MAKING PEACE WITH THE CROWS
We approached the lower camp, the lodges all yellow glow from the
cheerful fires within. And a cheerful camp it was; men and women singing
here and there, several dances going on, children laughing and
playing--and some squalling--men shouting out to their friends to come
and smoke with them. We could see many dim figures hurrying through the
cold and darkness from one lodge to another. We approached the west side
of the circle at a swift walk, just as though we belonged there--knew
where we were going; in that piercing cold to loiter, to hesitate, would
be to proclaim that we were strangers in the camp. The circle was
fifteen or twenty well separated lodges in width, so we had to go far
into it in order to see the inside lodges. Ancient Otter led us, looking
for the lodge of the painted wolves. We were well into the circle when
a man came out of a lodge that we were just passing, and my heart gave a
big jump when the door curtain was thrust aside and he stepped out. He
saw us, of course, but turned and went off the way we had come, and I
breathed more freely. But we had not gone two lodges farther when we saw
some one coming straight toward us. We had to keep on. We drew our robes
yet more closely about our faces. It was an anxious moment. We were due
to meet the person right in front of a well-lighted lodge, and were
within a few steps of it when a number of men inside struck up a song.
When opposite our leader the person said something, and half stopped;
but Ancient Otter pretended that he did not hear and kept right on, we
following. Then, just as I was passing the person, he did stop and stare
at us! I dared not look back, and oh, how I wanted to! I expected every
step I made to hear a shout of alarm that would arouse the camp. But no!
We went peacefully on, and presently Ancient Otter led us out of the
circle, and away out from the lodges, and when at a safe distance
stopped and told us that we had been in the wrong camp; the camp of the
River Crows.
"Never mind! We have had two escapes! The gods are with us! Lead on!"
Mad Plume told him.
"Yes, I go! Follow, brothers, and pray! Pray for help!" he exclaimed.
We made a wide circle around to the other camp to avoid any persons who
might be going from one to the other of the two, and presently struck it
on the west side of the circle. No one was in sight so we went straight
in among the lodges and soon saw the one of the wolf medicine, the light
of the fire within revealing plainly the big wolf painting on the right
of the doorway. It had the appearance of great ferocity, the wide mouth
showing long, sharp fangs. Ancient Otter stopped and pointed to the
lodge and said to us in a low tone: "There it is, the wolf medicine
lodge, and that one just to the north of it is my friend's lodge. Come!
We will go in!"
"No! It is best that we go to my sister's lodge first. We will need some
one to interpret for us at once, and I am sure that by this time she
speaks Crow," said Mad Plume.
Now, this should all have been arranged beforehand, for while we stood
there talking a man suddenly came around a lodge behind us and called
out to us something or other in his language. We pretended not to hear
him.
"You haven't time to get to your sister's lodge! Follow me!" said
Ancient Otter, and we started on at a swift walk. But the Crow came
faster; something in our appearance, and our silence when he addressed
us had aroused his suspicions. As Ancient Otter raised the door curtain
of the lodge and the light streamed out full in his face, the man
recognized him as one of the hated Pi-kun-i and shouted--as I afterwards
learned--that the enemy were in the camp, and as we hurried into the
lodge we heard on all sides of it the answering, rallying cry of the
warriors.
When Ancient Otter stepped into the lodge and the Crow, Little Wolf, saw
who it was, he sprang up and embraced and kissed him, then did the same
to us and motioned us to seats. We took them, but it was hard to do so
with the rallying cries of the warriors and screams of frightened women
and children ringing in our ears. As soon as we were seated Little Wolf
signed his friend: "You have come! I am glad!"
"I am glad to see you! We are sent by our chiefs to propose peace to
your chiefs. Help us! First, send for the woman of the Pi-kun-i, sister
of the chief there, Mad Plume."
