NOTES
[Note 1] ([page 7])
When, in 1803, the new Republic purchased from France for fifteen million dollars what was then known as the territory of Louisiana, the United States extended its boundaries toward the unknown West where it was believed a mighty range of mountains divided the continent, while far beyond lay the Pacific Ocean. The territory included practically what is now covered by the States of Montana, North and South Dakota, Nebraska, Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Indian Territory, and part of Colorado.
President Jefferson wished to aid the settlers along the Mississippi, who wanted more room for expansion toward the setting sun, and accordingly, on his recommendation, Congress authorized the sending of an exploring expedition to ascertain what lay beyond the limits of the new land, and, if possible, to go all the way to the ocean.
Captain Meriwether Lewis, the President’s private secretary, together with Captain William Clark, was placed in charge of the expedition, which started from St. Louis early in 1804. It consisted of nine young Kentuckians, fourteen United States soldiers, two French voyageurs to serve as interpreters among the Indians whom they expected to encounter, and a black servant for Captain Clark. Some frontiersmen also joined them before they left the last trading post. On May 24th this little expedition left the mouth of the Missouri, and plunged into the then unknown wilderness, not knowing whether a single soul of the party would ever live to come back again with a record of the wonders they had seen, and the perils they had encountered.
History tells us that they wintered at the Mandan village near the headwaters of the Missouri and that strange river which the Indians called Yellowstone, on account of the predominating color along its banks. The following spring the Lewis and Clark expedition continued on its way, reaching the Columbia River, and following it down until, at its mouth, they beheld the goal of all their hopes, the glorious ocean that lay bathed in the glow of the setting sun.
[Note 2] ([page 26])
In those days, when the Indians of the Northwest did not have the Great White Father at Washington to supply them with rations and fresh beef, it was customary for the various tribes to participate in annual fall hunts, so that sufficient meat might be procured to last them through the long, cold winters.
Sometimes they went after buffalo, which at that day were to be found in immense herds, and often the most wanton destruction was indulged in, traps being laid whereby the great animals were driven by hundreds over some precipice, so that the Indians hardly bothered taking anything but the tongues of their victims, which they cured by drying in the smoke of their fires. In spite of this slaughter the herds continued to increase until modern man, with his repeating rifle, made his appearance, at the time the first railroad was being built across the continent, when they quickly reached the point of practical extermination.
More often the meat obtained in these fall hunts was venison. This the Indians cured by drying in the sun. Thus prepared, it would keep for any length of time, if not allowed to get wet. It is not the nicest food an epicure might select, being dark-looking, and often as hard as flint; but pemmican, as this dried venison is called, can be made into a palatable dish when properly cooked.
When an Indian was sent on a trip of perhaps two hundred miles, to take a message to another tribe, he would simply carry along with him in his pouch a handful of this pemmican, which would serve him as a means of sustenance throughout his long journey, washed down with an occasional drink from some spring that he would discover on the trail.
[Note 3] ([page 128])
Probably the giant geyser which performed such a splendid service for our two young heroes was the one known for many years as Old Faithful, from the fact that, while other geysers in Yellowstone Park may seem grander on occasion, they are often erratic in their flow, and not to be depended on. Old Faithful has often been described, and is an object of such general interest among the visitors to the National Park that a large hotel has been built so close that one can sit in an easy-chair within a few hundred yards, and view its spectacular upheaval.
It seems to come every sixty-five minutes, to a dot, and the great white column rises with a roar from one to two hundred feet into the air, continuing for possibly the space of five minutes. New beauties are to be discovered with almost every eruption, according to the weather, and the hour of the day or night. Sunrise, sunset, moonlight sway the great steaming column into a thousand fantastic forms. When the geyser is quiet one may approach the crater, an oblong opening about two by six feet, with a quiet pool of crystal water.
Some say the deposits around the crater indicate an age of tens, if not hundreds of thousands of years. When Columbus discovered America this great column played at regular intervals in the primal solitude; when Lief Erickson landed it was unspeakably old, but glorious as ever; when Christ was on earth its strange beauty fell on the eye of the infrequent savage who gazed on it with superstitious awe; long before the reputed date of creation it played and coruscated in the sunlight.
No wonder, then, that those, who stop to think, gaze with wonder on Old Faithful and that the Indians, at the time the Lewis and Clark expedition crossed the continent, held it in awe and reverence.
[Note 4] ([page 162])
The grizzly bear has never been found east of a certain line marked by spurs of the mighty Rocky Mountains. At the time the Lewis and Clark expedition penetrated the wilderness lying between the settlements along the lower Missouri and the far distant Coast Range of mountains, in what is now known as California, very little was known of this most terrible of all the wild animals native to North America; indeed, some big game hunters put the grizzly ahead of the African lion or the tiger of the Indian jungle so far as ferocity and toughness goes.
