I
AMONG THE CHEYENNES

One of the most charming books written about the early plains is Lewis H. Garrard’s Wah-To-Yah and the Taos Trail. It is the narrative of a boy, only seventeen years old, who, in 1846, travelled westward from St. Louis with a train led by Mr. St. Vrain, of the firm of Bent, St. Vrain & Co., and after some time spent on the plains and in Cheyenne camps, proceeded westward to New Mexico and there saw and heard of many of the events just antecedent to the Mexican War.

It is an interesting fact that the book, which, in its interest and its fidelity to nature and to early times, equals the far more celebrated California and Oregon Trail of Parkman, tells of the events of the same year as Parkman’s volume, but deals with a country to the south of that traversed by him who was to become one of the greatest historians of America. The charm of each volume lies in its freshness. Neither238 could have been written except by one who saw things with the enthusiastic eyes of youth, who entered upon each adventure with youth’s enthusiasm, and who told his story with the frankness and simplicity of one who was very young. After all, the greatest charm of any literature lies in the simplicity with which the story is told, and in both these delightful volumes is found this attractive quality.

Garrard reached St. Louis on his way to the Rocky Mountains in July, 1846, and there became acquainted with the firm of Pierre Chouteau, Jr., & Co., so well known in the fur trade of the West. Here, too, he met Kenneth McKenzie, one of the first traders with the Blackfeet Indians, and Mr. St. Vrain.

To the modern reader it seems odd to see it stated in the first two lines of the book that a part of the necessary preparations for the trip before him was the “laying in a good store of caps, fine glazed powder, etc.,” but in those days the percussion cap was still a new thing, and of the guns used west of the Missouri River the great majority still used the flint to strike fire to the charge.

Besides Garrard, there were others in St. Vrain’s company, who were new to the plains. Of these one was Drinker, a Cincinnati editor; another, a Mr. Chadwick. Besides these there were General Lee of St. Louis, a friend or two of St. Vrain’s, and various employees of the traders.

Bent’s train was encamped not far from Westport,239 and here Garrard got his first taste of wild life, sleeping on the ground in the open. Here, too, he saw his first Indians, the Wyandottes, who, in 1843, had been moved westward from their homes in Ohio. Here, of course, he met those who for months were to be his travelling companions, and he paints us a fresh picture of them in these pleasing words:

“There were eighteen or twenty Canadian Frenchmen (principally from St. Louis) composing part of our company, as drivers of the teams. As I have ever been a lover of sweet, simple music, their beautiful and piquant songs in the original language fell most harmoniously on the ear, as we lay wrapped in our blankets.

“On the first of September, Mr. St. Vrain’s arrival infused some life into our proceedings, but nothing more worthy of note occurred, except riding and looking at horses, of which Drinker and I were in need; one of which, Frank De Lisle, ‘le maitre de wagon,’ sold me for fifty dollars, whom, from his fanciful color, brown and white spots, and white eyes, was designated by the descriptive though not euphonious name of, ‘Paint.’ He was a noted buffalo chaser, and I anticipated much excitement through his services.

“The way the mules were broken to wagon harness would have astonished the ‘full-blooded’ animals of Kentucky and other horse-raising States exceedingly. It was a treatment none but hardy Mexican or scrub mules could survive. They first had to be lassoed by240 our expert Mexican, Bias, their heads drawn up to a wagon wheel, with scarce two inches of spare rope to relax the tight noose on their necks, and starved for twenty-four hours to subdue their fiery tempers; then harnessed to a heavy wagon, lashed unmercifully when they did not pull, whipped still harder when they ran into still faster speed, until, after an hour’s bewilderment, and plunging and kicking, they became tractable and broken down—a labor-saving operation, with the unflinching motto of ‘kill or cure.’”

