Colorado—The Bright Romance of American History

by F. C. Grable

And Friday? No one ever hunted as Friday hunted! The thirst of blood was upon him. He had plunged into the midst of danger, and knew no pity, no compunction, no fatigue. The instinct of his race that had been sleeping for years surged to the surface at a bound, never again to be dormant. That night he threw off the garb that stood for the civilizing influences of the past, donned the yellow blanket of his race and adopted the life of his people. That day of daring, and his education, marked him as a leader, and he became a Chief of the Arapahoe nation.

Chief Friday had a son. He was called Jacob after that Patriarch, who, when asked his age by Pharaoh, replied so poetically "the days of the years of my pilgrimage are an hundred and thirty years; few and evil have the days of the years of my life been, but have not attained unto the days of the years of the lives of my fathers in the days of their pilgrimage." There is a superstition among the Indians that if they have lost a battle, they must sacrifice some member of another tribe as an offering to the Great Spirit. Jacob had been chosen for the sacrifice. Hearing of it he fled. Returning two years later when he supposed there was no further fear of his destruction, he was set upon and left dead upon the ground. Friday loved Jacob with a very great love, and so did he love the good of his people. He counseled peace, and instead of plunging two nations in war, he buried his son with a breaking heart, hidden by the stoicism of his race.

Chief Friday had a daughter. A winsome lass. Light of foot, with a singing voice and dancing eyes. She was called "Little Niwot" by her father, because she used her left hand, and Niwot in the Indian tongue means "left hand." I asked a doctor once, those wisest of wise men, why it was that out of fifteen hundred million of the earth's inhabitants, so few used the left hand prominently, and this was his reply: "Upebanti manusinistra ob herededitatum."

Niwot's education was not alone like that of the other Indian children, whose eyes were trained to see the beauty in the sun, the moon and the stars; whose ears were attuned to catch the voices in the murmuring brooks, the music in the rustling trees, the melody in the warbling birds; but she had learned of her father as well, who taught her from the remembrances of those far-off days in the St. Louis schools. Little Niwot loved an Indian youth, who was not the choice of her mother. So she ran away with her dusky mate and became the wife of the man of her choice. Friday was left alone. Jacob was dead and Niwot was gone; he grieved for them, and could not be comforted. Niwot became the name of a Creek near Longmont, and of a near-by station on the Colorado and Southern Railway. So in station and stream, the memory of a little Indian maiden is to always be kept green.

And Friday died; died in the happy thought that in the civilizing processes that had been going on about him, he had always tried to stay the hand of his people when raised to check the white wave that was sweeping them to their destruction. Chief Friday was well known to the early settlers, and from them has come this story, here a little and there a little, and now woven into print for the first time. The unhappy ending of his life is like that of Chief Logan, whose heart-breaking plea has been handed down to us in this great burst of touching eloquence:

"I appeal to any white man to say if ever he entered Logan's cabin hungry and he gave him not meat; if ever he came naked and he clothed him not. During the course of the last long and bloody war, Logan remained idle in his camp, an advocate of peace. Such was my love for the whites that my countrymen pointed as I passed and said, 'Logan is a friend of the white man.' I had even thought to have lived with you but for the injuries of one man; Col. Cresap, who, the last Spring, in cold blood and unprovoked, murdered all the relations of Logan, not even sparing my women and children. There runs not a drop of my blood in any living creature. This called on me for revenge. I have sought it. I have killed many. I have fully glutted my vengeance. For my country, I rejoice at the beams of peace; but do not harbor a thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not turn on his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan? Not one."

CHAPTER XI.

A VANISHING RACE.