AT the risk of being tedious, I will tell of one more day’s buffalo
hunting, to show the vicissitudes of this kind of sport. Before doing so
we will glance at another important feature of prairie life, a camp of
Sioux Indians.
One evening, after halting on the banks of the Platte, we heard distant
sounds of tomtoms on the other side of the river. Jim, the half-breed,
and Louis differed as to the tribe, and hence the friendliness or
hostility, of our neighbours. Louis advised saddling up and putting the
night between us; he regaled us to boot with a few blood-curdling tales
of Indian tortures, and of _nous autres en haut_. Jim treated these with
scorn, and declared he knew by the ‘tunes’ (!) that the pow-wow was
Sioux. Just now, he asserted, the Sioux were friendly, and this
‘village’ was on its way to Fort Laramie to barter ‘robes’ (buffalo
skins) for blankets and ammunition. He was quite willing to go over and
talk to them if we had no objection.
Fred, ever ready for adventure, would have joined him in a minute; but
the river, which was running strong, was full of nasty currents, and his
injured knee disabled him from swimming. No one else seemed tempted; so,
following Jim’s example, I stripped to my flannel shirt and moccasins,
and crossed the river, which was easier to get into than out of, and soon
reached the ‘village.’ Jim was right,—they were Sioux, and friendly.
They offered us a pipe of kinik (the dried bark of the red willow), and
jabbered away with their kinsman, who seemed almost more at home with
them than with us.
Seeing one of their ‘braves’ with three fresh scalps at his belt, I asked
for the history of them. In Sioux gutturals the story was a long one.
Jim’s translation amounted to this: The scalps were ‘lifted’ from two
Crows and a Ponkaw. The Crows, it appeared, were the Sioux’ natural
enemies ‘anyhow,’ for they occasionally hunted on each other’s ranges.
But the Ponkaw, whom he would not otherwise have injured, was casually
met by him on a horse which the Sioux recognised for a white man’s. Upon
being questioned how he came by it, the Ponkaw simply replied that it was
his own. Whereupon the Sioux called him a liar; and proved it by sending
an arrow through his body.
I didn’t quite see it. But then, strictly speaking, I am no collector of
scalps. To preserve my own, I kept the hair on it as short as a
tooth-brush.
Before we left, our hosts fed us on raw buffalo meat. This, cut in
slices, and dried crisp in the sun, is excellent. Their lodges were very
comfortable, most of them large enough to hold a dozen people. The
ground inside was covered with buffalo robes; and the sewn skins, spread
tight upon the converging poles, formed a tent stout enough to defy all
weathers. In winter the lodge can be entirely closed; and when a fire is
kindled in the centre, the smoke escaping at a small hole where the poles
join, the snugness is complete.
At the entrance of one of these lodges I watched a squaw and her child
prepare a meal. When the fuel was collected, a fat puppy, playing with
the child, was seized by the squaw, and knocked on the throat—not
head—with a stick. The puppy was then returned, kicking, to the tender
mercies of the infant; who exerted its small might to add to the animal’s
miseries, while the mother fed the fire and filled a kettle for the stew.
The puppy, much more alive than dead, was held by the hind leg over the
flames as long as the squaw’s fingers could stand them. She then let it
fall on the embers, where it struggled and squealed horribly, and would
have wriggled off, but for the little savage, who took good care to
provide for the satisfactory singeing of its playmate.
Considering the length of its lineage, how remarkably hale and well
preserved is our own barbarity!
We may now take our last look at the buffaloes, for we shall see them no
more. Again I quote my journal:
‘_July_ 5_th_.—Men sulky because they have nothing to eat but rancid ham,
and biscuit dust which has been so often soaked that it is mouldy and
sour. They are a dainty lot! Samson and I left camp early with the
hopes of getting meat. While he was shooting prairie dogs his horse made
off, and cost me nearly an hour’s riding to catch. Then, accidentally
letting go of my mustang, he too escaped; and I had to run him down with
the other. Towards evening, spied a small band of buffaloes, which we
approached by leading our horses up a hollow. They got our wind,
however, and were gone before we were aware of it. They were all young,
and so fast, it took a twenty minutes’ gallop to come up with them.
Samson’s horse put his foot in a hole, and the cropper they both got gave
the band a long start, as it became a stern chase, and no heading off.
‘At length I managed to separate one from the herd by firing my pistol
into the “brown,” and then devoted my efforts to him alone. Once or
twice he turned and glared savagely through his mane. When quite
isolated he pulled up short, so did I. We were about sixty yards apart.
I flung the reins upon the neck of the mustang, who was too blown to
stir, and handling my rifle, waited for the bull to move so that I might
see something more than the great shaggy front, which screened his body.
