Three Years on the Plains: Observations of Indians, 1867-1870Tuttle, Edmund B. (Edmund Bostwick)
History
Three Years on the Plains: Observations of Indians, 1867-1870
Tuttle, Edmund B. (Edmund Bostwick)
Frontier and pioneer life -- West (U.S.); Indians of North America; Indians of North America -- Great Plains
In the journey through that most delightful region of Montana from Fort
Phil. Kearney to Fort C. F. Smith (in the Powder River country), one of
the most favored camping-grounds is the one called "Crazy Woman's
Fork," the name of a pretty little stream of water that rises in the
Big Horn Mountains, and emptying into the Little Horn River. About
three miles from the mountains this stream crosses the trail between
the two military posts mentioned.
This camp on the Fork is noted for its danger from Indian attacks, as
an abundant supply of game being found in the valley, brings the Indian
there to replenish his larder of wild meat. Notwithstanding the dangers
attending a journey through this region, it has its attractions in the
beautiful and diversified views of lovely scenery, which hasten the
parties traveling that region to encamp, for a night at least, on the
banks of a limpid stream that refreshes man and beast from an unfailing
source in the mountains. The banks are skirted with cottonwood-trees,
and to the west, one sees the tall spurs of the Rocky Mountains rising
up, as it were, from your feet, their dizzy heights covered with snow;
while the haze that surrounds them gives to them a halo of glory and
weirdlike appearance, that the imaginative might compare to _the
garments that mantle the spirits of the blessed in Paradise_!
Iron Bull said that about two hundred years ago, when the moon shone
brighter, and there were more stars, his nation was a great people, and
they roamed over all that country from the Missouri River to the west
of the Yellowstone, and no dog of a Sioux dare show himself there. But
the people had been wicked, and the Great Spirit had darkened the
heavens and made the sun to shine with such heat that the streams were
dried up, and the snow disappeared from the highest peaks of the
mountains. The buffalo, the elk, the mountain sheep, the deer, and the
rabbit, all disappeared and died away, bringing a great famine upon his
tribe, and the spirit of the air breathed death into the lodges, so
that the warrior saw his squaw and papooses die for want of the food he
could not find on all the plain, or on the mountain-sides; so that the
whole nation grieved and mourned in sorrow of heart.
Still, they kept up their wars with the Sioux, and fought many a bloody
battle with them when they suffered most, and the game had entirely
disappeared. Their great medicine-man called a council, and when the
head-men had assembled, he told them of a wonderful dream that he had
had, when he was bidden by the Great Spirit to gather the chiefs of the
tribe at the fork of the stream where they lived.
Their ponies had all been eaten for food, so the proud Indians were
compelled to make the journey on foot to the place of meeting.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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