Yet she has been the cause of all my troubles. She was the wife of
my chief. I loved her more than he did; and she knew it. We talked
together; we laughed together; we were always seeking each other’s
society; but we were as innocent as children. The chief grew jealous,
and commanded her to speak with me no more. His heart became hard toward
her; his jealousy grew more furious. He beat her without cause and
without mercy; and threatened to kill her outright if she even looked at
me. Do you want traces of his fury? Look at that scar! His rage against
me was no less persecuting. War parties of the Crows were hovering
round us; our young men had seen their trail. All hearts were roused for
action; my horses were before my lodge. Suddenly the chief came, took
them to his own pickets, and called them his own. What could I do? he
was a chief. I durst not speak, but my heart was burning. I joined no
longer in the council, the hunt, or the war-feast. What had I to do
there? an unhorsed, degraded warrior. I kept by myself, and thought of
nothing but these wrongs and outrages.
“I was sitting one evening upon a knoll that overlooked the meadow where
the horses were pastured. I saw the horses that were once mine grazing
among those of the chief. This maddened me, and I sat brooding for a
time over the injuries I had suffered, and the cruelties which she I
loved had endured for my sake, until my heart swelled and grew sore, and
my teeth were clinched. As I looked down upon the meadow I saw the chief
walking among his horses. I fastened my eyes upon him as a hawk’s; my
blood boiled; I drew my breath hard. He went among the willows. In an
instant I was on my feet; my hand was on my knife--I flew rather than
ran--before he was aware I sprang upon him, and with two blows laid him
dead at my feet. I covered his body with earth, and strewed bushes over
the place; then I hastened to her I loved, told her what I had done, and
urged her to fly with me. She only answered me with tears. I reminded
her of the wrongs I had suffered, and of the blows and stripes she had
endured from the deceased; I had done nothing but an act of justice. I
again urged her to fly; but she only wept the more, and bade me go. My
heart was heavy, but my eyes were dry. I folded my arms. ‘’Tis well,’
said I; ‘Kosato will go alone to the desert. None will be with him but
the wild beasts of the desert. The seekers of blood may follow on his
trail. They may come upon him when he sleeps and glut their revenge; but
you will be safe. Kosato will go alone.’
“I turned away. She sprang after me, and strained me in her arms. ‘No,’
she cried, ‘Kosato shall not go alone! Wherever he goes I will go--he
shall never part from me.’
“We hastily took in our hands such things as we most needed, and
stealing quietly from the village, mounted the first horses we
encountered. Speeding day and night, we soon reached this tribe. They
received us with welcome, and we have dwelt with them in peace. They
are good and kind; they are honest; but their hearts are the hearts of
women.”
Such was the story of Kosato, as related by him to Captain Bonneville.
It is of a kind that often occurs in Indian life; where love elopements
from tribe to tribe are as frequent as among the novel-read heroes and
heroines of sentimental civilization, and often give rise to bloods and
lasting feuds.
14.
The party enters the mountain gorge--A wild fastness among
hills--Mountain mutton--Peace and plenty--The amorous
trapper-A piebald wedding--A free trapper’s wife--Her gala
equipments--Christmas in the wilderness.
ON the 19th of December Captain Bonneville and his confederate Indians
raised their camp, and entered the narrow gorge made by the north fork
of Salmon River. Up this lay the secure and plenteous hunting region so
temptingly described by the Indians.
Since leaving Green River the plains had invariably been of loose sand
or coarse gravel, and the rocky formation of the mountains of primitive
limestone. The rivers, in general, were skirted with willows and bitter
cottonwood trees, and the prairies covered with wormwood. In the hollow
breast of the mountains which they were now penetrating, the surrounding
heights were clothed with pine; while the declivities of the lower hills
afforded abundance of bunch grass for the horses.
As the Indians had represented, they were now in a natural fastness of
the mountains, the ingress and egress of which was by a deep gorge, so
narrow, rugged, and difficult as to prevent secret approach or rapid
retreat, and to admit of easy defence. The Blackfeet, therefore,
refrained from venturing in after the Nez Perces, awaiting a better
chance, when they should once more emerge into the open country.
