After the skirmishers had poured a hot fire into the silent wagon boxes, which literally tore the tops to pieces, the two thousand began a mad gallop towards the corral. Again there was an awful silence, until they reached a distance of ninety yards or so from the defenders of the wooden oval. The thirty-two had been reduced to twenty-eight, but their spirits had not suffered. As the stalwart braves came onward in splendid war bonnets and beaded war shirts, it was a sight which would have made many a man quail. Several had shields of buffalo hide upon their left arms, which were brightly painted and decorated with fantastic designs. Led by the nephew of Red Cloud, they dashed forward in a wide semicircle, chanting wild war songs, calling upon the Great Spirit to aid them, and brandishing their weapons aloft. It was a clear day. The sun shone brightly upon them, and made good targets for the silent and watchful men from Fort Phil Kearney.
They advanced in a wild, uneven column, when
Crash!
A volley poured into their faces, knocking the nephew of the great Red Cloud to the turf, and sending down full twenty warriors among their plunging bronchos. Still they came on, and
Crash! Crash!
A still more deadly mass of lead ploughed gaps in the line. They did not falter, but swept forward with fierce cries of anger and disdain. Ponies screamed in agony and broke from the mass of maddened braves whenever their riders fell prostrate to the turf. The Sioux were now within twenty yards. It was a terribly critical situation. Should they leap over the wooden barrier, it would be all over with Powell's valiant band. But
Crash! Crash! Crash!
The Sioux were so close that the troopers rose to their knees, in their excitement, and threw their augurs, revolvers, and knives into the faces of the Indians. It was like the charge of Grover's brigade on Stonewall Jackson's men behind the railroad cut at Second Bull Run. The white men did anything to keep off the foe. They were desperate.
Crash! Crash! Crash!
Others were keeping up the fire. The Indians wavered. They broke. They began to ride away. A fierce cheer rent the air from the brave twenty-eight, and, upon a hillock a half mile away, Red Cloud, like Napoleon at Waterloo, bitterly bewailed this sudden and appalling reverse. He thought that he saw the end of his power as head war chief of the bloodthirsty Sioux.