Hour after hour passed on; the prospect was still the same. At last a loud cry from our guide announced that we had come in sight of the cantonment.
There was a snowy speck resting upon the distant green; behind it rose a forest of lofty timber, which shadowed the Missouri. This was Leavenworth. But still, many miles intervened; for the prairie is like the ocean—the view is wide and boundless; and it requires an eye trained by many months’ residence in these regions to measure accurately the distance of objects.
It was mid-day when we first caught sight of Leavenworth, but it was near sunset before we arrived there. About a dozen white-washed cottage-looking houses compose the barracks and the abodes of the officers. They are so arranged as to form the three sides of a hollow square; the fourth is open, and looks out into a wide but broken prairie. It is a rural looking spot—a speck of civilisation dropped into the heart of a wilderness. There was nothing here to tell a tale of war; and but for the solitary sentinels upon their posts; the lounging forms of the soldiers, who were nearly worn out with their labours to kill time; or the occasional roll of the drum, as the signal for the performance of some military duty, we should not have known that we were in the heart of a military station.
CHAP. V.
THE SAC INDIAN.
On the following day we strolled through the forest which skirted the garrison and overhung the Missouri. At one moment our eyes would be caught by the dazzling plumage of the little parroquets, as they whirled through the branches of the trees; at another we amused ourselves by listening to the shrill screams of a woodpecker, as he saluted some crony mounted on a neighbouring limb.
Our attention at other times would be attracted by the movements of some old antiquarian bird of the same species, who was busy peeping into the holes and crannies of some ruined trunk, to ascertain if possible the cause of its decay.
In another direction might be seen a solitary raven, sitting in silence upon the naked limb of some mouldering tree, and apparently brooding over the ruin that reigned around him.
As we passed an opening between the houses, which gave us a view of the green in front, we caught sight of a single Indian, standing beneath the shade of a tall oak.
Whilst we were regarding him, a little red-nosed soldier came up. He informed us that the Indian was a Sac, one of those who had fought against the whites under Black Hawk. As he mentioned this, he took the opportunity of uncorking his indignation, and letting off the superfluous foam, in a volley of oaths and anathemas against the whole race in, general, and this individual in particular. He threw out dark hints of what he had himself done in the war, and what he would now do, if the major would only permit it. At the time, we looked upon him with considerable awe; but we afterwards learned that there was little to be apprehended from him. He was a character notorious for boiling over in the excess of his wrath, especially in time of peace; but beyond this was distinguished for nothing, except a strong attachment to liquors of all descriptions.