Vague stories drifted to the ears of white hunters about a monster bear which terrified the red men of the West. They had even seen the claws strung around the neck of some chief who had won his high position after having killed one of these fearful creatures in a hand-to-hand fight.
When the explorers finally returned to civilization they brought with them the most amazing stories of things they had seen; but undoubtedly nothing surpassed their descriptions of the grizzly bear’s ten lives, and the fearful strength which the animal possessed.
In these modern days of soft-nosed bullets, and the exploding kind that do such fearful execution upon striking the game, it may not be so difficult to bring down old “Eph,” as Western men call the grizzly; but a score or more of years ago men declared that they had known such an animal to be hit with twenty shots, and yet seem to mind his wounds no more than if they were flea-bites.
It can be seen, then, that, in slaying a grizzly, Dick and his cousin Roger were really accomplishing what in those days was a stupendous feat. Their success must be laid partly to good luck, and the fact that they were able to send their lead to a vital spot. Ordinary wounds will have little or no effect upon a tough grizzly, save to further enrage the beast, and make him more fierce than ever.
Unless they are heavily armed, or can gain the shelter of a convenient tree, wise hunters usually let such a dangerous animal severely alone when coming unexpectedly upon him in the rocky canyons where he loves to prowl.
[Note 5] ([page 181])
The first real intimation the world received concerning the wonders of what is now Yellowstone Park can be said to have come through the experiences of a trapper by the name of Colter. He was made prisoner by the hostile Blackfeet in the early part of the nineteenth century, and, after being tortured by them, managed to escape. When he afterwards reached civilization he had some marvelous tales to tell about a land of steaming pools; of springs of boiling water, that at intervals shot hundreds of feet into the air; of seething cauldrons of pitch; of strange lakes and rivers; as well as of rocks and clay that bore the diversified colors of the rainbow. Of course, his rough friends laughed at his stories, and gave them little credence. Indeed, it was believed that the sufferings of the trapper had made him somewhat light in the head. They treated his accounts with derision, and classed the tales with those of Gulliver and Munchausen. But, in later years, everything Colter had told was amply verified, showing that he had actually been in the region now known as Yellowstone Park.
It was not until 1869 that a well-equipped prospecting party was sent out by private enterprise to ascertain the truth about this supposedly mythical region of awe-inspiring wonders. Thirty-six days were spent on the trip, and the party saw such amazing things that, as the account tells us, some of them “were unwilling on their return to risk their reputation for veracity by relating the wonders of that unequaled country.”
To-day, the tourist is taken into the Park and shown everything that is worth seeing with the least degree of discomfort. And there is nothing in the Old World that can at all compare with the natural wonders to be found on the great Government Reservation, the lake itself being the gem of them all, for it covers something like one hundred and fifty square miles, and is as clear as crystal.
[Note 6] ([page 191])
As a rule the Indians of the Great Northwest seemed to avoid the region now known as Yellowstone Park, even though it abounded in game, because of superstitious fears connected with the mysterious working of the spouting geysers, which they believed to be the evidence of the Evil One opposed to the Good Manitou. Occasionally the Blackfeet or the Crows invaded the borders when in need of fresh meat. Some lodges of a fragment of the Snake Indians have been found, a miserable tribe known as Sheep-eaters; but the powerful Sioux, the Mandans, and the Nez Perces tribes avoided the district as though it were truly accursed.
The most important Indian trail in the Park was that known as the Great Bannock Trail. It extended from Henry Lake across the Gallatin Range to Mammoth Hot Springs, where it was joined by another coming up the valley of the Gardiner. Thence it led across the Black-tail Deer plateau to the ford above Tower Falls; thence up the Lamor Valley, forking at Soda Butte, and reaching the Bighorn Valley by way of Clark’s Falls and the Stinking-water River. The trail was certainly a very ancient and much traveled one. It had become a deep furrow in the grassy slopes, and is still distinctly visible in places, though unused for a quarter of a century.
Arrows and spear heads have been discovered in considerable numbers. Some of the early explorers also found more recent and perishable evidence of the presence of Indians in the Park in the shape of rude wick-e-ups, brush enclosures, and similar contrivances of the Sheep-killers.
[Note 7] ([page 196])
Of all the tribes west of the Mississippi, even including the warlike Sioux, none gave the venturesome paleface adventurers who wandered into that country more trouble than the Blackfoot Indians. Like the Flatheads, and some other tribes, they had their main villages far up amidst the pine-clad mountains where enemies could hardly reach them without long and dangerous journeys. From these eyries they were accustomed to sally forth, either on some grand hunt for a winter’s supply of meat, or else to strike a sudden blow at some tribe with which they were at war.
