to return over the ground which I had just passed. I remember well the spot where I paused to settle my purpose. It was a high swell, which commanded a view over miles of prairie, and even overlooked the top of the lofty trees in the thicket. It was strewed with bones. For several hundred yards, the whole hill was literally covered with them. It looked like some deserted charnel; and I recollect even in the midst of my perplexity, taking up one and examining it—wondering whether it belonged to man or beast. The place might have been the scene of a battle; for the bones were so small that they could scarcely be those of animals. There were no skulls, either of man or brutes, to solve the mystery; and even the bones were covered with a greenish mould, from many years’ exposure. After some consideration, I resolved to retrace my steps, and accordingly turned down the hill, and once more proceeded on my journey. I now was growing hungry, and for once felt the miseries of a keen appetite. In the midst of these cogitations, I caught sight of the head of a racoon, who was reconnoitering me from behind the stump of a tree; I shot him, and skinned him; and kindling a fire, cooked part of him on the spot. The cinders from my fire, caught in a small patch of dry grass, which had escaped the general burning of the prairie; and in a moment it was in a blaze—filling the air with a cloud of black smoke. When I finished my meal, I slung the residue of my prize upon my back, and struck out into the prairie. I had scarcely done so before I caught sight of an Indian, standing upon the top of a ridge at some distance. In a moment after he perceived me, and waved his blanket over his head, to attract my attention. I raised the Otoe hunting-whoop, and his shout, faint, from the distance, answered me. I then started for the hill, and the Indian, seating himself, waited till I came up. He was one of the Otoes who accompanied us. His Indian name I do not recollect; but when translated it signified, “_the man that drags his heels_.” It was given him on account of a shuffling gait, which it was said that he possessed, but which I could never discover. We started together, and about a mile beyond the arm of timber where I had turned back in the morning, we came upon the trail of the party.