He becomes reduced almost to a skeleton, and even staggers, as he walks about to find some sheltered nook into which he can retreat for protection from the keen winds which cut through the thickest clothing like a knife.
His master, whom he has perhaps carried safely through a score of successful hunts and forays, pays not the slightest attention to him.
Comfortably settled in his teepee, hugging a little fire over which a white man would freeze to death, the warrior sits with his buffalo-robe around him, passing the time in smoking and sleeping, but arousing himself at intervals to engage in a game of chance with some of his companions, or to send his squaw to the agency to draw the rations a generous government provides for all the “good” Indians.
But when spring comes, and the snow melts away, and the tender grass begins to spring and grow luxuriantly beneath the genial influence of the sun, a great change takes place in the Indian and his pony.
The latter quietly sheds the long, rough coat he has worn all winter, and with it the burrs and mud with which he was covered; his ribs disappear, his skeleton frame begins to swell out into a well-rounded form, and all his old-time life and spirit come back to him; while his master, having shaken off his lethargy, polishes up his weapons, lays in a new supply of ammunition, and begins to look about for something to do—something that will add new laurels to those already won.
If he can find the least excuse for so doing he is ready at any moment to take the war-path. Oftentimes he has no excuse at all beyond a desire to gratify his incontrollable propensity for stealing and shooting.
Not infrequently a company of boys, who are ambitious to prove themselves expert thieves, and thus render themselves candidates for the “sun-dance,” through which trying ordeal all must pass before they become full-fledged warriors, break away from their agency and raid upon the sheep and cattle herders before spoken of.
Sometimes whole bands and tribes break out in this way, and spend the summer in dodging the troops and sacking defenseless ranches.
While the brave is on the war-path he is a “bad” Indian, and runs the risk of being shot by anybody who meets him; but in spite of this he enjoys himself to the utmost while summer lasts.
It is not until the pleasant weather draws to a close, and all the ranches he can find have been plundered and burned, and all the sheep and cattle in the country have been captured or dispersed, and the fall buffalo-hunt is over, and the cold winds begin to sweep over the plains, that the Indian becomes repentant.