Captain Bonneville soon found that the Indians had not exaggerated the
advantages of this region. Besides the numerous gangs of elk, large
flocks of the ahsahta or bighorn, the mountain sheep, were to be
seen bounding among the precipices. These simple animals were easily
circumvented and destroyed. A few hunters may surround a flock and kill
as many as they please. Numbers were daily brought into camp, and the
flesh of those which were young and fat was extolled as superior to the
finest mutton.
Here, then, there was a cessation from toil, from hunger, and alarm.
Past ills and dangers were forgotten. The hunt, the game, the song, the
story, the rough though good-humored joke, made time pass joyously away,
and plenty and security reigned throughout the camp.
Idleness and ease, it is said, lead to love, and love to matrimony,
in civilized life, and the same process takes place in the wilderness.
Filled with good cheer and mountain mutton, one of the free trappers
began to repine at the solitude of his lodge, and to experience the
force of that great law of nature, “it is not meet for man to live
alone.”
After a night of grave cogitation he repaired to Kowsoter, the
Pierced-nose chief, and unfolded to him the secret workings of his
bosom.
“I want,” said he, “a wife. Give me one from among your tribe. Not a
young, giddy-pated girl, that will think of nothing but flaunting and
finery, but a sober, discreet, hard-working squaw; one that will share
my lot without flinching, however hard it may be; that can take care of
my lodge, and be a companion and a helpmate to me in the wilderness.”
Kowsoter promised to look round among the females of his tribe, and
procure such a one as he desired. Two days were requisite for the
search. At the expiration of these, Kowsoter, called at his lodge, and
informed him that he would bring his bride to him in the course of
the afternoon. He kept his word. At the appointed time he approached,
leading the bride, a comely copper-colored dame attired in her Indian
finery. Her father, mother, brothers by the half dozen and cousins by
the score, all followed on to grace the ceremony and greet the new and
important relative.
The trapper received his new and numerous family connection with proper
solemnity; he placed his bride beside him, and, filling the pipe, the
great symbol of peace, with his best tobacco, took two or three whiffs,
then handed it to the chief who transferred it to the father of the
bride, from whom it was passed on from hand to hand and mouth to mouth
of the whole circle of kinsmen round the fire, all maintaining the most
profound and becoming silence.
After several pipes had been filled and emptied in this solemn
ceremonial, the chief addressed the bride, detailing at considerable
length the duties of a wife which, among Indians, are little less
onerous than those of the pack-horse; this done, he turned to her
friends and congratulated them upon the great alliance she had made.
They showed a due sense of their good fortune, especially when the
nuptial presents came to be distributed among the chiefs and relatives,
amounting to about one hundred and eighty dollars. The company soon
retired, and now the worthy trapper found indeed that he had no green
girl to deal with; for the knowing dame at once assumed the style and
dignity of a trapper’s wife: taking possession of the lodge as her
undisputed empire, arranging everything according to her own taste and
habitudes, and appearing as much at home and on as easy terms with the
trapper as if they had been man and wife for years.
We have already given a picture of a free trapper and his horse, as
furnished by Captain Bonneville: we shall here subjoin, as a companion
picture, his description of a free trapper’s wife, that the reader
may have a correct idea of the kind of blessing the worthy hunter in
question had invoked to solace him in the wilderness.
“The free trapper, while a bachelor, has no greater pet than his horse;
but the moment he takes a wife (a sort of brevet rank in matrimony
occasionally bestowed upon some Indian fair one, like the heroes of
ancient chivalry in the open field), he discovers that he has a still
more fanciful and capricious animal on which to lavish his expenses.
“No sooner does an Indian belle experience this promotion, than all her
notions at once rise and expand to the dignity of her situation, and the
purse of her lover, and his credit into the bargain, are taxed to the
utmost to fit her out in becoming style. The wife of a free trapper to
be equipped and arrayed like any ordinary and undistinguished squaw?
