With the close of the outbreak and the subsequent readjustment of affairs came a great change in the condition of the Kiowa and their confederated tribes. The old chiefs who had so often led them on the warpath were dead or in prison; their horses, which to prairie warriors were almost as essential as the bow or rifle, had been taken from them, together with their weapons; military posts and garrisons had been established in their midst and the chain of white settlements had been drawn closer around them; their old allies, the Cheyenne, had been rendered powerless to help them, and, more than all, their unfailing commissary, the buffalo, had practically disappeared. They felt that they were powerless in the hands of the stronger race, and with a deep sigh of regret for their vanished sovereignty they literally put their hands to the plow and endeavored in their weak fashion to follow the white man's road. The warriors, realizing that their time was too short to learn new ways, were anxious to see their children prepared to meet the changed conditions, and in consequence the schools were soon crowded, some of the chiefs even assisting the teachers in the work of organizing. Henceforth we find them trying to follow the new path with patient resignation, in spite of difficulties and frequent neglect, with only occasional weak ebullitions of the old fighting temper when aroused by some particularly aggravated grievance. EPIDEMICS OF MEASLES AND FEVER IN 1877--FIRST HOUSES BUILT In 1877 an epidemic of measles in the tribe carried off a large number of children. It was followed immediately afterward by an outbreak of fever. In the fall of the same year the government, through agent Haworth, built a number of houses for the prominent chiefs, these being the first Indian houses on the reservation (see the calendar). In accordance with a new plan of employing Indians at agencies, a police force of about thirty natives was organized in 1878. The result in this as in all other cases has been eminently satisfactory (_Report, 60_). AGENCY REMOVED TO ANADARKO--THE LAST OF THE BUFFALO