“Just before night, several days after this, a Yuma Indian came suddenly into camp, driving this Cochopa captive. She was the most distressed-looking being imaginable when she returned. Her hair disheveled, her few old clothes torn, (they were woolen clothes,) her eyes swollen, and every feature of her noble countenance distorted.
“‘Criers’ were kept constantly on the way between the Mohaves and Yumas, bearing news from tribe to tribe. These messengers were their news-carriers and sentinels. Frequently two criers were employed, (sometimes more,) one from each tribe. These would have their meeting-stations. At these stations these criers would meet with promptness, and by word of mouth each would deposit his store of news with his fellow-expressman, and then each would return to his own tribe with the news. When the news was important, or was of a warning character, as in time of war, they would not wait for the fleet foot of the ‘runner,’ but had their signal fires well understood, which would telegraph the news hundreds of miles in a few hours. One of these Yuma criers, about four days after the disappearance of Nowereha, was coming to his station on the road connecting these two tribes, when he spied a woman under a shelf of the rock on the opposite side of the river. He immediately plunged into the stream and went to her. He knew the tribe to which she belonged, and that the Mohaves had been making war upon them. He immediately started back with her to the Mohave village. It was a law to which they punctually lived, to return all fleeing fugitives or captives of a friendly tribe.
“It seemed that she had concealed that portion of the corn meal she did not bake, with a view of undertaking to escape.
“When she went out that night she plunged immediately into the river to prevent them from tracking her. She swam several miles that night, and then hid herself in a willow wood; thinking that they would be in close pursuit, she resolved to remain there until they should give up hunting for her. Here she remained nearly two days, and her pursuers were very near her several times. She then started, and swam where the river was not too rapid and shallow, when she would out and bound over the rocks. In this way, traveling only in the night, she had gone near one hundred and thirty miles. She was, as she supposed, safely hid in a cave, waiting the return of night, when the Yuma found her.
“On her return another noisy meeting was called, and they spent the night in one of their victory dances. They would dance around her, shout in her ears, spit in her face, and show their threats of a murderous design, assuring her that they would soon have her where she would give them no more trouble by running away.
“The next morning a post was firmly placed in the ground, and about eight feet from the ground a cross-beam was attached. They then drove large, rough wooden spikes through the palms of poor Nowereha’s hands, and by these they lifted her to the cross and drove the spikes into the soft wood of the beam, extending her hands as far as they could. They then, with pieces of bark stuck with thorns, tied her head firmly back to the upright post, drove spikes through her ankles, and for a time left her in this condition.
“They soon returned, and placing me with their Cochopa captives near the sufferer, bid us keep our eyes upon her until she died. This they did, as they afterward said, to exhibit to me what I might expect if they should catch me attempting to escape. They then commenced running round Nowereha in regular circles, hallooing, stamping, and taunting like so many demons, in the most wild and frenzied manner. After a little while several of them supplied themselves with bows and arrows, and at every circlet would hurl one of these poisoned instruments of death into her quivering flesh. Occasionally she would cry aloud, and in the most pitiful manner. This awakened from that mocking, heartless crowd the most deafening yells.
HORRID DEATH OF THE INDIAN CAPTIVE.