everywhere for the two enemies, but could find nothing of them.
Now when these people were running in all directions, hunting for these two men, E-k[=u]s'-kini was coming down the valley slowly with the four other Sarcees. He saw some Indians coming toward him, and supposed that they were some of his own people, coming to meet him, with horses for him to ride. At length, when they were close to him, and E-k[=u]s'-kini could see that they were the enemy, and were taking the covers off their guns, he jumped to one side and stood alone and began to sing his war song. He called out, "Children of the Crees, if you have come to try my manhood, do your best." In a moment or two he was surrounded, and they were shooting at him from all directions. He called out again, "People, you can't kill me here, but I will take my body to your camp, and there you shall kill me." So he advanced, fighting his way toward the Cree camp, but before he started, he killed two of the Crees there. His enemies kept coming up and clustering about him: some were on foot and some on horseback. They were thick about him on all sides, and they could not shoot much at him, for fear of killing their own people on the other side.
One of the Sarcees fell. E-k[=u]s'-kini said to his men, "A-wah-heh'" (Take courage). "These people cannot kill us here. Where that patch of choke-cherry brush is, in the very centre of their camp, we will go and take our stand." Another Sarcee fell, and now there were only three of them. E-k[=u]s'-kini said to his remaining men: "Go straight to that patch of brush, and I will fight the enemy off in front and at the sides, and so will keep the way open for you. These people cannot kill us here. There are too many of their own people. If we can get to that brush, we will hurt them badly." All this time they were killing enemies, fighting bravely, and singing their war songs. At last they gained the patch of brush, and then with their knives they began to dig holes in the ground, and to throw up a shelter.
In the Cree camp was K[)o]m-in'-[)a]-k[=u]s (Round), the chief of the Crees, who could talk Blackfoot well. He called out: "E-k[=u]s'-kini, there is a little ravine running out of that brush patch, which puts into the hills. Crawl out through that, and try to get away. It is not guarded." E-k[=u]s'-kini replied: "No, Children of the Crees, I will not go. You must remember that it is E-k[=u]s'-kini that you are fighting with—a man who has done much harm to your people. I am glad that I am here. I am sorry for only one thing; that is, that my ammunition is going to run out. To-morrow you may kill me."
All night long the fight was kept up, the enemy shooting all the time, and all night long E-k[=u]s'-kini sang his death song. K[)o]m-in'-[)a]-k[=u]s called to him several times: "E-k[=u]s'-kini, you had better do what I tell you. Try to get away." But he shouted back, "No," and laughed at them. He said: "You have killed all my men. I am here alone, but you cannot kill me." K[)o]m-in'-[)a]-k[=u]s, the chief, said: "Well, if you are there at daylight in the morning, I will go into that brush and will catch you with my hands. I will be the man who will put an end to you." E-k[=u]s'-kini said: "K[)o]m-in'-[)a]-k[=u]s, do not try to do that. If you do, you shall surely die." The patch of brush in which he had hidden had now been all shot away, cut off by the bullets of the enemy.
When day came, E-k[=u]s'-kini called out: "Eh, K[)o]m-in'-[)a]-k[=u]s, it is broad daylight now. I have run out of ammunition. I have not another grain of powder in my horn. Now come and take me in your hands, as you said you would." K[)o]m-in'-[)a]-k[=u]s answered: "Yes, I said that I was the one who was going to catch you this morning. Now I am coming."
He took off all his clothes, and alone rushed for the breastworks. E-k[=u]s'-kini's ammunition was all gone, but he still had one load in his gun, and his dagger. K[)o]m-in'-[)a]-k[=u]s came on with his gun at his shoulder, and E-k[=u]s'-kini sat there with his gun in his hand, looking at the man who was coming toward him with the cocked gun pointed at him. He was singing his death song. As K[)o]m-in'-[)a]-k[=u]s got up close, and just as he was about to fire, E-k[=u]s'-kini threw up his gun and fired, and the ball knocked off the Cree chiefs forefinger, and going on, entered his right eye and came out at the temple, knocking the eye out. K[)o]m-in'-[)a]-k[=u]s went down, and his gun flew a long way.
When K[)o]m-in'-[)a]-k[=u]s fell, the whole camp shouted the war whoop, and cried out, "This is his last shot," and they all charged on him. They knew that he had no more ammunition.
The head warrior of the Crees was named Bunch of Lodges. He was the first man to jump inside the breastworks. As he sprang inside, E-k[=u]s'-kini met him, and thrust his dagger through him, and killed him on the spot. Then, as the enemy threw themselves on him, and he began to feel the knives stuck into him from all sides, he gave a war whoop and laughed, and said, "Only now I begin to think that I am fighting." All the time he was cutting and stabbing, jumping backward and forward, and all the time laughing. When he was dead, there were fifteen dead Crees lying about the earthworks. E-k[=u]s'-kini body was cut into small pieces and scattered all over the country, so that he might not come to life again.