"PAINTING INJUN."
Withal, I was not reckless. If not sanguine, I was far from despondent;
and as I continued to dwell upon it, the prospect seemed to brighten,
and success to appear less problematical.
One of the chief difficulties I should have to encounter would be
_getting into_ the camp. Once inside the lines--that is, among the
camp-fires and tents, if there should be any--I should be comparatively
safe. This I knew from experience; for it would not be my first visit
to an encampment of prairie-Indians. Even in their midst, mingling with
the savages themselves, and under the light of their glaring fires, I
should be less exposed to the danger of detection than while attempting
to cross their lines. First, I should have to pass the outlying
pickets: then within these the horse-guards; and within these, again,
the horses themselves!
You may smile when I assert that the last was to me a source of
apprehension as great as either of the others. An Indian horse is a
sentinel not to be despised. He is as much the enemy of the white man
as his master; and partly from fear, and partly from actual antipathy,
he will not permit the former to approach him. The human watcher may be
negligent--may sleep upon his post--the horse never. The scent of a
white man, or the sight of a skulking form, will cause him to snort and
neigh; so that a whole camp will either be _stampeded_ or put upon the
alert in a few minutes. Many a well-planned attack has been defeated by
the warning-snort of the sentinel mustang.
It is not that the prairie-horse feels any peculiar attachment for the
Indian; strange if he did--since tyrant more cruel to the equine race
does not exist; no driver more severe, no rider more hard, than a
horse-Indian.
It is simply the faithfulness which the noble animal exhibits for his
companion and master, with the instinct which tells him when that master
is menaced by danger. He will do the same service for a white as for a
red man; and often does the weary trapper take his lone rest, with full
confidence that the vigil will be faithfully kept by his horse.
Had there been dogs in the Indian camp, my apprehensions would have been
still more acute--the danger would have been more than doubled. Within
the lines, these cunning brutes would have known me as an enemy: the
disguise of garments would not have availed me by the scent, an Indian
dog can at once tell the white from the red man; and they appear to hold
a real antipathy against the race of the Celt or Saxon. Even in time of
truce, a white man entering an Indian camp can scarcely be protected
from the wolfish pack.
I knew there were no dogs--we saw tracks of none. The Indians had been
upon the war-trail; and when they proceed on these grand expeditions,
their dogs, like their women, are left "at home." I had reason to be
thankful that such was their custom.
Of course it was my intention to go disguised; it would have been
madness to have gone otherwise. In the darkest night, my uniform would
have betrayed me; but necessarily, in my search for the captive, I
should be led within the light of the fires.
It was my design, therefore, to counterfeit the Indian costume; and how
to do this had been for some time the subject of my reflections. I had
been congratulating myself on the possession of the buffalo-robe. That
would go far towards the disguise; but other articles were wanting to
complete my costume. The leggings and moccasins--the plumed head-dress
and neck ornaments--the long elfin locks--the bronze complexion of arms
and breast--the piebald face of chalk, charcoal, and vermilion--where
were all these to be obtained? There was no _costumerie_ in the desert.
In the moment of excitement that succeeded the capture of the savage, I
had been thinking of other things. It was only when we were about to
part from him that the idea jumped into my mind--that bright idea--that
_he_ could _furnish_ me--the very man.