“No more trips will be made by my people into the settlements,” assured Little Raven, the fat old Arapaho chief, who had always been friendly toward the whites. “Their hearts are good, and they wish to be at peace forever.” So even General Sully was convinced, and ordered the guns and ammunition to be issued. “The gen’ral ought to’ve known better, gentle-_men_,” declared Scout Will Comstock, speaking of the matter at Fort Hays, where he had arrived on an errand. “Those Injuns talked ’round him. One hundred pistols, eighty rifles, twelve kegs powder, half a keg o’ lead, fifteen thousand caps, to the ’Rapahos: forty pistols, twenty rifles, three kegs powder, half a keg o’ lead, five thousand caps to the ’Paches; Cheyennes, Comanches, Kiowas—they’re bein’ treated the same; that’s the case to-day. And, gentle-_men_,” he added, impressively, “you mark my words. We’ll hear from those weepons in a way we won’t like. I know Injuns. Little Raven an’ Black Kettle may mean all right, when speakin’, but they can’t control their bucks. We’ll all be fightin’ those same guns before the buff’ler turn south.” Now August had set in; and on the seventh who should arrive at the post of Fort Hays but a large band of the Indians from the Arkansas. They had come up from the Pawnee Fork west of Fort Larned, and said they were on their way to fight the Pawnees. There were four or five Arapahos, and twenty Sioux visitors from the north, and 200 Cheyennes. Old Black Kettle the Cheyenne chief was leader; other chiefs were Tall Wolf and Red Nose and Porcupine Bear and Bear That Goes Ahead (Cheyennes), and even a son of Little Raven the Arapaho chief. That night they held a big powwow. Black Kettle shook hands with all the soldiers within reach. From beside the council camp-fire he made a speech, to say, as translated by Wilson the post trader: “The white soldiers ought to be glad all the time, because their ponies are so big and so strong, and because they have so many guns and so much to eat. All other Indians may take the war path, but Black Kettle will forever keep peace with his white brothers. He loves his white brothers, and his heart feels glad when he meets them and shakes their hands in friendship.” This sounded very good, for the whites; but everybody knew that the Black Kettle band had no business going out to fight the Pawnees or anybody else. If they didn’t find the Pawnees, then they might try to fight whomever they met.