It was midnight. A dim campfire accentuated the loneliness. Flickering
shadows wrote weird lines on the cone-shaped walls of the tepee. The rain
ceased not the beating of its soft tattoo on the frail roof above our
heads. Old Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa, bent and tottering with his more than eighty
years of life, his noble old face still wearing great dignity, his almost
sightless eyes looking for the last flicker of life’s sunset, presented a
pathetic picture as he faced the firelight and told of his loneliness as
he passed the deserted buffalo trails.
Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa, or Willouskin, is one of the notable chiefs of the
Umatillas. He rendered valuable services to the Government as a scout
during the Indian wars of 1855 and 1856. The heroic deeds of those
faraway days have not been written down in history, and no doubt will be
forgotten by future generations, but they have been written large on the
character lines of this gigantic frame and Savonarola-like face—a poet, a
dreamer, a warrior, and chieftain.
It is better to let Tin-Tin-Meet-Sa open the door himself upon that mighty
past: “My days have been spent for many suns along the great rivers and
high mountains of Oregon. It has been many years ago that I was selected
by our agent as the head man of my tribe. In those days I was a very
active man, but since I have become so old, although they look upon me as
the head man of the tribe, I must leave the work for others to do. During
my younger days I had a big herd of cattle and horses, but as the years
have come over me, I am not able to look after my stock any more. I
consider the greatest event in my life the assistance I rendered in the
capture and killing of Chief Eagan, war chief of the Piutes, during the
Bannock or Sheep-Eater war. These Bannock Indians created great
destruction wherever they went; they burned my tepee and killed over
seventy head of my cattle. I did not know at that time how many cattle I
had, because there was not any one around to steal them. This led me to
go on the warpath against the Bannocks.”
“This country all looks familiar to me because, in my younger days, I
travelled all over these prairies fighting the Sioux Indians who had
stolen horses from my tribe. Again I have travelled all over this country
many times, long years ago, as we came here to hunt the buffalo. I had a
number of fast horses, with which I could easily kill as many buffalo as I
wanted, but I only killed as many as I needed to last for a few days.
When I came here the other day to meet all these chiefs, and I looked at
this country for the last time, I felt lonesome when I saw how it was all
changed, and all of the buffalo gone out of the country, for I could still
see traces of these large animals. It is easy for an old hunter to
discover these buffalo trails, for they all walked in the same place, and
now the rains of many moons have cut those trails deep, just as if a man
had been irrigating some field. I can scarcely see, but my eyes could
find the old trail. The buffalo has gone, and I am soon going.”
[Chief Runs the Enemy]