When game grew scarce in their customary hunting grounds, some of these bold braves were in the habit of taking longer hunts, and had frequently approached the border of the Land of Wonders. As a rule they avoided the country of the spouting geysers, because they believed an Evil Spirit dwelt there.
The habits of these Indians differed from those of the Mandans, because they were by nature of a much wilder disposition, utterly untamable. To this day the remnants of the old Blackfoot tribe are not to be compared with other civilized aborigines who have taken to the plow and the cottage. The Mandans themselves suffered so severely from smallpox, introduced into the tribe through connection with the whites, that long years ago they became extinct.
[Note 8] ([page 221])
The usual medicine man of all the Indian tribes of North America in the days of the pioneers was as big a humbug as could be imagined. He usually held his position through craftiness, and the ability to make the tribe believe that he was in direct communication with the Great Spirit or Manitou. It was therefore a matter of some moment for the native doctor to “make good” when he had promised that victory would crown the efforts of the warriors going forth to battle, or otherwise his life might pay the penalty.
When it came to treating disease he seldom gave even the commonest herbs, rather trusting to incantations in order to frighten off the evil thing that had fastened on the sick person. Thus tomtoms were beaten, chants given, and the medicine man himself would perform a weird dance around the sick one, making music to accompany his gesticulations by rattling gourds in which stones had been slipped, jingling the metal ornaments on his apparel, and in every imaginable way trying to “conjure” the maker of the spell that had been laid upon the afflicted one.
Sometimes the invalid got well in spite of everything, and great was the jubilation of the tribe; on the other hand if death came and took a victim it was easy for the medicine man to find some excuse.
Perhaps the Blackfoot chief, Black Otter, may have seen white doctors cure their patients by giving them medicine; or else learned of it through intercourse with French traders, such as Lascelles. However that might be, it was not so very singular for some of his braves to have become afflicted with the same desire to be treated by a paleface medicine man. This, then, would account for the eagerness with which those who had received wounds in the affray between the Blackfeet and the invaders of the Enchanted Land agreed to let young Dick Armstrong attend to their hurts. Deep down in their hearts they must have realized that the way of the palefaces was much superior to the crude methods in vogue with their native medicine man.
[Note 9] ([page 246])
This incident of an Indian’s gratitude is not of an unusual character. The history of early pioneer days shows many such. The red men were savage and cruel fighters, crafty, and not to be trusted in many ways; but they possessed several noble characteristics that will always stand out boldly when the good and bad are contrasted.
Many instances are on record which prove that the Indian could be grateful for benefits bestowed, though he might sooner choose to die than ask a favor.
The brave whose wounded shoulder Dick had so skillfully treated evidently saw no reason why he should call out and alarm the camp when he discovered the paleface boys escaping. He probably had no special liking for the French trader, and it was Lascelles who seemed to be most concerned in the keeping of the two white lads. Perhaps, even, he had some reason to dislike the trader; or he may have felt, deep down in his heart, a secret admiration for the boys who could thus hoodwink a dozen Blackfoot braves.
[Note 10] ([page 308])
The Sioux proper, known among themselves and by other Indian tribes as Dacotahs, were originally one of the most extensively diffused nations of the Great West. From the Upper Mississippi, where they mingled with the northern race of Chippewas, to the Missouri, and far in the Northwest toward the country of the Blackfeet, the tribes of this family occupied the boundless prairie.
It was in the country of the Sioux, on a high ridge separating the head-waters of the St. Peter’s from the Missouri, that the far-famed quarry of red pipestone lay. It was originally deemed a neutral ground where hostile tribes from far and near might resort to secure a supply of this all-essential want of the Indian, for all their pipes were made of this peculiar hard clay.
To use the stone for any other purposes was to the Indians an act of sacrilege. They looked upon it as priceless medicine. At a meeting of chiefs which Mr. Catlin, the historical writer, attended near this quarry many years ago he heard some remarkable expressions used. “You see,” said one chief, holding a pipe close to his arm, “this pipe is part of our own flesh.” Another said: “If the white man takes away a piece of the red pipestone, it is a hole in our flesh, and the blood will always run.” A third expressed his feelings in a still more remarkable way: “We love to go to the Pipe-Stone, and get a piece for our pipes; but we ask the Great Spirit first. If the white men go to it they will take it out, and not fill up the holes again and the Great Spirit will be offended.”
Besides the Sioux there were to be found at times in this region the Flatheads, the Ojibbeways, the Assinaboias, the Crows, the Blackfeet, and several lesser tribes. Among them there was almost constant warfare. While the Blackfeet and others had plenty of game in their own lands, they were now and then seized with a desire to dare the anger of the Sioux and hunt the buffalo over the territory claimed as their preserves by the latter. And many fierce battles took place because of this belligerency.