The winter passed without mishap to any one in our tent. An old man named Holding Eagle had his leg broken digging in a bank for white clay; he was prying out a lump with a stick, when the bank caved in upon him. Toward spring, Wolf-with-his-back-to-the-wind and his brother were surprised by Sioux and killed. A man named Drum was also killed and scalped.
Spring came, but ice still lay on the Missouri when the Goose society gave their spring dance. The flocks of geese that came flying north at this season of the year were a sign that it was time to make ready our fields for planting corn. The Goose society was a society of women, and their dance was a prayer that the spirits of the geese would send good weather for the corn-planting. Most of the work of planting and hoeing our corn fell to the women.
Our winter camp now broke up, most of the tribe returning to the Yellowstone; but my grandfather and One Buffalo, with their families, went up the Missouri to hunt for buffaloes. They found a small herd, gave chase, and killed ten.
Four more tepees now joined us, those of Strikes Back-bone, Old Bear, Long Wing, Spotted Horn, and their families. To each tent owner, my grandfather gave the half of a freshly killed buffalo and one whole green buffalo skin. Camp was pitched; the meat was hung on stages to dry, and the women busied themselves making the skins into bull boats.
At Work with a Bone Hoe.
When the ice on the Missouri broke, our camp made ready to return to the village, for the women wanted to be about their spring planting. Bull boats were now taken to the river and loaded; and the families, six or seven tepees in all, pushed out into the current.
My parents led, with three boats lashed together, in the first of which they sat and paddled; my father’s rifle lay by him. The second boat was partly loaded with bags of dried meat, and upon these sat Flies Low, my uncle, with me in his arms. The third boat was loaded to the water with meat and skins.
The Missouri’s course is winding; if a turn in it sends the current against the wind, the waves rise heavy and choppy, so that a single boat can hardly ride them. When approaching one of these turns, our party would draw together, laying tight hold of one another’s boats until the danger was passed; bunched together in this manner, the boats ran less risk of upsetting.