The Great Lone Land / A Narrative of Travel and Adventure in the North-West of America

by Sir William Francis Butler

"You speak with a forked tongue," answered the Blackfoot--dividing his fingers as he spoke to indicate that the-other was speaking falsely.

Just at that moment something caught the traders eye in the bushes along the river bank; he looked again and saw, close alongside, the willows swarming with naked Blackfeet. He made one spring back into his boat, and called to his men to shove off; but it was too late. In an instant two hundred braves rose out of the grass and willows and rushed into the water; they caught the boat and brought her back to the shore; then, filling her as full as she would hold with men, they pushed off for the other side. To put as good a face upon matters as possible, the trader commenced a trade, and at first the batch that had crossed, about forty in number, kept quiet enough, but some-of their number took the boat back again to the south shore and brought over the entire band; then the wild work commenced, bolts and bars were broken open, the trading-shop was quickly cleared out, and in the highest spirits, laughing loudly at the glorious fun they were having, the braves commenced to enter the houses, ripping up the feather beds to look for guns and tearing down calico curtains for finery. The men of the fort were nearly all away in the plains, and the women and children were in a high state of alarm. Sometimes the Indians would point their guns at the women, then drag them off the beds on which they were sitting and rip open bedding and mattress, looking for concealed weapons; but no further violence was attempted, and the whole thing was accompanied by such peals of laughter that it was evident the braves had not enjoyed such a "high old time" for a very long period. At last the chief, thinking, perhaps, that things had gone quite far enough, called out, in a loud voice, "Crees! Crees!" and, dashing out of the fort, was quickly followed by the whole band.

Still in high good humour, the braves recrossed the river, and, turning round on the farther shore, fired a volley to Wards the fort; but as the distance was at least 500 yards, this parting salute was simply as a bravado. This band was evidently bent on mischief. As they retreated south to their own country they met the carts belonging to the fort on their way from the plains; the men in charge ran off with the fleetest horses, but the carts were all captured and ransacked, and an old Scotchman, a servant of the Company, who stood his ground, was reduced to a state bordering upon nudity by the frequent demands of his captors.

The Blackfeet chiefs exercise great authority over their braves; some of them are men of considerable natural abilities, and all-must be brave and celebrated in battle. To disobey the mandate of a chief is at times to court instant death at his hands. At the present time the two most formidable chiefs of the Blackfeet nations are Sapoo-max-sikes, or "The Great Crow's Claw;" and Oma-ka-pee-mulkee-yeu, or "The Great Swan." These men are widely different in their characters; the Crow's Claw being a man whose word once given can be relied on to the death, but the other is represented as a man of colossal size and savage disposition, crafty and treacherous.

During the year just past death had struck heavily among the Blackfeet chiefs. The death of one of their greatest men, Pe-na-koam, or "The Far-off Dawn," was worthy of a great brave. When he felt that his last night had come, he ordered his best horse to be brought to the door of the tent, and mounting him he rode slowly around the camp; at each corner he halted and called out, in a loud voice to his people, "The last hour of Pe-na-koam has come; but to his people he says, Be brave; separate into small parties, so that this disease will have less power to kill you; be strong to fight our enemies the Crees, and be able to destroy them. It is no matter now that this disease has come upon us, for our enemies have got it too, and they will also die of it. Pe-na-koam tells his people before he dies to live so that they may fight their enemies, and be strong." It is said that, having spoken thus, he died quietly. Upon the top of a lonely hill they laid the body of their chief beneath a tent hung round with scarlet cloth; beside him they put six revolvers and two American repeating rifles, an at the door of his tent twelve horses were slain, so that their spirits would carry him in the green prairies of the happy hunting-grounds; four hundred blankets were piled around as offerings to his memory, and then the tribe moved away from the spot, leaving the tomb of their dead king to the winds and to the wolves.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

The Buffalo--His Limits and favourite Grounds--Modes of Hunting--A Fight --His inevitable End--I become a Medicine-man--Great Cold-Carlton--Family Responsibilities.

