What is said in the Indian traditions, about nearly the whole face of the country having been covered with water in ancient times, is undoubtedly true. In all the valleys throughout the Great Basin are to be seen traces of water, and on the sides of the hills water-marks have been left that are visible at the distance of a mile, and can be traced for many miles. In places, there are four or five of these water marks, showing the gradual subsidence of the lakes. For hundreds on hundreds of miles, on all sides, there was a labyrinth of lakes. The water-marks showing the former levels of the lakes (in places two or three hundred feet above the present level of the valleys) not having yet disappeared by erosion, the date of the subsidence of their waters cannot be many centuries back. The Piutes and Shoshones have lost nothing by the coming among them of the whites; indeed, they appear to fare better now than in the days when they were in undisturbed possession of the whole land. They pitch their camps in the suburbs of the towns and fare sumptuously every day on the broken victuals collected by the bushel at hotels, restaurants, and private houses, by the squaws. The men, unlike the men of many other tribes, are not above work. They work at sawing and splitting wood, at grading off building-lots, or anything that they can manage—all they want is to be shown money.
It is not unusual to see a Piute brave marching through a street in Virginia City with a wood-saw and buck under his left arm, and upon his right shoulder an ax—the living exemplification of the dawn of civilization upon barbarism. Thus far, however, he is one of the civilized, and represents “labor” seeking “capital,” but with all the implements of peaceful industry borne about him, his pride still clings to the ancient insignia of the “brave” in his tribe. His face is painted in zigzag lines of black, white, and red; a necklace of bear’s claws rests on his breast, and an eagle feather decorates his scalp-lock; but instead of bearing a bow and arrows, a tomahawk and scalping-knife, he carries only his saw, buck, and ax, and is only on the war-path to do battle with a wood-pile; therefore is either a peaceful warrior or a warlike wood-sawyer, just as you may choose to consider him. He has, as we may say, beaten his sword into a plowshare, but has not the heart to throw away the scabbard.
Old Winnemucca, the head chief of all the Piutes, is about 70 years of age, and has but little to say about the “affairs of the nation”; indeed, there is little demand for legislation as the tribe is at present situated. Many years ago the old fellow appears to have turned over business of almost every kind to his nephew, young Winnemucca, then war-chief. Young Winnemucca was in command at the time of the trouble between the Piutes and the whites, in the spring of 1860. Young Winnemucca never gambled, but old Winnemucca was an inveterate gambler—that is, among his own people. The Piutes do not gamble with white men. Old Winnemucca has been known to lose all his ponies, all his blankets and arms, and, in fact, everything he possessed, down to a breech-clout, at a single sitting. He is a good-natured, kind-hearted old man, but not a man remarkable for either wisdom or cunning.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
WINNEMUCCA AND HIS BRAVES.
At the time the war broke out between the whites and Piutes, two young Germans were engaged in prospecting at a point in the mountains east of the sink of the Humboldt. They knew nothing of the trouble and started to come into Chinatown.
On reaching a station on the Humboldt River they found the buildings burned, and various articles, such as books and cards, strewn about. The thought then struck them that there was trouble between the Indians and whites. Feeling that they could make no fight, and not desiring to give the Indians an opportunity of blowing their brains out with their own weapons, the young men threw their guns into the river, and poured their powder upon the ground and set fire to it.
After leaving the burned station they traveled on till night, without seeing any Indians; but after they camped, an Indian who spoke very good English came riding up to the fire. He told the young fellows to pack their things and come with him, for should they remain in their present camp they were sure to be killed, as the Piutes were now at war with the whites.
“Piute man,” said he, “kill um great many white man at Pyramid Lake, get heap gun, heap pony. S’pose white man kill Piute, Piute kill um white man!”
The young men thought it best to do as requested, and catching up their mustangs, packed their blankets and equipments, when they announced their readiness to follow their red guide. After an hour’s travel they reached a large encampment, and found themselves in the midst of three or four hundred warriors.
Their guide conducted them to a tent near the middle of the camp, which he informed them was “Winnemucca’s house.”