The Captain of the Gray-Horse TroopGarland, Hamlin
General
The Captain of the Gray-Horse Troop
Garland, Hamlin
Colorado -- Fiction; Western stories
They believed in Swift Eagle, however, for he visited every cluster of
huts each month, and became acquainted with nearly every family during
the winter. No agent had ever taken the like pains to shake the old
women by the hand, or to speak as kindly to the old men who sat beside
the fire, feeble and bent with rheumatism. The little children all ran
to him when he came near, as if he were a friend, and that was a good
sign, too. Some of the old chiefs complained, of course--there was so
little else for them to do; but they did not blame the Little Father.
They were assured of his willingness to do whatever lay within his
power to mitigate their poverty. Jennie, who was often at the beds of
those who suffered, had won wide acceptance of her lotions by an amused
tolerance of the medicine-men, whose mystic paraphernalia interested her
exceedingly. The men of magic came at last to sing their curious songs
and perform their feats of healing in her presence. "Together we will
defeat the evil spirits," they said, and the health of the tribe
continued to be very good, in spite of unsanitary housing and the evil
influence of the medicine-men. When the missionaries came to have the
native doctors suppressed Curtis said: "My policy is to supplant, not to
suppress."
The bill which called for the removal of the Tetongs to another
reservation was reported killed. The compromise measure for buying out
the settlers was "hung up" in the committee-room, and this delay on the
part of Congress exasperated the settlers beyond reason, and at a
convention held early in April at Pinon City, Joseph Streeter brazenly
shouted, "If the government does not remove these Injuns before the
first of July we'll make it hot for all concerned," and his threat was
wildly cheered and largely quoted thereafter as the utterance of a man
not afraid of Congress or anybody else.
Seed-time came without any promise of change, and the white settlers on
the reservation went sullenly to their planting, and the cattlemen drove
their herds across the boundaries upon the Tetong range as they had been
doing for many years. "We are in for another season of it," they said,
with the air of being martyrs in the cause of civilization.
Curtis immediately sent warning commands to all the outside ranchers to
keep clear of the reservation, and also notified Streeter, Johnson, and
others of the settlers on the Elk and the Willow that their cattle must
not be allowed to stray beyond certain lines, which he indicated. These
orders, according to Calvin, made the settlers "red-headed as
wood-peckers. They think you're drawin' the lines down pretty fine."
"I mean to," replied Curtis. "You original settlers are here by right
and shall have full opportunity to graze your stock, but those on the
outside must keep out. I will seize and impound all stock that does not
belong on this land."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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