"Yes!" Little Wolf signed, and spoke to one of his women, and she
hurried out. He spoke to another, and as she went out he signed to us,
"I am sending that one for our chiefs! Now, sit you here! I go to stand
outside and keep the crazy warriors back." And with that he snatched up
his bow case, drew out the bow and a handful of arrows, and ran outside,
thrusting back a man entering as he reached the doorway. He went none
too soon; a great crowd was gathering about the lodge, shouting angrily,
crying for our scalps, no doubt. We held our weapons ready and kept our
eyes on the lodge skin, expecting every moment that the warriors would
raise it and pour in upon us. I tell you, that was an anxious time. I
must have shown that I was terribly frightened, for Mad Plume gave my
shoulder a pat and said to me: "Take courage, younger brother, take
courage!"
Just then the door curtain was thrust aside and a handsome young woman
rushed in, and Mad Plume sprang up and embraced her. She clung to him,
crying: "Oh, my brother! What a risk for you to come here at this time!
Oh, I hope that all will be well with us! My man is out there with
Little Wolf, holding back the warriors! Oh, why don't the chiefs come!
Oh, they have come! Listen!"
The noise outside had suddenly died down; some one was addressing the
crowd in a deep and powerful voice, and in a minute or two she said to
us: "It is the head chief, Spotted Bull. He commands his head warriors
to see that you are not harmed, and tells the others to all go home!"
And then, a little later: "They are going; they are minding him! Oh, I
am glad! For the present you are safe!"
Again, the door curtain was raised and Little Wolf came in, followed by
a young man who hurried to greet Mad Plume. Red Crow told me that it was
his brother-in-law. In turn he gave us greeting. Then Little Wolf's
wives returned, and he ordered them to hurry and set food before us,
which they presently did, big wooden bowls full of boiled boss ribs of
buffalo. I should have been hungry; perhaps I was, but I was so excited
and anxious that I ate only a few mouthfuls. Presently we heard some one
talking loudly outside the doorway. Little Wolf answered him, and then
spoke to Mad Plume's sister, telling her to interpret, and she said to
us: "Spotted Bull sends you word that the chiefs will council together
to-morrow morning, and then have a talk with you."
"Yes. I told Spotted Bull that you were peace messengers from your
chiefs," Little Wolf signed to us.
After the meal was over there was some talk, Mad Plume's sister
interpreting, and then it was decided that Ancient Otter should sleep in
his friend's lodge, and that we three should be the guests of Mad
Plume's brother-in-law. Accordingly we went over to his lodge, big, and
well fitted out with soft, robe couches, and Mad Plume and his sister
fell to talking. She first had to hear all about her relatives and
friends, who had died, and how the living were doing. She then told
about the Crows, and her life with them. She said that her man was very
kind to her, that she was perfectly happy except for the fact that,
owing to the continuous war between the Crows and the Pi-kun-i, she
could not occasionally visit her relatives. As to the last fight, she
said that a big war party had started out on the trail of some Snakes,
who had taken a large herd of horses, and while after them had
discovered the Pi-kun-i moving out from Arrow River without the usual
line of warriors in the lead of the column, and so had made the attack.
And at that her man, who was listening, understanding considerable of
her language, told her to tell us that the people who had lost relatives
in the fight were still mourning, and he feared that they might win over
the chiefs to refuse our peace pipe. She added that she thought most of
the women would want peace, and that she would go among them early in
the morning, and get them to urge their men to talk for it.
That was about all Red Crow and I heard of the talk. Tired out, and made
drowsy by the comfortable heat of the lodge, a great change from the
bitter cold that we had experienced, we fell asleep. And we slept
soundly under the assurance that the Crow chief's guards were in the
lodges on either side of us.
Early the next morning, right after preparing food for us, Mad Plume's
sister went out on her round of talks for peace, and soon afterward some
of the Crow men began to drop in for a chat and smoke, and especially
ask about certain of the Pi-kun-i with whom they had become very
friendly in time of peace. I was surprised and pleased at the large
number of these visitors; it was proof that there were many in the camp
who would be on the side of peace. Another thing that surprised me was
the elegance of dress of these men. Without exception they wore
beautiful quill-embroidered shirts and leggings and moccasins, garments
that our people put on only on great occasions. And if anything they
were even taller, more graceful, and with more pride in their bearing
than the men of the Blackfeet tribes, and that is saying much. They were
all apparently much interested in me, wanting to know all that my
friends could tell them about my presence in the country, and why one so
young should be a peace messenger. To that last question Mad Plume
answered that, when the time for it came, I would probably tell my
reason for being there. After a time Ancient Otter came in with his
friend, Little Wolf, and we anxiously awaited the call from the council
of chiefs.
