* * * * * After the rattler was dead I plucked off eleven beautifully graduated white rattles and a black button, later on adding them to a hatband of several hundred which I had sewn together, using silk thread and a cambric needle. The other boot was tenantless. The blankets, in a neat roll secured by a heavy leather strap, were thrown on top of the freight in the trailer, and away we went for a dry camp in the bad lands, where we spent six hours of the middle of the day hiding under our wagons to escape the hot rays of the sun. A late afternoon start ended at nine p. m., in a moonlit camp on a creek that ran swiftly through chalk-like bluffs--perhaps the headwaters of the Niobrara river. In those days none but a geographer or a government surveyor knew the names of many of the waterways, if they had names. It had been a hard drive through deep sand most of the way, and after the bulls had been relieved of their yokes and the chains that held the teams together, all hands raced for the water, both for internal and external purposes. Our night camp was on a flat between the bluffs and a few yards from the stream in a most inviting spot, the edge of the crooked channel being lined with stunted and gnarled box-elder, while farther back were a few dozen dead and gaunt cottonwoods. Some small bushes grew in clumps here and there, but our camp commanded a good view, even in the night, of the country for a mile in at least two directions--north and south. Though tired, it was too nice a night even in this wilderness to go to bed; for a youngster who had acquired two revolvers, a Winchester rifle, a butcher knife and other weapons believed the crumpled grass he had seen at the edge of the creek indicated the presence not far away of others of the human family, and he intended to find out about it. He had confided this suspicion to one other youth of the outfit, and as the supper camp-fire died down to a bed of coals and a cool wind began to fan the hot earth these boys stole out of camp, waded the creek, and carefully examined the earth up and down its margin until they came upon a distinct moccasin, pony and lodge pole trail. They followed it along the bottoms for two miles to a jutting bluff where around the corner they saw six tepees, near which were picketed several ponies. All was silent as the boys, concealed in a safe spot, viewed the scene. Then there was a sound, low at first, like the crooning of a mother to a babe, which grew louder and louder, until finally there emerged from one of the tepees a big buck who stood silently for a full minute, listening. He wore nothing but a breech-clout, and over his shoulder hung a buckskin strap upon which was attached the arrows for the big bow held in his hand. He did wear a bonnet and it consisted principally of feathers that looked exactly like some of the creations worn by women of the present day.