Perish the grovelling thought! In the first place, she must have a horse
for her own riding; but no jaded, sorry, earth-spirited hack, such as
is sometimes assigned by an Indian husband for the transportation of his
squaw and her pappooses: the wife of a free trader must have the
most beautiful animal she can lay her eyes on. And then, as to his
decoration: headstall, breast-bands, saddle and crupper are lavishly
embroidered with beads, and hung with thimbles, hawks’ bells, and
bunches of ribbons. From each side of the saddle hangs an esquimoot,
a sort of pocket, in which she bestows the residue of her trinkets and
nick-nacks, which cannot be crowded on the decoration of her horse or
herself. Over this she folds, with great care, a drapery of scarlet and
bright-colored calicoes, and now considers the caparison of her steed
complete.
“As to her own person, she is even still more extravagant. Her hair,
esteemed beautiful in proportion to its length, is carefully plaited,
and made to fall with seeming negligence over either breast. Her
riding hat is stuck full of parti-colored feathers; her robe, fashioned
somewhat after that of the whites, is of red, green, and sometimes
gray cloth, but always of the finest texture that can be procured.
Her leggings and moccasins are of the most beautiful and expensive
workman-ship, and fitted neatly to the foot and ankle, which with the
Indian woman are generally well formed and delicate. Then as to jewelry:
in the way of finger-rings, ear-rings, necklaces, and other female
glories, nothing within reach of the trapper’s means is omitted that can
tend to impress the beholder with an idea of the lady’s high estate. To
finish the whole, she selects from among her blankets of various dyes
one of some glowing color, and throwing it over her shoulders with a
native grace, vaults into the saddle of her gay, prancing steed, and
is ready to follow her mountaineer ‘to the last gasp with love and
loyalty.’”
Such is the general picture of the free trapper’s wife, given by Captain
Bonneville; how far it applied in its details to the one in question
does not altogether appear, though it would seem from the outset of her
connubial career, that she was ready to avail herself of all the pomp
and circumstance of her new condition. It is worthy of mention that
wherever there are several wives of free trappers in a camp, the keenest
rivalry exists between them, to the sore detriment of their husbands’
purses. Their whole time is expended and their ingenuity tasked by
endeavors to eclipse each other in dress and decoration. The jealousies
and heart-burnings thus occasioned among these so-styled children of
nature are equally intense with those of the rival leaders of style and
fashion in the luxurious abodes of civilized life.
The genial festival of Christmas, which throughout all Christendom
lights up the fireside of home with mirth and jollity, followed hard
upon the wedding just described. Though far from kindred and friends,
Captain Bonneville and his handful of free trappers were not disposed
to suffer the festival to pass unenjoyed; they were in a region of good
cheer, and were disposed to be joyous; so it was determined to “light
up the yule clog,” and celebrate a merry Christmas in the heart of the
wilderness.
On Christmas eve, accordingly, they began their rude fetes and
rejoicings. In the course of the night the free trappers surrounded the
lodge of the Pierced-nose chief and in lieu of Christmas carols, saluted
him with a feude joie.
Kowsoter received it in a truly Christian spirit, and after a speech, in
which he expressed his high gratification at the honor done him, invited
the whole company to a feast on the following day. His invitation was
gladly accepted. A Christmas dinner in the wigwam of an Indian chief!
There was novelty in the idea. Not one failed to be present. The banquet
was served up in primitive style: skins of various kinds, nicely dressed
for the occasion, were spread upon the ground; upon these were heaped up
abundance of venison, elk meat, and mountain mutton, with various bitter
roots which the Indians use as condiments.
After a short prayer, the company all seated themselves cross-legged, in
Turkish fashion, to the banquet, which passed off with great hilarity.
After which various games of strength and agility by both white men and
Indians closed the Christmas festivities.
15.
A hunt after hunters--Hungry times--A voracious repast--
Wintry weather--Godin’s River--Splendid winter scene on the
great--Lava Plain of Snake River--Severe travelling and
tramping in the snow--Manoeuvres of a solitary Indian
horseman--Encampment on Snake River--Banneck Indians--The
horse chief--His charmed life.
THE continued absence of Matthieu and his party had, by this time,
caused great uneasiness in the mind of Captain Bonneville; and, finding
there was no dependence to be placed upon the perseverance and courage
of scouting parties in so perilous a quest, he determined to set
out himself on the search, and to keep on until he should ascertain
something of the object of his solicitude.