The pulling out of the train from near Westport was an interesting and exciting event. Teamsters were shouting to their newly yoked bulls; the herders were driving along the caballada; mounted men were hurrying back and forth; the leader of the company and his wagon-master were constantly passing to and fro from one end of the train to the other, seeing how things went, and looking for weak spots among the teams and the wagons. A few days later came the first rain-storm—a dismal occasion to the young traveller on the plains. There are few old plainsmen but can still recall something of the discomfort of a long day’s travel in the storm; of the camping at night with clothing thoroughly wet and bodies thoroughly chilled, and the sitting or lying, or perhaps even sleeping in the wet clothing. “The wagons being full of goods, and we without tents, a cheerless, chilling, soaking, wet night was the consequence. As the water penetrated, successively, my blanket, coat, and shirt, and made its241 way down my back, a cold shudder came over me; in the gray, foggy morning a more pitiable set of hungry, shaking wretches were never seen. Oh! but it was hard on the poor greenhorns!”

At Council Grove, which they reached the last of September, the train remained for two days, and as this was the last place travelling westward where hardwood could be procured, the men felled hickories and oaks for spare axle-trees, and swung the pieces under their wagons. Young Garrard was an eager hunter, and set out from camp in search of wild turkeys, whose cries he could hear, but he got none.

Here is another picture of that early life which may call up in the minds of some readers pleasant memories of early days when they, too, were a part of such things: “So soon as a faint streak of light appears in the east, the cry ‘turn out’ is given by De Lisle; all rise, and, in half an hour, the oxen are yoked, hitched and started. For the purpose of bringing everything within a small compass, the wagons are corralled; that is, arranged in the form of a pen, when camp is made; and as no animals in that country are caught without a lasso, they are much easier noosed if driven in the corral. There, no dependence must be placed in any but one’s self; and the sooner he rises, when the cry is given, the easier can he get his horse.

“Like all persons on the first trip, I was green in the use of the lasso, and Paint was given to all sorts of malicious dodging; perhaps I have not worked myself242 into a profuse perspiration with vexation a hundred and one times, in vain attempts to trap him.

“Not being able to catch my horse this morning, I hung my saddle on a wagon and walked, talking to the loquacious Canadians, whose songs and stories were most acceptable. They are a queer mixture, anyhow, these Canadians; rain or shine, hungry or satisfied, they are the same garrulous, careless fellows; generally caroling in honor of some brunette Vide Poche, or St. Louis Creole beauty, or lauding, in the words of their ancestry, the soft skies and grateful wine of La Belle France, occasionally uttering a sacré, or enfant de garce, but suffering no cloud of ill humor to overshadow them but for a moment. While walking with a languid step, cheering up their slow oxen, a song would burst out from one end of the train to the other, producing a most charming effect.”

The train was now approaching the buffalo range, and before long several buffalo were seen. Now, too, they had reached a country where “bois de vaches”—buffalo chips—were used for fuel, and the collecting of this was a part of the daily work after camp was made. More and more buffalo were seen, and before long we hear of the plain literally covered with them, and now, as buffalo were killed more often, Garrard is introduced to a prairie dish which no one will ever eat again. He says: “The men ate the liver raw, with a slight dash of gall by way of zest, which, served à la Indian, was not very tempting to cloyed appetites; but to hungry men,243 not at all squeamish, raw, warm liver, with raw marrow, was quite palatable.

“It would not do,” he continues, “for small hunting parties to build fires to cook with; for, in this hostile Indian country, a smoke would bring inquiring friends. Speaking of hostile Indians, reminds me of a question related by one of our men: at a party, in a Missouri frontier settlement, a lady asked a mountaineer, fresh from the Platte, ‘if hostile Indians are as savage as those who serve on foot!’