When noon came, and there was still no word from them, our anxiety
increased. Then Mad Plume's sister returned and told us to take courage.
Both Spotted Bull and Lone Runner, chief of the River Crows, and some of
the clan chiefs of both tribes, were for accepting the peace pipe, but
that other clan chiefs, and a good number of warriors wanted the pipe
sent back. The objectors to peace were mostly those who had lost
relatives in the Arrow River fight. She thought that these would
eventually do as the head chiefs desired.
It was not until late afternoon that a messenger called us to the
council. We went over to the big lodge accompanied by Little Wolf, and
Mad Plume's brother-in-law and sister, the latter to act as interpreter.
There was an immense crowd in the camp, most of the River Crows having
come up to hear all about the peace talk, and many that we passed stared
at us with anything but friendly eyes. Had it not been for our guard of
warriors coming right behind us, we might never have reached the council
lodge.
We were not greeted with smiles or any word of welcome when we entered
the lodge and took the seats left vacant for us, but, not at all
daunted, Mad Plume leaned forward and placed the peace pipe and tobacco
in front of Spotted Bull, and said: "Lone Walker, your friend, sends you
this pipe and tobacco, with these words: 'Peace is good, and war is bad!
Let us smoke together and each declare that there shall be peace between
the Crow Tribes and the Blackfeet Tribes.'"
"Ai! Learning from our young man, Little Wolf, that you had come with an
offer of peace from our good friend, Lone Walker, we have been
considering the matter all day," Spotted Bull answered. "From the
beginning my brother there, chief of our brother tribe, and I have
talked for peace, and so have many of our clan chiefs. But a few still
hold out that between us and the Blackfeet tribes there can be no
peace."
"You mean me when you say that!" exclaimed one of the clan chiefs, a
big, haughty appearing, flashing eyed man. "Yes! I hold out for war, war
always between us and the Pi-kun-i! And I am not alone in that desire; I
can go out in this camp and bring you many, very many men who think as I
do!"
Now, when Mad Plume's sister had told us what this man said, Mad Plume
then, much to my surprise, told her to say to the chief that he would
like to have his friend, Rising Wolf, the white youth, speak a few words
to the council. She did so, and Spotted Bull replied, "Yes! Let us hear
what he has to say!"
I considered a moment or two. My first thought was to tell the council
that they were not powerful enough to fight the Blackfeet tribes, and
their Gros Ventre and Sak-si allies. But I said to myself that that
wouldn't do. Nothing had even been said of the flight of the Crows,
their abandonment of much of their property after the Arrow River fight.
At last I said to the interpreter, "Tell them this for me:
"I would like to see peace made on account of the women and children! In
war they suffer, not you men. I have been sick ever since that Arrow
River fight, for I then saw women and girls and even children killed as
well as men! White men do not do that! They would sooner die than kill
women! They believe that it is only cowards who kill women.
"This is a great country. There is plenty of room in it for the Crow
tribes and the Blackfeet tribes, and game enough upon the plains and in
the mountains for all. Then why fight? Why keep the women and children
mourning for loss of father and brother and son? Now, my Red Coat chief
wants the Crows and the Blackfeet and all different tribes to be friends
with one another, and friendly with him. From the Far East he has come
with guns, and tobacco, and all kinds of goods, and built a white man's
lodge on Bow River, and he wants you all to come there and smoke and
feast with him, and give him your beaver skins for his guns and other
things. You Crows can't do that if you are at war with the Blackfeet. I
say this: Make peace, and be happy."
