"We had planned that uprising wisely and secretly. We had able leaders. We were well organized and thoroughly armed. The whites were weakened by the Southern war. Everything was in our favor. We had prayed to our gods. But when the conflict came, we were beaten so rapidly and completely, I felt that the white man's God must be greater than all the Indians' gods; and I determined to look Him up, and I found Him, All-Powerful and precious to my soul." Faithfully he studied his letters and learned his Dakota Bible, which became more precious to him than any record of traditions and shadows handed down from mouth to mouth by his people. He soon became possessed of a great longing to let his tribe know his great secret of the God above. So when the prisoners were restored to their families in the Missouri Vally in Nebraska, Artemas was soon chosen one of the preachers of the reorganized tribe. His first pastorate was that of the Pilgrim Congregational Church at Santee, Nebraska, in 1867. It was also his last, for he was ever so beloved and honored by his people, that they would not consider any proposal for separation. No such proposition ever met with favor in the Pilgrim Church for Artemas firmly held first place in the affections of the people among whom he labored so earnestly. He served this church for thirty-two years and passed on to take his place among the Shining Ones, on the eve of Easter Sabbath, 1902. Artemas seldom took a vacation. In fact there is only one on record. In 1872, his church voted a vacation of six weeks. True to his Indian nature, he planned a deer hunt. He turned his footsteps to the wilds of the Running Water (Niobrara River), where his heart grew young and his rifle cracked the death-knell of the deer and antelope. One evening, in the track of the hostile Sioux and Pawnees, he found himself near a camp of the savage Sicaugu. He was weak and alone. They were strong and hostile. He had tact as well as courage. He invited those savage warriors to a feast. His kettle was brimming, and as the Indians filled their mouths with the savory meat, he filled their ears with the story of the gospel, and gave them their first view of that eternal life, purchased by the blood of Christ. The deer-hunt became a soul-hunt. The wild Sicaugu grunted their amicable "Hao" as they left his teepee, their mouths filled with venison and their hearts planted with the seeds of eternal truth. Again he went on a deer-hunt, when he crossed another trail, that of hunters from another hostile tribe. In the camp he found a sick child, the son of Samuel Heart, a Yankton Sioux. But let Heart tell the story himself in his simple way: