The Necessities Of The Camp At
Length Became So Urgent That Captain Bonneville Determined To
Dispatch A Party To The Horse Prairie, A Plain To The North Of
His Cantonment, To Procure A Supply Of Provisions.
When the men
were about to depart, he proposed to the Nez Perces that they, or
some of them, should join the hunting-party.
To his surprise,
they promptly declined. He inquired the reason for their refusal,
seeing that they were in nearly as starving a situation as his
own people. They replied that it was a sacred day with them, and
the Great Spirit would be angry should they devote it to hunting.
They offered, however, to accompany the party if it would delay
its departure until the following day; but this the pinching
demands of hunger would not permit, and the detachment proceeded.
A few days afterward, four of them signified to Captain
Bonneville that they were about to hunt. "What! " exclaimed he,
"without guns or arrows; and with only one old spear? What do you
expect to kill? " They smiled among themselves, but made no
answer. Preparatory to the chase, they performed some religious
rites, and offered up to the Great Spirit a few short prayers for
safety and success; then, having received the blessings of their
wives, they leaped upon their horses and departed, leaving the
whole party of Christian spectators amazed and rebuked by this
lesson of faith and dependence on a supreme and benevolent Being.
"Accustomed," adds Captain Bonneville, "as I had heretofore been,
to find the wretched Indian revelling in blood, and stained by
every vice which can degrade human nature, I could scarcely
realize the scene which I had witnessed.
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