LITMIR.BIZ

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lay over a somewhat bare, but undulating, country. About noon the clouds partially lifted, and the sun of the last day of May shone out fitfully to cheer our weary road. We soon gained the summit of an unusually high swell in the prairie, called in frontier parlance "a divide," and beheld, with some degree of joy, to our left and front, distant perhaps one hundred miles, the chilly, white summits of the mighty Big Horn mountains. From this same "divide" we had an exceptionally fine view of that portion of Wyoming which we had marched over. Looking backward, we could see the faint blue outline of Laramie Peak, almost dipping below the horizon. On our right, and almost due east, tho dark group of

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      the Black Hills of Dakota could be descried through a fieldglass. On our right front, northeastward, the Pumpkin buttes, four long, somewhat irregular, but mountain-like, formations, several hundred feet in height, arose abruptly from the very bosom of "the bad lands." Those buttes run very nearly north and south, the northernmost being nearly abreast of Fort Reno. But soon the lurking storm came back upon us with renewed fury, and there was an end, for that day at least, of our enjoyment of savage scenery.

      Wind creek did not belie its name. A more comfortless bivouac rarely fell to a soldier's lot. Every inch of ground was covered with some species of cacti, each seemingly more full of thorns than its neighbor. The water was simply execrable, the wood scarce and the weather bitterly cold. By order of General Crook, who did not desire to be hampered with too many impediments, we had left our tent stoves at Fort Fetterman, and as the thermometer continued to fall, we began to think that we had accidentally marched into Alaska. The storm, as night advanced, increased in fury, and came near playing us the shabby trick which it inflicted on the English army in 1854, when nearly all the tents of the Crimean expeditionary force were swept into the bay of Balaklava. When the grim morning of Thursday, June 1, 1876, broke upon Wind river, snow was falling as thickly as it does in Chicago about New Year's. The shower did not continue very long, and when it ceased, we found the temperature much more comfortable. We marched on that day to a dreary place known as the "dry fork" of the Powder river—something over twenty miles. As every

      OR THE CONQUEST OF THE SIOUX

      officer and soldier wore a service overcoat, the brigade looked much better, because more uniform, than usual. The first half of our journey lay through and over a mountainous region, but when we reached the highest crest of " the divide," and the valley of Powder river lay stretched out before and beneath us, mile on mile, we concluded that we had, at last, struck a portion of Wyoming which we could praise with a fairly good conscience. Although the soil was marred by the brushwood and weeds which disfigure, more or less, most portions of the Territory, the valley showed evidences of fertility. It is inundated periodically by copious mountain torrents, which follow the " snow melts" and the rain storms. The vegetation is comparatively good, and a belt of cottonwood timber follows the whole course of the river, from its source among the Big Horn mountains to where it falls into the Yellowstone, opposite Sheridan buttes, in Montana. We found many traces of Indian villages near our encampment, which indicated that the valley was a favorite haunt of the savages in the days, not so long removed, when the buffalo covered the range as far as the eye could reach. Antelope were the largest game we found in the locality, because the buffalo had chosen, temporarily, to graze on the then great ranges of the Yellowstone and Tongue rivers.

      As we approached the river, a young staff officer raised his field-glass to his eyes, and looked steadily to the westward for some minutes. He soon rode up to General Crook, and informed him that he had observed what he believed to be a cloud of Indians hovering on our left. The distance was

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      too great to allow any of us to make out the precise character of the rapidly moving objects. Colonel Henry's company of the 3d Cavalry was at once ordered to reconnoitre, and set out at a fast trot over the prairie. Our column had begun to straggle somewhat, owing to the uneven character of the road, and an aide-de-camp came riding rapidly from front to rear, shouting, " Close up, close up!" which we did with great alacrity. Judging by the amount of bustle, the uninitiated among us began to believe that Sitting Bull and all his warriors must be close upon our heels. A fight was expected—muskets were examined and carbines unslung. The saddle girths were tightened, and nearly every man in the outfit assumed a proper look of martial ferocity. Very soon we observed Henry's command approaching the rapidly-moving " enemy," who seemed to be coming on with great fearlessness. The troop came to a halt, while the other party continued their movement in advance. Through our field-glasses we could then see that those dreaded "Indians" wore blue uniforms, rode American horses, and had a small pack train with them. They were, in fact, the two troops of cavalry detached under Meinhold and Vroom, at Sage creek, by the General, returning from their scout. "What a fuss about nothing!" observed Crook, as he closed his telescope and resumed his place at the head of the column. We rode almost immediately into camp on the "dry fork " of Powder river, and then we learned that the scouting party had seen no Indians, or traces of Indians, during their long ride. Captain Meinhold, a very fine-looking German officer, with a romantic history, told me smilingly,

      OR THE CONQUEST OF THE SIOUX

      that the party had found no water since leaving the Platte, but that they had shot some deer, and, in order to quench their thirst, had emptied their brandy flasks with true military promptitude. Captain Vroom was then a magnificent specimen of the human race, tall, well-built and good-looking. He has since grown much stouter, the result, doubtless, of the absence of Indian campaigns, which would now seem to be almost at an end. One of Meinhold's men had wounded himself mortally by the accidental discharge of his pistol, and the poor fellow had suffered intensely on the subsequent march. He was placed in an ambulance, and made as comfortable as possible.

      The absence of Indians surprised the men who had been over the road previously. Around the camp-fires, that evening, both officers and rank and file asked, "Where are the Sioux?" This interrogation was addressed by Captain Sutorius to Captain Wells, at a bivouac fire of the 3d Cavalry.

      "Don't be alarmed," said Wells, in his grim, abrupt way, "if they want to find us, we will hear from them when we least expect. If they don't want to find us, we won't hear from them at all, but I think they will."

      "They have neglected us strangely up to date," remarked Lieutenant Lemley. "Last time they serenaded us with rifle-shots every evening after we crossed the Platte. You have heard, I suppose, the joke on Lieutenant Bourke, of Crook's staff?"

      "No, let's hear it," shouted half a dozen future generals.

      "Very well. We were camped on Crazy Woman's—a

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      d—d mean place—and no Indians had been disturbing us for some nights. The thing was growing stale, and we were all impatient for some kind of excitement, as it was awfully cold, and we were slowly freezing to death. 'Let us go up to Bourke's tent,' some one suggested that night, and there all of us went. The lieutenant was engaged in scanning a military map by the light of a candle. 'Hello, Bourke,' said one of the party,' ain't you afraid the Indians will ventilate your tent if you keep that light burning?'

      "'Oh, no,' said Bourke. 'The Indians that have been firing into us are a small flying party. You may rely on it that you won't hear anything more from them this side of Tongue river. The distance is too great from their villages and the weather is too cold. Mr. Indian doesn't care to be frozen. Now, I'll show you on this map the point where they will, most likely, make their first real at—'

      "Whizz! pop! bang! zip! came a regular volley from the bluffs above our camp. A bullet struck the candle and put it out. Another made a large-sized hole in the map. The group scattered quicker than a line of skirmishers, and Bourke was left alone to meditate on the instability of Indian character."

      It doesn't take much to make men laugh around a camp fire, and there was general hilarity at the expense of the gallant and genial staff-officer, who was one of the most efficient men connected with the expedition, and who has since been so much distinguished in successive Indian campaigns.

      "Now, Lieutenant Schwatka, tell us about that Pawnee Indian picket you had on Powder river, last March,"

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