WHEN the early Spanish adventurers penetrated from the sea-board of America into the great central prairie region, they beheld for the first time a strange animal whose countless numbers covered the face of the country. When De Soto had been buried in the dark waters of the Mississippi, the remnant of his band, pursuing their western way, entered the "Country of the Wild Cows." When in the same year explorers pushed their way northward from Mexico into the region of the Rio-del-Norte, they looked over immense plains black with moving beasts. Nearly 100 years later settlers on the coasts of New England heard from westward-hailing Indians of huge beasts on the shores of a great lake not many days journey to the north-west. Naturalists in Europe, hearing of the new animal, named it the bison; but the colonists united in calling it the buffalo, and, as is usual in such cases, although science clearly demonstrated that it was a bison, and was not a buffalo, scientific knowledge had not a chance against practical ignorance, and "buffalo" carried the day. The true home of this animal lay in the great prairie region between the Rocky Mountains, the Mississippi, the Texan forest, and the Saskatchewan River and although undoubted evidence exists to show that at some period the buffalo reached in his vast migrations the shores of the Pacific and the Atlantic; yet since the party of De Soto only entered the Country of the Wild Cows after they had crossed the Mississippi, it may fairly be inferred that the Ohio River and the lower Mississippi formed the eastern boundaries to the wanderings of the herds since the New World has been known to the white man. Still even within this immense region, a region not less than 1,000,000 of square miles in area, the havoc worked by the European has been terrible. Faster even than the decay of the Indian has gone on the destruction-of the bison and only a few years must elapse before this noble beast, hunted down in the last recesses of his breeding-grounds, will have taken his place in the long list of those extinct giants which once dwelt in our world. Many favourite spots had this huge animal throughout the great domain over which he roamed-many beautiful scenes where, along river meadows, the grass in winter was still succulent and the wooded "bays" gave food and shelter, but-no more favourite ground than this valley of the Saskatchewan; thither he wended his way from the bleak plains of the Missouri in herds that passed and passed for days and nights in seemingly never-ending numbers. Along the countless creeks and rivers that add their tribute to the great stream, along the banks of the Battle River and the Vermilion River, along the many White Earth Rivers and Sturgeon Creeks of the upper and middle Saskatchewan, down through the willow copses and aspen thickets of the Touchwood Hills and the Assineboine, the great beasts dwelt in all the happiness of calf-rearing and connubial felicity. The Indians who then occupied these regions killed only what was required for the supply of the camps-a mere speck in the dense herds that roamed up to the very doors of the wigwams; but when the trader pushed his adventurous way into the fur regions of the North, the herds of the Saskatchewan plains began to experience a change in their surroundings. The meat, pounded down` and mixed with fat into "pemmican," was found to supply a most excellent food for transport service, and accordingly vast numbers of buffalo were destroyed to supply the demand of the fur traders. In the border-land between the wooded country and the plains, the Crees, not satisfied with the ordinary methods of destroying the buffalo, devised a plan by which great multitudes could be easily annihilated. This method of hunting, consists in the erection of strong wooden enclosures called pounds, into which the buffalo are guided by the supposed magic power of a medicine-man. Sometimes for two days the medicine-man will live with the herd, which he half guides and half drives into the enclosures; sometimes he is on the right, sometimes on the left, and sometimes, again, in rear of the herd, but never to windward of them. At last they approach the pound, which is usually concealed in a thicket of wood. For many miles from the entrance to this pound two gradually diverging lines of tree-stumps and heaps of snow lead out into the plains. Within these lines the buffalo are led by the medicine-man, and as the lines narrow towards the entrance, the herd, finding itself hemmed in on both sides, becomes more and more alarmed, until at length the great beasts plunge on into the pound itself, across the mouth of which ropes are quickly thrown and barriers raised. Then commences the slaughter. From the wooded fence around arrows and bullets are poured into the dense plunging mass of buffalo careering wildly round the ring. Always going in one direction, with the sun, the poor beasts race on until not a living thing is left; then, when there is nothing more to kill, the cutting-up commences, and pemmican-making goes on.

