Let us look on this scene a moment; it may humanize our feelings. The prison is but a common wooden building, 30 by 40 feet, and known as the “guard-house.” It is on the extreme left of and facing the open “plaza” or “parade-ground,” in the centre of which stands a flag-pole, from whose top floats the stars and stripes. A veranda covers the door-way, before which are pacing back and forth the sentries.
Before entering cast your eye to the right, about one hundred yards, and a square-looking corral arrests your attention. This is the stockade. It is constructed of round pine poles, twenty feet long, standing upright, with the lower ends planted in the ground. Through the openings we see human beings peeping out, who appear like wild animals in a cage. A partition divides this corral. In the further end Captain Jack’s family and a few others are encaged; in the nearer one the Curly-haired Doctor’s people. In front walk the sentinels. Outside, at the end of the stockade, nearest the guard-house, there are four army tents; in these four tents are the families of Hooker Jim, Bogus Charley, Steamboat Frank, and Shacknasty Jim, and these Modoc lions are with them, probably engaged in a game of cards. Scar-faced Charley also enjoys the privilege of being outside; but he does not engage in sports, or idle talk, oftenest sitting alone in gloomy silence.
Passing the guards as we enter the room, a board partition stands at our right, cutting off one-third of
the guard-house into cells; the first cell has been the home of Boston, Slolux and Barncho, since their arrival at the fort. The next is where Captain Jack and Schonchin have passed the long, painful hours of confinement, meditating on the changes of fortune that have come to them.
In front, and running alongside the opposite walls, are low bunks raised twenty inches from the floor. Sitting around on these bunks are the thirteen Modoc Indians,—prisoners,—six of whom have just learned from official authority their doom.
Gen. Wheaton is in full uniform. The white-haired chaplain is near the centre of this curious-looking group. Oliver Applegate and Dave Hill are with him. Officers and armed soldiers fill up the remaining space. Outside the building are soldiers, citizens, and Klamath Indians, crowding every window.
The tremulous voice of the kind-hearted chaplain breaks the solemn stillness with a short sentence of prayer. Applegate translates the words into Chinook to Dave Hill, who repeats them in the Modoc tongue. Sentence after sentence of this prayer is thus repeated until its close.
The good old man who has performed this holy ministry bursts into tears, and bows his head upon his hands. In this moment every heart feels moved by the eloquence of the prayer, and a common emotion of sympathy for those whose lives were closing up so rapidly.
Gen. Wheaton terminates this painful interview by assuring the convicts that, as far as possible, their wishes should be respected.
In the name of humanity, do we thank God for