The
Trapper Hastened To Conceal Himself, But Was Discerned By The
Quick Eye Of The Savages.
With whoops and yells, they dragged him
from his hiding-place, flourished over his head their tomahawks
and scalping-knives, and for a time, the poor trapper gave
himself up for lost.
Fortunately, the Crows were in a jocose,
rather than a sanguinary mood. They amused themselves heartily,
for a while, at the expense of his terrors; and after having
played off divers Crow pranks and pleasantries, suffered him to
depart unharmed. It is true, they stripped him completely, one
taking his horse, another his gun, a third his traps, a fourth
his blanket, and so on, through all his accoutrements, and even
his clothing, until he was stark naked; but then they generously
made him a present of an old tattered buffalo robe, and dismissed
him, with many complimentary speeches, and much laughter. When
the trapper returned to the camp, in such sorry plight, he was
greeted with peals of laughter from his comrades and seemed more
mortified by the style in which he had been dismissed, than
rejoiced at escaping with his life. A circumstance which he
related to Captain Bonneville, gave some insight into the cause
of this extreme jocularity on the part of the Crows. They had
evidently had a run of luck, and, like winning gamblers, were in
high good humor. Among twenty-six fine horses, and some mules,
which composed their cavalcade, the trapper recognized a number
which had belonged to Fitzpatrick's brigade, when they parted
company on the Bighorn.
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