Widely different from this indiscriminate slaughter is the fair hunt on horseback in the great open plains. The approach, the cautious survey over some hill-top, the wild charge on the herd, the headlong flight, the turn to bay, the flight and fall--all this contains a large share of that excitement which we call by the much abused term sport. It is possible, however, that many of those who delight in killing placid pheasants and stoical partridges might enjoy the huge battue of an Indian "pound" in preference to the wild charge over the sky bound prairie, but, for my part, not being of the privileged few who breed pheasants at the expense of peasants (what a difference the "h" makes in Malthusian theories!), I have been compelled to seek my sport in hot climates instead of in hot corners, and in the sandy bluffs of Nebraska and the Missouri have drawn many an hour of keen enjoyment from the long chase of the buffalo. One evening, shortly before sunset, I was steering my way through the sandy hills of the Platte Valley, in the State of Nebraska, slowly towards Fort Kearney; both horse and rider were tired after a long day over sand-bluff and meadow-land, for buffalo were plenty, and five tongues dangling to the saddle told that horse, man, and rifle had not been idle. Crossing a grassy ridge, I suddenly came in sight of three buffalo just emerging from the broken bluff. Tired as was my horse, the sight of one of these three animals urged me to one last chase. He was a very large bull, whose black shaggy mane and dewlaps nearly brushed the short prairie grass beneath him. I dismounted behind the hill, tightened the saddle-girths, looked to rifle and cartridge touch, and then remounting rode slowly over the intervening ridge. As I came in view of the three beasts thus majestically stalking their way towards the Platte for the luxury of an evening drink, the three shaggy heads were thrown up--one steady look given, then round went the animals and away for the bluffs again. With a whoop and a cheer I gave chase, and the mustang, answering gamely to my call, launched himself well over the prairie. Singling out the large bull, I urged the horse with spur and voice, then, rising in the stirrups I took a snap-shot at my quarry. The bullet struck him in the flanks, and quick as lightning he wheeled down upon me. It was now my turn to run. I had urged the horse with voice and spur to close with the buffalo, but still more vigorously did I endeavour, under the altered position of affairs, to make him increase the distance lying between us. Down the sandy incline thundered the huge beast, gaining on us at every stride. Looking back over my shoulder, I saw him close to my horse's tail, with head lowered and eyes flashing furiously-under their shaggy covering. The horse was tired; the buffalo was fresh, and it seemed as though another instant must bring pursuer and pursued into wild collision. Throwing back my rifle over the crupper; I laid it at arm's length, with muzzle full upon the buffalo's head. The shot struck the centre of his forehead, but he only shook his head when he received it; still it seemed to check his pace a little, and as we had now reached level ground the horse began to gain something upon his pursuer. Quite as suddenly as he had charged the bull now changed his tactics. Wheeling off he followed his companions, who by this time had vanished into the bluffs. It never would have done to lose him after such a fight, so Ii brought the mustang round again, and gave chase. This time a shot fired low behind the shoulder brought my fierce friend to bay. Proudly he turned upon me, but now his rage was calm and stately, he pawed the ground, and blew with short angry snorts the sand in clouds from the plain; moving thus slowly towards me, he looked the incarnation of strength and angry pride. But his doom was sealed. I remember so vividly all the wild surroundings of the scene--the great silent waste, the two buffalo watching from a hill-top the fight of their leader, the noble beast himself stricken but defiant, and beyond, the thousand glories of the prairie sunset. It was only to last an instant, for the giant bull, still with low-bent head and angry snorts, advancing slowly towards his puny enemy, sank quietly to the plain and stretched his limbs in death. Late that night I reached the American fort with six tongues hanging to my saddle, but never since that hour, though often but a two days ride from buffalo, have I sought to take the life of one of these noble animals. Too soon will the last of them have vanished from the great central prairie land; never again will those countless herds roam from the Platte to the Missouri, from the Missouri to the Saskatchewan; chased for his robe, for his beef, for sport, for the very pastime of his death, he is rapidly vanishing from the land. Far in the northern forests of the Athabasca a few buffaloes may for a time bid defiance to man, but they, too, must disappear and nothing be left of this giant beast save the bones that for many an age will whiten the prairies over which the great herds roamed at will in times before the white man came.