Brave Bear, in the language of the Cheyennes, of whom he is head chief, is
Ni-go High-ez, Ni-go meaning bear, and High-ez, brave. This name he has
kept to the standard on many a hard-fought field, and in helping to
reconstruct his tribe in the ways of civilization. He is tactful and
courteous, and his smile resembles the sunlight breaking a path across a
darkened sheet of water; it is the most winsome that I have seen for years
on the face of any man.
Showing the Indian’s long continued aversion to any speech regarding the
Custer battle, Brave Bear said: “I was in the battle of the Little Big
Horn. The Indians called the General ‘Long Hair.’ It is a fight that I do
not like to talk about.”
Just here it may be well to carry in our minds the distinction between the
Northern and Southern Cheyennes. When the tribe was a compact whole they
were constantly pressed farther into the plains by the hostile Sioux and
established themselves on the upper branches of the Platte River. In
consequence of the building of Bent’s Ford upon the upper Arkansas in
Colorado, a large part of the tribe decided to move south, the other
section moving north to the Yellow-stone. The two sections of the one
tribe have since been known officially as the Northern and Southern
Cheyennes. Ever and again the Southern branch of the tribe came to the
far north to help their brothers when in conflict. This may account for
Brave Bear being present with the Northern Cheyennes in the Custer fight.
Then came the story of Brave Bear concerning one of the battles in the
south. “There is,” he said, “a Cheyenne called ‘Tall Bear’; he was the
head man at the time we began to fight down on the Platte River. From that
hard battle we were returning home. In front of us there were a lot of
soldiers camped, and some of the Pawnee scouts were with the soldiers. We
thought they were Pawnee tents, but when we came close enough we saw it
was a soldier camp, and they fired upon us and pursued us. That day we
kept on fighting, and they killed three of us. It was a great fight, and
it still remains with me when I think about it.”
“I like the white man’s way of living to-day better, because I feel that
when the new day comes everything else is new, and the things of the white
man grow new with every day. I try to do as our agent directs. I have
never had any trouble with him.”
There is a touch of humanness about these tall, graceful, feather-bedecked
men, willingly assuming the role of children, that they may learn the
better ways of the white man. The hard ideals of the warpath are all
merged in pursuing the path of peace.
[Skirting the Sky-Line]