There lies in a “coulee” near the Marias River, on the road that leads
from Macleod to Benton, a large “medicine stone,” venerated by the
Indians belonging to the Blackfoot Confederacy. The “coulee” is named by
the Indians the “Red Coulee.” When the Blackfeet came from the north,
the Snake Indians, who at that time inhabited the country, told the
Blackfeet that there was a large medicine stone on the top of a hill,
close to a ravine.
Several years after they were told this, a Blackfoot chief with fifty
men went southward on the war-path. They all went to this stone, and the
chief, being sceptical about the mysterious powers possessed by it,
laughed at his men for exhibiting such childishness as to believe in it.
In derision he hurled the stone down the mountain-side into the ravine
and then departed. They engaged in a battle with some Indians in the
south, and all of them were killed, only one man returning to tell the
fate of his comrades. Ever since that time the Indians have called the
place the “Red Coulee,” and as they travel to and fro they never forget
to go there and present their offerings, to insure safety in battle and
protection by the way.