“Returning to camp the prairie was black with the herds; and, a good chance presenting itself, I struck spurs into Paint, directing him toward fourteen or fifteen of the nearest, distant eight or nine hundred yards. We (Paint and I) soon neared them, giving me a flying view of their unwieldy proportions, and, when within fifteen feet of the nearest I raised my rifle half way to the face and fired. Reloading, still in hot pursuit (tough work to load on a full run), I followed, though without catching up. One feels a delightfully wild sensation when in pursuit of a band of buffalo, on a fleet horse, with a good rifle, and without a hat, the winds playing around the flushed brow, when with hair streaming, the rider nears the frightened herd, and, with a shout of exultation, discharges his rifle. I returned to the party highly gratified with my first, though unsuccessful, chase, but Mr. St. Vrain put a slight damper to my ardor, by simply remarking—

“‘The next time you “run meat” don’t let the horse244 go in a trot and yourself in a gallop’ (I had, in my eagerness, leaned forward in the saddle, and a stumble of the horse would have pitched me over his head); by which well-timed and laconic advice, I afterward profited.”

From this time on there was much chasing of buffalo, but little killing of them, except by the old hands. The young ones, of course, neither knew how to shoot nor where to shoot, and our author na?vely remarks, after one of his chases: “To look at a buffalo, one would think that they could not run with such rapidity; but, let him try to follow with an ordinary horse, and he is soon undeceived.”

During the efforts of the greenhorns to kill buffalo this incident occurred: “Mr. Chadwick (of St. Louis, on his first trip, like several of us, for pleasure), seeing a partially blind bull, concluded to ‘make meat’ of him; crawling up close, the buffalo scented him and pitched about every way, too blind to travel straight or fast. Chad fired; the mad animal, directed by the rifle report, charged. How they did ‘lick it’ over the ground! He pursued, yelling, half in excitement, half in fear, till they were close to the wagons, where the pursuer changed tack, only to be shot by one of the teamsters with a nor’-west fusil.”
BUFFALO HERD NEAR LAKE JESSIE, UPPER MISSOURI RIVER

It is natural enough that the boy author, while travelling for the first time through the buffalo range, should think and write chiefly about buffalo, yet he finds time to tell of the prairie-dog towns through245 which they passed, and of the odd ways of the dogs and the curious apparent companionship or at least co-habitation of the snakes and the prairie owls with them. As they passed through this region north of the Arkansas in the hot, dry weather of the early fall, they suffered sometimes from thirst. The first grave passed by the train aroused melancholy and sympathetic feelings in the boy’s heart.

One day Garrard went out hunting with Mr. St. Vrain and another, and a band of buffalo were discovered on their way to water. Here Garrard first found himself near a wounded bull, and the picture that he paints of the monster is a true and a striking one. “Mr. St. Vrain, dismounting, took his rifle, and soon was on the ‘approach,’ leaving us cached behind a rise of the ground to await the gun report. We laid down with our blankets, which we always carried strapped to the saddle, and, with backs to the wind, talked in a low tone, until hearing Mr. St. Vrain’s gun, when we remounted. Again and again the rifle was heard, in hasty succession, and hastening to him, we found a fat cow stretched, and a wounded male limping slowly off. The animals were tied to the horns of our cow; and, with butcher knives, we divested the body of its fine coat; but, finding myself a ‘green hand,’ at least not an adept, in the mysteries of prairie butchering, I mounted Paint for the wounded fellow, who had settled himself, with his fore legs doubled under him, three hundred yards from us. Mine was a high246 pommeled, Mexican saddle, with wooden stirrups; and, when once seated, it was no easy matter to be dislodged. Paint went up within twenty yards of the growling, wounded, gore-covered bull, and there stood trembling, and imparting some of his fear to myself.

“With long, shaggy, dirt-matted, and tangled locks falling over his glaring, diabolical eyes, blood streaming from nose and mouth, he made the most ferocious looking object it is possible to conceive; and, if nurses could portray to obstinate children in true colors the description of a mad buffalo bull, the oft-repeated ‘bugaboo’ would soon be an obsolete idea.

