It had been a matter of surprise to us how the Indians could make such inferior looking stock as theirs capable of such speed and extraordinary journeys; but it ceased to excite our wonder after an examination of their whips. These ingenious instruments of torture have handles, which in form and size resemble a policeman's club. To one end are attached some thongs of thick leather, half a yard in length, and to the other a loop of the same material, just large enough to go over the hand and bind slightly on the wrist. Dangling from the latter, the handle can be instantly grasped, and the body of thongs brought down on the pony's skin, with a crack like a flail on the sheaves, and the result is what Sachem called an astonishing "shelling out" of speed. We explained to White Wolf that Tammany Sachem was one of many great chiefs who had a mighty wigwam in the big city of the pale-faces, far away toward the rising sun; that they were all good men, and never lied like the chiefs of the Cheyennes, or took any thing belonging to others; and that their women, instead of carrying heavy burdens, spent all their time in distributing the money and goods of the big wigwam to the needy. White Wolf signified, through the interpreter, that such a wigwam was too good for earth, and ought to be pitched on the happy hunting grounds as soon as possible. Sachem thought the savage meant to be sarcastic. CHAPTER XII. ARMS OF A WAR PARTY--A DONKEY PRESENT--EATING POWERS OF THE NOMADS--SATANTA, HIS CRIMES AND PUNISHMENT--RUNNING OFF WITH A GOVERNMENT HERD--DAUB, OUR ARTIST--ANTELOPE CHASE BY A GREYHOUND. At our request White Wolf and two of his braves gave us a display of their skill--or rather, their strength--in the use of their bows, shooting their arrows at a stake sixty yards off. The efforts were what would be called good "line shots," although missing the slender stick. We then essayed a trial with the chief's bow, which was an exceedingly stout hickory wrapped in sinew, but we found that more practiced strength than ours was required even to bend it. Some amusement was created when the first of our party took up the bow, by the haste with which a small and unusually ugly Indian retreated from the foreground as if fearing that an arrow might be accidentally sent through his blanket.