My people will die in darkness, and they will go a long path to other hunting grounds. No white man will go with them, and no White Man's Book make the way plain. I have no more words.
They left. Rabbit-skin Leggins reached his people; No-horns-on-his-head fell upon the trail and died.
But his words lived. As translated into English, they were printed in Eastern papers, and aroused great desire among the churches to give them the right answer. Should these Indians beyond the mountains remain in darkness? No!
Missionaries were called for, to carry the Book and the Word to the Columbia River. In the spring of 1834 the first party, of four Methodists, set out; others followed, the next year; soon the Roman Catholic church sent its Black Robes; and the Pierced Noses and their kin the Flatheads were made glad.
Not in vain had their warriors died, while seeking the road to the white man's heaven.
CHAPTER XIX
A TRAVELER TO WASHINGTON (1831-1835)
WIJUNJON, THE "BIG LIAR" OF THE ASSINIBOINS
The Assiniboins are of the great Sioux family. Today there are in the United States about one thousand of them. But when they were a free and powerful people they numbered as high as ten thousand, and ranged far—from the Missouri River in northern North Dakota and northern Montana clear into Canada, above.