“While looking with considerable trepidation on the vanquished monarch of the Pawnee plains, he started to his feet; and, with a jump, materially lessened the distance between us, which so scared Paint that he reared backward, nearly sliding myself and gun over his tail; and before the bridle rein could be tightened, ran some rods; but, turning his head, and setting the rowels of my spurs in his flanks, I dashed up within thirty feet of the bull; and at the crack of the gun, the ‘poor buffler’ dropped his head, his skin convulsively shook, his dark eyes, no longer fired with malignancy, rolled back in the sockets, and his spirit departed for the region of perpetual verdure and running waters, beyond the reach of white man’s rifle or the keen lance of the prairie warrior.”

And then the picture with which he closes the chapter covering the march through the buffalo range!247 How boyish, and yet how charming and how true it is!

“Good humor reigned triumphant throughout camp. Canadian songs of mirth filled the air; and at every mess fire, pieces of meat were cooking en appolas; that is, on a stick sharpened, with alternate fat and lean meat, making a delicious roast. Among others, boudins were roasting without any previous culinary operation, but the tying of both ends, to prevent the fat, as it was liquified, from wasting; and when pronounced ‘good’ by the hungry, impatient judges, it was taken off the hot coals, puffed up with the heat and fat, the steam escaping from little punctures, and coiled on the ground, or a not particularly clean saddle blanket, looking for all the world like a dead snake.

“The fortunate owner shouts, ‘Hyar’s the doin’s, and hyar’s the ’coon as savys “poor bull” from “fat cow”; freeze into it, boys!’ And all fall to, with ready knives, cutting off savory pieces of this exquisitely appetizing prairie production.

“At our mess fire there was a whole side of ribs roasted. When browned thoroughly we handled the long bones, and as the generous fat dripped on our clothes, we heeded it not, our minds wrapped up with the one absorbing thought of satisfying our relentless appetites; progressing in the work of demolition, our eyes closed with ineffable bliss. Talk of an emperor’s table—why, they could imagine nothing half so good! The meal ended, the pipe lent its aid to248 complete our happiness, and, at night we retired to the comfortable blankets, wanting nothing, caring for nothing.”

Late in October the train met with the advance guard of a party of Cheyenne warriors, then on the warpath for scalps and horses against the Pawnee nation. These were the first really wild Indians that Garrard had seen, and their picturesqueness and unusual appearance greatly interested him. In those days the Cheyennes had never been at war with the white people, and they were on terms of especial friendliness with Bent and St. Vrain, from whose trading posts they obtained their supplies. A little later, on the way to Bent’s Fort, they passed a Cheyenne medicine lodge, with its sweat-house, and later still Indian graves on scaffolds which rested on the horizontal limbs of the cottonwood trees. A day or two after this they reached Fort William, or Bent’s Fort, where they met William Bent, in his day one of the best-known men of the southern plains. A few days were spent there, and then came the most interesting adventure that the boy had had.

Early in November he started for the Cheyenne village with John Smith, who, with his wife, his little boy Jack, and a Canadian, were setting out for the village to trade for robes.

John Smith is believed to have been the first white man ever to learn the Cheyenne language, so as to be able to interpret it into English. When he made his249 appearance on the plains we do not know, but he was there in the ’30’s, and for many years was employed by Bent and St. Vrain to follow the Indians about and trade with them for robes. Early in his life on the plains he had married a Cheyenne woman and established intimate relations with the tribe, among whom he remained for many years. He was present in the camp of the Cheyennes during the Chivington massacre at Sand Creek, in 1864, at which time his son, Jack, the child mentioned by Garrard in this volume, was killed by the soldiers, being shot in the back by a soldier who saw his shadow on the lodge skins and fired at it. It is said that John Smith himself came very near being killed, and had a hard time in talking the Colorado soldiers out of killing him. He has a son now living at Pine Ridge.

