Sinopah, the Indian Boy

by James Willard Schultz

"That I shall not do," the chief grimly answered. "I forbid any one in this camp to bring it in. 'Tis an animal of crazy head and evil heart. Here, now, I give it to the sun, also the saddle that is on its back. Mother, make a new saddle for the boy. In place of the pony, I give him that gentle old black-and-white pinto to ride."

"But I have my own horses; plenty of them," Sinopah objected. "Let me ride one of them."

"Not until you are much older," his father answered. "They are all wild and too strong-mouthed for your little hands to guide."

As soon as the meat was dried, the people moved on to the middle butte of the Sweet-Grass Hills, and from there through the gap to Milk River, which runs past the northern slope of the small range. The lodges were set up in the edge of the timber bordering the stream, and the play lodge of the children was placed under some big trees close to the water. The tribe remained here for several moons. With their mothers to watch them, and often Grandfather Red Crane, Sinopah and Lone Bull and Otaki passed the long days playing in and around the little lodge. They had crowds of guests, children coming from all parts of the big camp to join in their sports.

A favorite game of Blackfeet children, and one as old as the tribe itself, was the making of clay images of the different animals of the country. Not all clay was good for this purpose, some of it falling apart, or cracking, as soon as it dried. The best was dark gray in color, very fine-grained, and tough when mixed with a few drops of water to about an ounce of the material. Grandfather Red Crane discovered a foot-thick deposit of this good clay in a riverbank near the play lodge and called the children: "Come over here, all of you," he shouted; "here is image earth in plenty. Now I want to see which one of you can make the best buffalo."

With Sinopah and his two chums were a dozen other children. At the call of the old man, they all ran to him and with sticks and sharp stones began digging out lumps of the clay; pieces from the size of a hazelnut up to that of a hen's egg. These were angular in shape and very hard and tough, but that didn't matter. Each child found a good-sized, flat, smooth rock, and on it mashed the clay lumps to fine powder with a smooth hand-stone. The longer the stuff was pounded, the more flour-like it became, the better it would be for making the images. Some of the children were in such a hurry to start making these that they didn't half pound their clay, and afterwards their work cracked and fell to pieces.

Sinopah had never before played this game, so Grandfather Red Crane sat beside him and directed the work. It was work, hard work, the pounding of the clay, and the perspiration dripped from his forehead as he kept on until it was very fine. It was done at last, and the old man gathered it in a flat heap in the centre of the flat rock. They were sitting right at the edge of the river, and dipping his fingers into the water he sprinkled the clay two or three times, and then began kneading it, just as a cook does flour for bread.

"Put your hand into it; feel of it," old Red Crane told Sinopah every few minutes, and the boy kept doing so.

At first the clay was very sticky, large portions of it hanging to his fingers; and although the stuff had been pounded very fine, it felt coarse and lumpy.

"Now here is where a big mistake is often made," said the old man. "The clay feels as if it needed a lot more water, and if you were working it, you would surely sprinkle on too much. Really the stuff is almost wet enough. Now see: I put on just a few drops more, and now I work it a long time."