Accordingly on the 20th December he left the camp, accompanied by
thirteen stark trappers and hunters, all well mounted and armed for
dangerous enterprise. On the following morning they passed out at the
head of the mountain gorge and sallied forth into the open plain. As
they confidently expected a brush with the Blackfeet, or some other
predatory horde, they moved with great circumspection, and kept vigilant
watch in their encampments.
In the course of another day they left the main branch of Salmon River,
and proceeded south toward a pass called John Day’s defile. It was
severe and arduous travelling. The plains were swept by keen and bitter
blasts of wintry wind; the ground was generally covered with snow, game
was scarce, so that hunger generally prevailed in the camp, while the
want of pasturage soon began to manifest itself in the declining vigor
of the horses.
The party had scarcely encamped on the afternoon of the 28th, when two
of the hunters who had sallied forth in quest of game came galloping
back in great alarm. While hunting they had perceived a party of
savages, evidently manoeuvring to cut them off from the camp; and
nothing had saved them from being entrapped but the speed of their
horses.
These tidings struck dismay into the camp. Captain Bonneville endeavored
to reassure his men by representing the position of their encampment,
and its capability of defence. He then ordered the horses to be driven
in and picketed, and threw up a rough breastwork of fallen trunks of
trees and the vegetable rubbish of the wilderness. Within this barrier
was maintained a vigilant watch throughout the night, which passed away
without alarm. At early dawn they scrutinized the surrounding plain, to
discover whether any enemies had been lurking about during the night;
not a foot-print, however, was to be discovered in the coarse gravel
with which the plain was covered.
Hunger now began to cause more uneasiness than the apprehensions of
surrounding enemies. After marching a few miles they encamped at the
foot of a mountain, in hopes of finding buffalo. It was not until the
next day that they discovered a pair of fine bulls on the edge of the
plain, among rocks and ravines. Having now been two days and a half
without a mouthful of food, they took especial care that these animals
should not escape them. While some of the surest marksmen advanced
cautiously with their rifles into the rough ground, four of the best
mounted horsemen took their stations in the plain, to run the bulls down
should they only be maimed.
The buffalo were wounded and set off in headlong flight. The
half-famished horses were too weak to overtake them on the frozen
ground, but succeeded in driving them on the ice, where they slipped
and fell, and were easily dispatched. The hunters loaded themselves with
beef for present and future supply, and then returned and encamped
at the last nights’s fire. Here they passed the remainder of the day,
cooking and eating with a voracity proportioned to previous starvation,
forgetting in the hearty revel of the moment the certain dangers with
which they were environed.
The cravings of hunger being satisfied, they now began to debate about
their further progress. The men were much disheartened by the hardships
they had already endured. Indeed, two who had been in the rear guard,
taking advantage of their position, had deserted and returned to the
lodges of the Nez Perces. The prospect ahead was enough to stagger the
stoutest heart. They were in the dead of winter. As far as the eye
could reach the wild landscape was wrapped in snow, which was evidently
deepening as they advanced. Over this they would have to toil, with the
icy wind blowing in their faces: their horses might give out through
want of pasturage, and they themselves must expect intervals of horrible
famine like that they had already experienced.
With Captain Bonneville, however, perseverance was a matter of pride;
and, having undertaken this enterprise, nothing could turn him back
until it was accomplished: though he declares that, had he anticipated
the difficulties and sufferings which attended it, he should have
flinched from the undertaking.
Onward, therefore, the little band urged their way, keeping along the
course of a stream called John Day’s Creek. The cold was so intense that
they had frequently to dismount and travel on foot, lest they should
freeze in their saddles. The days which at this season are short enough
even in the open prairies, were narrowed to a few hours by the high
mountains, which allowed the travellers but a brief enjoyment of the
cheering rays of the sun. The snow was generally at least twenty inches
in depth, and in many places much more: those who dismounted had to beat
their way with toilsome steps. Eight miles were considered a good day’s
journey. The horses were almost famished; for the herbage was covered by
the deep snow, so that they had nothing to subsist upon but scanty wisps
of the dry bunch grass which peered above the surface, and the small
branches and twigs of frozen willows and wormwood.
