They Are
Not Vengeful And Enterprising In Warfare, However; Seldom Sending
War Parties To Attack The Blackfeet Towns, But Contenting
Themselves With Defending Their Own Territories And House.
About
one third of their warriors are armed with fusees, the rest with
bows and arrows.
As soon as the spring opens they move down the right bank of
Snake River and encamp at the heads of the Boisee and Payette.
Here their horses wax fat on good pasturage, while the tribe
revels in plenty upon the flesh of deer, elk, bear, and beaver.
They then descend a little further, and are met by the Lower Nez
Perces, with whom they trade for horses; giving in exchange
beaver, buffalo, and buffalo robes. Hence they strike upon the
tributary streams on the left bank of Snake River, and encamp at
the rise of the Portneuf and Blackfoot streams, in the buffalo
range. Their horses, although of the Nez Perce breed, are
inferior to the parent stock from being ridden at too early an
age, being often bought when but two years old and immediately
put to hard work. They have fewer horses, also, than most of
these migratory tribes.
At the time that Captain Bonneville came into the neighborhood of
these Indians, they were all in mourning for their chief,
surnamed The Horse. This chief was said to possess a charmed
life, or rather, to be invulnerable to lead; no bullet having
ever hit him, though he had been in repeated battles, and often
shot at by the surest marksmen. He had shown great magnanimity in
his intercourse with the white men. One of the great men of his
family had been slain in an attack upon a band of trappers
passing through the territories of his tribe. Vengeance had been
sworn by the Bannecks; but The Horse interfered, declaring
himself the friend of white men and, having great influence and
authority among his people, he compelled them to forcgo all
vindictive plans and to conduct themselves amicably whenever they
came in contact with the traders.
This chief had bravely fallen in resisting an attack made by the
Blackfeet upon his tribe, while encamped at the head of Godin
River. His fall in nowise lessened the faith of his people in his
charmed life; for they declared that it was not a bullet which
laid him low, but a bit of horn which had been shot into him by
some Blackfoot marksman aware, no doubt, of the inefficacy of
lead. Since his death there was no one with sufficient influence
over the tribe to restrain the wild and predatory propensities of
the young men. The consequence was they had become troublesome
and dangerous neighbors, openly friendly for the sake of traffic,
but disposed to commit secret depredations and to molest any
small party that might fall within their reach.
16
Misadventures of Matthieu and his party Return to the caches at
Salmon River Battle between Nez Perces and Black feet Heroism
of a Nez Perce woman Enrolled among the braves.
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