The small party journeyed on toward the village, and while Pierre, the Canadian, drove the wagon, and the woman and her child rode in silence, Smith and Garrard kept up a lively conversation. Smith was anxious to learn all about the “States” and life there, while Garrard replied to him with inquiries about Indians and their ways. And so, day after day, they journeyed over the plain until the cone-shaped lodges of the village came in sight, to be reached a few hours later. Riding into the camp, they halted at the lodge of one of the principal men, and unsaddling and unpacking their animals there, entered it with their goods, and according to custom established themselves in the250 back part, which was at once given up to them by the host. And now began an entirely new life for Garrard—a life into which he threw himself with the whole-hearted enthusiasm of a healthy lad, and which he thoroughly enjoyed. The days and evenings in the camp; the moving from place to place over the prairie; the misfortunes which happened to the men unaccustomed to such life, are all described. Vivid glimpses of the marching Indian column are given in the following paragraphs:

“The young squaws take much care of their dress and horse equipments; they dashed furiously past on wild steeds, astride of the high-pommeled saddles. A fancifully colored cover, worked with beads or porcupine quills, making a flashy, striking appearance, extended from withers to rump of the horse, while the riders evinced an admirable daring, worthy of Amazons. Their dresses were made of buckskin, high at the neck, short sleeves, or rather none at all, fitting loosely, and reaching obliquely to the knee, giving a relieved, Diana look to the costume; the edges scalloped, worked with beads, and fringed. From the knee, downward, the limb was encased in a tightly fitting leggin, terminating in a neat moccasin—both handsomely worked with beads. On the arms were bracelets of brass, which glittered and reflected in the radiant, morning sun, adding much to their attractions. In their pierced ears, shells from the Pacific shore, were pendant; and, to complete the picture of savage taste251 and profusion, their fine complexions were eclipsed by a coat of flaming vermillion.

“Many of the largest dogs were packed with a small quantity of meat, or something not easily injured. They looked queerly, trotting industriously under their burdens; and, judging from a small stock of canine physiological information, not a little of the wolf was in their composition. These dogs are extremely muscular and are compactly built.

“We crossed the river on our way to the new camp. The alarm manifested by the ki-kun (children) in the lodge-pole drays, as they dipped in the water, was amusing; the little fellows, holding their breaths, not daring to cry, looked imploringly at their inexorable mothers, and were encouraged by words of approbation from their stern fathers. Regaining the grassy bottom, we once more went in a fast walk.

“The different colored horses, the young Indian beaux, the bold, bewildering belles, and the newness of the scene were gratifying in the extreme to my unaccustomed senses. After a ride of two hours we stopped, and the chiefs, fastening their horses, collected in circles, to smoke the pipe and talk, letting their squaws unpack the animals, pitch the lodges, build fires, arrange the robes, and, when all was ready, these ‘lords of creation’ dispersed to their several homes to wait until their patient and enduring spouses prepared some food. I was provoked, nay, angry, to see the lazy, overgrown men, do nothing to help their252 wives; and, when the young women pulled off their bracelets and finery, to chop wood, the cup of my wrath was full to overflowing, and, in a fit of honest indignation, I pronounced them ungallant and savage in the true sense of the word. A wife, here, is, indeed, a helpmeet.”

Bravery, endurance, and hardihood were in those days a part of the education of each Indian boy, and here is a glimpse of the training received by a baby, which should fit him for the hardships that each warrior must endure. This was the grandson of the Vip-po-nah, a boy six or seven months old:

“Every morning, his mother washed him in cold water, and sent him out to the air to make him hardy; he would come in, perfectly nude, from his airing, about half frozen. How he would laugh and brighten up, as he felt the warmth of the fire! Being a boy, the parents have great hopes of him as a brave and chief (the acme of Indian greatness); his father dotes upon him, holding him in his arms, singing in a low tone, and in various ways, showing his extreme affection.”