But he stood his ground, tossing up the sand with his hoofs. Presently,
instead of turning tail, he put his head down, and bellowing with rage,
came at me as hard as he could tear. I had but a moment for decision,—to
dig spurs into the mustang, or risk the shot. I chose the latter; paused
till I was sure of his neck, and fired when he was almost under me. In
an instant I was sent flying; and the mustang was on his back with all
four legs in the air.
‘The bull was probably as much astonished as we were. His charge had
carried him about thirty yards, at most, beyond us. There he now stood;
facing me, pawing the ground and snorting as before. Badly wounded I
knew him to be,—that was the worst of it; especially as my rifle, with
its remaining loaded barrel, lay right between us. To hesitate for a
second only, was to lose the game. There was no time to think of
bruises; I crawled, eyes on him, straight for my weapon: got it—it was
already cocked, and the stock unbroken—raised my knee for a rest. We
were only twenty yards apart (the shot meant death for one of the two),
and just catching a glimpse of his shoulder-blade, I pulled. I could
hear the thud of the heavy bullet, and—what was sweeter music—the ugh! of
the fatal groan. The beast dropped on his knees, and a gush of blood
spurted from his nostrils.
‘But the wild devil of a mustang? that was my first thought now.
Whenever one dismounted, it was necessary to loosen his long lariat, and
let it trail on the ground. Without this there was no chance of catching
him. I saw at once what had happened: by the greatest good fortune, at
the last moment, he must have made an instinctive start, which probably
saved his life, and mine too. The bull’s horns had just missed his
entrails and my leg,—we were broadside on to the charge,—and had caught
him in the thigh, below the hip. There was a big hole, and he was
bleeding plentifully. For all that, he wouldn’t let me catch him. He
could go faster on three legs than I on two.
‘It was getting dark, I had not touched food since starting, nor had I
wetted my lips. My thirst was now intolerable. The travelling rule,
about keeping on, was an ugly incubus. Samson would go his own ways—he
had sense enough for that—but how, when, where, was I to quench my
thirst? Oh! for the tip of Lazarus’ finger—or for choice, a bottle of
Bass—to cool my tongue! Then too, whither would the mustang stray in the
night if I rested or fell asleep? Again and again I tried to stalk him
by the starlight. Twice I got hold of his tail, but he broke away. If I
drove him down to the river banks the chance of catching him would be no
better, and I should lose the dry ground to rest on.
‘It was about as unpleasant a night as I had yet passed. Every now and
then I sat down, and dropped off to sleep from sheer exhaustion. Every
time this happened I dreamed of sparkling drinks; then woke with a start
to a lively sense of the reality, and anxious searches for the mustang.
‘Directly the day dawned I drove the animal, now very stiff, straight
down for the Platte. He wanted water fully as much as his master; and
when we sighted it he needed no more driving. Such a hurry was he in
that, in his rush for the river, he got bogged in the muddy swamp at its
edge. I seized my chance, and had him fast in a minute. We both plunged
into the stream; I, clothes and all, and drank, and drank, and drank.’
That evening I caught up the cavalcade.
How curious it is to look back upon such experiences from a different
stage of life’s journey! How would it have fared with me had my rifle
exploded with the fall? it was knocked out of my hands at full cock. How
if the stock had been broken? It had been thrown at least ten yards.
How if the horn had entered my thigh instead of the horse’s? How if I
had fractured a limb, or had been stunned, or the bull had charged again
while I was creeping up to him? Any one, or more than one, of these
contingencies were more likely to happen than not. But nothing did
happen, save—the best.
Not a thought of the kind ever crossed my mind, either at the time or
afterwards. Yet I was not a thoughtless man, only an average man. Nine
Englishmen out of ten with a love of sport—as most Englishmen are—would
have done, and have felt, just as I did. I was bruised and still; but so
one is after a run with hounds. I had had many a nastier fall hunting in
Derbyshire. The worst that could happen did not happen; but the worst
never—well, so rarely does. One might shoot oneself instead of the
pigeon, or be caught picking forbidden fruit. Narrow escapes are as good
as broad ones. The truth is, when we are young, and active, and healthy,
whatever happens, of the pleasant or lucky kind, we accept as a matter of
course.
Ah! youth! youth! If we only knew when we were well off, when we were
happy, when we possessed all that this world has to give! If we but knew
that love is only a matter of course so long as youth and its bounteous
train is ours, we might perhaps make the most of it, and give up looking
for—something better. But what then? Give up the ‘something better’?
Give up pursuit,—the effort that makes us strong? ‘Give up the sweets of
hope’? No! ’tis better as it is, perhaps. The kitten plays with its
tail, and the nightingale sings; but they think no more of happiness than
the rose-bud of its beauty. May be happiness comes not of too much
knowing, or too much thinking either.