Red Cloud, the Solitary Sioux: A Story of the Great Prairie

by Sir William Francis Butler

The meal over, he took me aside and unfolded to me his plan of action.

“To-day,” he said, “we are sure to be found out by the war-party of Assineboines. They will not venture openly to attack us during the day, but they will reconnoitre our camp, and probably to-night they will attempt to run off the horses and kill this Cree. We cannot wait here, they are too many for us; neither can we move out into the plain, they would instantly see us and give chase; and though you and your companion might make a good stand with me by ourselves, yet with this Cree we could not do it. What I propose doing is this: the Cree is able to sit a horse; you three will start at once, taking the hound with you, heading straight into the hills. The Cree will know the line to follow, and how to keep the bottom of the valley. Until one hour before noon you must hold your course deep into the hills due east, then you will turn to the north and ride fast for three hours until the sun is half-way to the prairie. Then turning quickly to the west, you will continue your way until you come again to the edge of three hills; by this course you will have followed three sides of a square. Within that square lies the camp of the Assineboines. This evening, if you do all I say, you will be as far to the north of that camp as we are to the south of it now. Look how the grass falls.”

So saying, he threw some dry grass into the air. It fell towards the south, the wind was blowing from the north.

“To-night,” he said, “that wind will blow in the direction I want. You will reach the edge of the hills before the sun has set. When it is quite dark make a small fire on the slope of one of the hills facing towards the plain; let it be in such a position that while visible to a person out on the prairie, it will be concealed from the sight of any one in the hills to the south. Keep the fire burning for half an hour after dark; then extinguish it, and make your camp near the spot, but within the shelter of the hills. Soon after that time I will be with you. For the rest, fire no shot during the day unless you should happen to be attacked, and move silently in your course through the hills.”

The preparations for moving were soon made; there was no time to be lost. We took three horses and set off into the hills. The Sioux spoke a word to the dog, ordering him to go with us; the dog reluctantly obeyed, but his training was perfect and he trotted on after the Cree. Having seen us out of the camp and behind the first intervening rise of ground, he turned his horse’s head full for the plains, and taking the lariat of a loose pack-horse carrying only a few light articles, he set off at a sharp pace into the great prairie.

He had kept his own plans to himself, but they will unfold themselves to view as we follow his steps.

Keeping for some time along the base of the hills, he had at length begun to edge farther and farther out into the plain, until after a couple of hours’ riding he was many miles in a diagonal line from his starting-point. Then he began to direct his horse more to the west, making a wide curve the base of which was the range of hills, then turning towards the north he continued for some time to hold a course in that direction. He was now fully ten miles out in the plain, a distance which made him and his horse appear mere specks in the immense range of vision.

Small as these specks of life were, they did not escape, however, the watchful glance of a scout, who from the neighbourhood of the Assineboine camp scanned the plains; but not even Indian sight could resolve at that distance these objects. Horsemen or horseman certainly—but what horsemen? No human eye could tell.

The scout’s report brought quickly to the standpoint some more of the braves, but no additional light could be gleaned from their opinions as to who the distant specks might be, or where their course was laid for. At break of day that morning the trusty scout who had first discovered the camp, and had brought tidings of the Cree to his companions, had started to again reconnoitre the place and its occupants.