The council with the Sioux continued the greater part of the day with a great flow of Indian eloquence. A large quantity of goods was brought from the boats and piled in heaps--enough, it seemed, to stock a large wholesale house, but, in accepting the goods, the Indians did not seem to show any pleasure, much less gratitude; on the contrary, they looked about with their usual indifference as if they felt they were being put under obligations not easily discharged. But in truth little of their talk was understood by me, and less of their actions. The fur trade at Fort Pierre was more extensive than at any other point on the river, and both the trading companies had many employees residing there, and kept large stocks of goods. Here I made the acquaintance of two young gentlemen, natives of St. Louis, members of the forty or four hundred porcelain of that town, now, however, on duty at the fort directing the Indian trade, and each supporting two squaws, the mothers of several children. They seemed in fine health and spirits, and enjoying life in spite of isolation from refined society. As the boat was leaving Fort Pierre, we gained a passenger that would be a conspicuous person in any crowd from his unusual good looks. Soon after coming on board he joined in the poker game, being well known to all the upper river men. A man of twenty-five years, tall, well built and remarkably handsome, a quarter-blood Sioux, his mother being a half-blood, his father a Frenchman long a resident of the Indian country, and who had given this son all the advantages of a good education at some eastern college. He was affable, agreeable and gentlemanly in his conduct, and I shall never forget the man although I do not recall his name. He remained with us only a few days, stopping off at a trading post some distance above Fort Pierre. At Fort Pierre we had another addition to our passengers in the person of Colonel Vaughn’s Indian wife and children. The colonel, being a widower when appointed by President Pierce agent for the Sioux, married (according to the custom of the Indians) a member of that tribe, and in the early spring she had accompanied the colonel from the Blackfoot Agency, down the river on a keel-boat, to Fort Pierre, where she had remained with some relatives awaiting the colonel’s return. Being thus identified, Colonel Vaughn’s influence and popularity with the Indians was greatly increased, and in fact so thoroughly established that he remained at the agency on Sun River, Montana, surrounded by Indians, without a guard and with perfect safety.