One of the subjects discussed by Garrard and John Smith before they reached the Cheyenne village was prairie foods. Smith spoke of the excellence of dog meat, while Garrard declared that it must be horrible, saying that buffalo meat was unquestionably the most delicate food in this or any other country. Smith agreed that buffalo was the best, but that dog meat was the next, and offered to bet that he would make253 Garrard eat dog meat in the village and make him declare that it was good. How John Smith carried out his threat is told in the following paragraphs:

“One evening we were in our places—I was lying on a pile of outspread robes, watching the blaze, as it illumined the lodge, which gave the yellow hue of the skins of which it was made, a still brighter tinge; and, following with my eye, the thin blue smoke, coursing, in fantastic shapes, through the opening at the top of the cone; my thoughts carrying me momentarily everywhere; now home; now enjoying some choice edible, or, seated by a pleasant friend, conversing; in short, my mind, like the harp in Alexander’s feast, the chords of which, touched by the magic hand of memory, or flight of fancy, alternately depressed, or elevated me in feeling. Greenwood and Smith, sitting up, held in ‘durance vile’ the ever present pipe. Their unusual laughter attracted my attention, but, not divining the cause I joined in the conversation. It was now quite late, and feeling hungry, I asked what was on the fire.

“‘Terrapins!’ promptly replied Smith.

“‘Terrapins?’ echoed I, in surprise, at the name. ‘Terrapins! How do you cook them?’

“‘You know them hard-shell land terrapin?’

“‘Yes.’

“‘Well! the squaws go out to the sand buttes and bring the critters in and cook ’em in the shell alive—those stewin’ thar ar cleaned first. Howsomever, they’re darned good!’

254 “‘Yes, hos, an’ that’s a fact, wagh!’ chimed in Greenwood.

“I listened, of course, with much interest to their account of the savage dish, and waited, with impatience for a taste of that, the recital of whose merits sharpened my already keen appetite. When the squaw transferred the contents of the kettle to a wooden bowl, and passed it on to us, our butcher knives were in immediate requisition. Taking a piece, with hungry avidity, which Smith handed me, without thought, as to what part of the terrapin it was, I ate it with much gusto, calling ‘for more.’ It was extremely good, and I spoke of the delicacy of the meat, and answered all their questions as to its excellency in the affirmative, even to the extent of a panegyric on the whole turtle species. After fully committing myself, Smith looked at me a while in silence, the corners of his mouth gradually making preparations for a laugh, and asked:

“‘Well, hos! how do you like dogmeat?’ and then such hearty guffaws were never heard. The stupefaction into which I was thrown by the revolting announcement, only increased their merriment, which soon was resolved into yells of delight at my discomfiture.

“A revulsion of opinion, and dogmeat too, ensued, for I could feel the ‘pup’ crawling up my throat; but saying to myself—‘that it was good under the name of terrapin,’ ‘that a rose under any other name would smell as sweet,’ and that it would be prejudice to stop, I broke the shackles of deep-rooted antipathy to the255 canine breed, and, putting a choice morceau on top of that already swallowed, ever after remained a stanch defender and admirer of dogmeat. The conversation held with Smith, the second day of our acquaintance, was brought to mind, and I acknowledged that ‘dog’ was next in order to buffalo.”

Life in the Cheyenne camp went on interestingly. Garrard began to make a vocabulary of the Cheyenne language, and soon to speak it in a broken fashion which caused his auditors to shriek with laughter. He watched them at the sign language, amused them with games and the few books which he possessed, went to feasts, noted the odd implements and ways of his camp mates, and set down all that happened, together with his boyish reflections on the incidents.

The discipline practised by John Smith on his son Jack will bear repeating. It seems that the child had taken to crying one night, much to the annoyance of four or five chiefs who had come to the lodge to talk and smoke. “In vain did the mother shake and scold him with the severest Cheyenne words, until Smith, provoked beyond endurance, took the squalling youngster in hands; he ‘shu-ed’ and shouted, and swore, but Jack had gone too far to be easily pacified. He then sent for a bucket of water from the river, and poured cupfull after cupfull on Jack, who stamped and screamed,............