While the woman was interpreting that I asked Mad Plume if it would not
be well for him to offer to give back to the Crows the lodges and things
that we had taken after their flight.
"No. About everything has been used up, and they have new lodges. And I
don't think that they want to be reminded that they fled from us," he
answered.
Just then the woman finished speaking and I happened to be looking
across at the man who had declared that he was for war, always war! A
great change had taken place in him as he listened. Instead of hatred
and defiance, his eyes now expressed great interest, intense desire;
and leaning forward he said to Spotted Bull, as I afterward learned,
"Lift the pipe! Fill, and light it!"
Spotted Bull looked around at the circle and asked: "Is that what you
all say?"
"Yes! Yes!" they answered, and he took the pipe from its wrappings, cut
some of the tobacco, mixed it with dried red willow bark, filled the
bowl, and after lighting the pipe and taking a few whiffs, passed it to
Mad Plume, saying: "Let us smoke together. Tell my good friend, Lone
Walker, that there shall be peace between him and me, between his
children and mine, and that as soon as it is warm enough for us to
travel we will go and camp beside him and hold the peace council with
him and his chiefs."
Mad Plume took a few whiffs of smoke, then started the pipe on the round
of the circle, and answered: "I am glad to have that word to take back
to him. All you chiefs here, remember this, when you come, my lodge is
your lodge. We shall have many smokes together!"
Suitable replies were made to that. Then the fierce chief asked many
questions about the Red Coats' trading post, and the price in beaver
skins of different articles. And then, a little later, the council broke
up and we returned to Little Wolf's lodge, much pleased at the success
of our mission.
Said Mad Plume's sister, "It was your talk that won them over, Rising
Wolf."
"I am glad of that! I hoped that my talk about the poor women would do
some good," I answered.
She laughed. "It was your talk about guns that they heard, not what you
said about the women! More than anything else the Crows want guns," she
said.
That very evening a Chinook wind set in, so we decided to make an early
start for home. We wanted to get across Elk River, the Yellowstone,
before the ice went out. Mad Plume's sister was so anxious to see her
people again that she prevailed upon her man to take her with us, lodge
and all; and Ancient Otter's friend, Little Wolf, came with us with his
lodge and outfit, so we were quite a party. The two Crow tribes were to
break camp three days later, and follow us. If there were any men still
angry that the chiefs had accepted the peace pipe, we felt safe enough
from them now that we had two lodges of their people with us, and
accordingly we set out in high spirits, and, traveling leisurely,
arrived in our own camp five days later. We were received with great
acclaim, and as soon as it was learned that our mission was successful,
that the Crows would soon be with us, great preparations for their
reception went forward. Dearly they loved these opportunities for the
spectacular, the dramatic incidents of life, and made the most of them.
When the Crows came, they halted some miles out from the river and put
on all their finery, the men their war costumes, the women their
beautiful, quill-embroidered, elk-tush-decorated gowns. Our scouts
reported that they were coming, so we all dressed in our best and
mounting our most lively horses went out to meet them. Lone Walker and
his Bull band of the All Friends Society led, of course, all the other
bands following. The women remained in camp, all but Mad Plume's sister,
who rode in the rear of the Bull band, ready to act as interpreter.
We topped the slope up to the plain and found the great column of riders
right close to us. They struck up a mighty song, a Crow song of greeting
and peace, suddenly halted it, and then we sang the Blackfeet song of
peace. And so, alternately singing, we approached one another, and at
last met and the chiefs of both sides sprang from their horses and
embraced one another. Then said Lone Walker, the woman interpreting, "My
brothers! Because you and your children have come, this is a happy day
for me and my children. We make you welcome. Come. Let us ride in to my
lodge and smoke the pipe of peace together!"
Replying for both Crow tribes, Spotted Bull then answered: "Your words
are straight. This is a happy day. We are glad to be with you, we shall
be glad to smoke the peace pipe with you."