In this way they urged their slow and painful course to the south down
John Day’s Creek, until it lost itself in a swamp. Here they encamped
upon the ice among stiffened willows, where they were obliged to beat
down and clear away the snow to procure pasturage for their horses.
Hence they toiled on to Godin River; so called after an Iroquois hunter
in the service of Sublette, who was murdered there by the Blackfeet.
Many of the features of this remote wilderness are thus named after
scenes of violence and bloodshed that occurred to the early pioneers. It
was an act of filial vengeance on the part of Godin’s son Antoine that,
as the reader may recollect, brought on the recent battle at Pierre’s
Hole.
From Godin’s River, Captain Bonneville and his followers came out upon
the plain of the Three Butes, so called from three singular and isolated
hills that rise from the midst. It is a part of the great desert of
Snake River, one of the most remarkable tracts beyond the mountains.
Could they have experienced a respite from their sufferings and
anxieties, the immense landscape spread out before them was calculated
to inspire admiration. Winter has its beauties and glories as well as
summer; and Captain Bonneville had the soul to appreciate them.
Far away, says he, over the vast plains, and up the steep sides of the
lofty mountains, the snow lay spread in dazzling whiteness: and whenever
the sun emerged in the morning above the giant peaks, or burst forth
from among clouds in his midday course, mountain and dell, glazed rock
and frosted tree, glowed and sparkled with surpassing lustre. The tall
pines seemed sprinkled with a silver dust, and the willows, studded with
minute icicles reflecting the prismatic rays, brought to mind the fairy
trees conjured up by the caliph’s story-teller to adorn his vale of
diamonds.
The poor wanderers, however, nearly starved with hunger and cold, were
in no mood to enjoy the glories of these brilliant scenes; though they
stamped pictures on their memory which have been recalled with delight
in more genial situations.
Encamping at the west Bute, they found a place swept by the winds, so
that it was bare of snow, and there was abundance of bunch grass. Here
the horses were turned loose to graze throughout the night. Though for
once they had ample pasturage, yet the keen winds were so intense that,
in the morning, a mule was found frozen to death. The trappers gathered
round and mourned over him as over a cherished friend. They feared their
half-famished horses would soon share his fate, for there seemed scarce
blood enough left in their veins to withstand the freezing cold. To beat
the way further through the snow with these enfeebled animals seemed
next to impossible; and despondency began to creep over their hearts,
when, fortunately, they discovered a trail made by some hunting party.
Into this they immediately entered, and proceeded with less difficulty.
Shortly afterward, a fine buffalo bull came bounding across the snow and
was instantly brought down by the hunters. A fire was soon blazing and
crackling, and an ample repast soon cooked, and sooner dispatched; after
which they made some further progress and then encamped. One of the men
reached the camp nearly frozen to death; but good cheer and a blazing
fire gradually restored life, and put his blood in circulation.
Having now a beaten path, they proceeded the next morning with more
facility; indeed, the snow decreased in depth as they receded from the
mountains, and the temperature became more mild. In the course of the
day they discovered a solitary horseman hovering at a distance before
them on the plain. They spurred on to overtake him; but he was better
mounted on a fresher steed, and kept at a wary distance, reconnoitring
them with evident distrust; for the wild dress of the free trappers,
their leggings, blankets, and cloth caps garnished with fur and topped
off with feathers, even their very elf-locks and weather-bronzed
complexions, gave them the look of Indians rather than white men, and
made him mistake them for a war party of some hostile tribe.
After much manoeuvring, the wild horseman was at length brought to a
parley; but even then he conducted himself with the caution of a knowing
prowler of the prairies. Dismounting from his horse, and using him as a
breastwork, he levelled his gun across his back, and, thus prepared for
defence like a wary cruiser upon the high seas, he permitted himself to
be approached within speaking distance.
He proved to be an Indian of the Banneck tribe, belonging to a band at
no great distance. It was some time before he could be persuaded that
he was conversing with a party of white men and induced to lay aside his
reserve and join them. He then gave them the interesting intelligence
that there were two companies of white men encamped in the neighborhood.
This was cheering news to Captain Bonneville; who hoped to find in one
of them the long-sought party of Matthieu. Pushing forward, therefore,
with renovated spirits, he reached Snake River by nightfall, and there
fixed his encampment.