"Then let us mount and ride in. My lodge is your lodge. The pipe awaits
you there," said Lone Walker, and they all mounted and led off, and we,
holding back, fell in here and there with the long column of warriors
and escorted them to our camp. In every lodge a feast and smokes awaited
them, and while the chiefs counciled together, and smoked the peace
pipe, and feasted, they were well entertained. And meantime, out in the
big flat of Warm Spring Creek, their women were putting up their camp.
The lodges were soon set, and then, even as the men were doing, the
women of both camps renewed friendships, and exchanged presents and
gossip. They were all expert sign talkers, as well as their men. It was,
indeed, a happy time. A number of dances were held that afternoon, and I
joined in the one that my band gave, and some of Lone Walker's women
told me that I was a very graceful dancer. Well, I believe that I was.
On the following morning Lone Walker dispatched messengers to the chief
of the Kai-na tribe, over on the Missouri, advising him of the peace
that had been made with the Crows, and asking that he and some of his
chiefs come over to meet the Crow chiefs, and to make plans for the
return to the fort of the Red Coats. They came in due time, and more
feasts and smokes, and more dances were held in their honor. At the
council it was decided that the Kai-na, with the River Crows, should
follow up the Missouri to the mountains, and trap northward along them,
and that we, with the Mountain Crows, should go by the way of the gap
between the Bear Paw and Wolf Mountains to Little River, and follow that
up to the main range, and thence north to the post.
With the Mountain Crows, then, we crossed the Missouri at a place later
named by the whites, Cow Island, the place where, in 1877, the Nez
Percés made one of their last stands. From there we followed up the
Stahk-tsi-kye-e-tuk-tai (River-in-the-Middle), which heads in the low
gap dividing the Bear Paw and the Wolf Mountains, and thence went down
to Little, or, as the whites say, Milk River. And here again I was in
country that none of my race had ever seen.
Spring had now come. The days were warm and sunny, green grass was
sprouting, buffaloes and antelopes covered the plains on all sides of
us, the stream was alive with beavers, and so we were happy. The Crows
had no traps, but nevertheless they kept gathering in nearly as many
beaver pelts as we did with traps, simply by careful stalking, and long
waiting, and good shooting with bow and arrows.
We were more than a month following up the river to its head. We then
dropped over onto the St. Mary's Lakes (the Lakes Inside), trapped there
for a time, and then went slowly northward, and ahead of the Kai-na and
the River Crows. When the camp was still two days travel from the fort,
Red Crow and I hurried on and, on the morning of the second day,
suddenly appeared before Factor Hardesty as he sat in the sun just
outside the gate of the fort.
"Bless me! It is little Hugh Monroe!" he cried, springing up and
grasping my hand as I slid from my horse. "Well, well! Tell me quick!
Did you get to the Missouri plains--and saw you any traders there?"
"I have been far beyond the Missouri! Away south of it to Elk River, the
Sieur de la Vérendrie's _La Roche Jaune_, you know, and seen not one
trader!" I answered. But I could not wait for him to ask questions. I
poured out my tale of the vast country I had seen, its wealth of furs,
our trouble with the Crows, and how we had made peace with them and they
were coming to trade with us; and how he and the gathering of employees
behind him did stare at me!
"When are they coming--the Crows and Pi-kun-i?" he asked.
"The River Crows and the Kai-na later on, the others, the Mountain Crows
and the Pi-kun-i, to-day," I answered.
And at that he whirled upon the men and cried: "Hear ye that, now! Two
tribes coming to-day. Go get your women busy cooking pots of meat for a
feast to the chiefs. Put pipe and tobacco in my room! Run up the flag!
Draw the shot from the cannon so that we can salute them and no one be
hurt!"
The men flew to do his bidding, and then he had me for an hour or more
telling him my adventures, and even then I had hardly begun.
"That will do for now! You have done well," he said at last, "so very
well, my boy, that back you go with the Pi-kun-i for another winter in
the South!"
And so ended my first year upon the plains.
THE END
[Illustration: HUGH MONROE IN HIS OLD AGE
_From a photograph_]
The Riverside Press
CAMBRIDGE . MASSACHUSETTS
U . S . A