This Story Of The Arapahoes
Therefore Caused Us Some Anxiety.
Just after leaving the government wagons, as Shaw and I were riding
along a narrow passage between the river bank and a rough hill that
pressed close upon it, we heard Tete Rouge's voice behind us.
"Hallo!" he called out; "I say, stop the cart just for a minute, will
you?"
"What's the matter, Tete?" asked Shaw, as he came riding up to us
with a grin of exultation. He had a bottle of molasses in one hand,
and a large bundle of hides on the saddle before him, containing, as
he triumphantly informed us, sugar, biscuits, coffee, and rice.
These supplies he had obtained by a stratagem on which he greatly
plumed himself, and he was extremely vexed and astonished that we did
not fall in with his views of the matter. He had told Coates, the
master-wagoner, that the commissary at the fort had given him an
order for sick-rations, directed to the master of any government
train which he might meet upon the road. This order he had
unfortunately lost, but he hoped that the rations would not be
refused on that account, as he was suffering from coarse fare and
needed them very much. As soon as he came to camp that night Tete
Rouge repaired to the box at the back of the cart, where Delorier
used to keep his culinary apparatus, took possession of a saucepan,
and after building a little fire of his own, set to work preparing a
meal out of his ill-gotten booty. This done, he seized on a tin
plate and spoon, and sat down under the cart to regale himself. His
preliminary repast did not at all prejudice his subsequent exertions
at supper; where, in spite of his miniature dimensions, he made a
better figure than any of us. Indeed, about this time his appetite
grew quite voracious. He began to thrive wonderfully. His small
body visibly expanded, and his cheeks, which when we first took him
were rather yellow and cadaverous, now dilated in a wonderful manner,
and became ruddy in proportion. Tete Rouge, in short, began to
appear like another man.
Early in the afternoon of the next day, looking along the edge of the
horizon in front, we saw that at one point it was faintly marked with
pale indentations, like the teeth of a saw. The lodges of the
Arapahoes, rising between us and the sky, caused this singular
appearance. It wanted still two or three hours of sunset when we
came opposite their camp. There were full two hundred lodges
standing in the midst of a grassy meadow at some distance beyond the
river, while for a mile around and on either bank of the Arkansas
were scattered some fifteen hundred horses and mules grazing together
in bands, or wandering singly about the prairie. The whole were
visible at once, for the vast expanse was unbroken by hills, and
there was not a tree or a bush to intercept the view.
Here and there walked an Indian, engaged in watching the horses. No
sooner did we see them than Tete Rouge begged Delorier to stop the
cart and hand him his little military jacket, which was stowed away
there. In this he instantly invested himself, having for once laid
the old buffalo coat aside, assumed a most martial posture in the
saddle, set his cap over his left eye with an air of defiance, and
earnestly entreated that somebody would lend him a gun or a pistol
only for half an hour. Being called upon to explain these remarkable
proceedings, Tete Rouge observed that he knew from experience what
effect the presence of a military man in his uniform always had upon
the mind of an Indian, and he thought the Arapahoes ought to know
that there was a soldier in the party.
Meeting Arapahoes here on the Arkansas was a very different thing
from meeting the same Indians among their native mountains. There
was another circumstance in our favor. General Kearny had seen them
a few weeks before, as he came up the river with his army, and
renewing his threats of the previous year, he told them that if they
ever again touched the hair of a white man's head he would
exterminate their nation. This placed them for the time in an
admirable frame of mind, and the effect of his menaces had not yet
disappeared. I was anxious to see the village and its inhabitants.
We thought it also our best policy to visit them openly, as if
unsuspicious of any hostile design; and Shaw and I, with Henry
Chatillon, prepared to cross the river. The rest of the party
meanwhile moved forward as fast as they could, in order to get as far
as possible from our suspicious neighbors before night came on.
The Arkansas at this point, and for several hundred miles below, is
nothing but a broad sand-bed, over which a few scanty threads of
water are swiftly gliding, now and then expanding into wide shallows.
At several places, during the autumn, the water sinks into the sand
and disappears altogether. At this season, were it not for the
numerous quicksands, the river might be forded almost anywhere
without difficulty, though its channel is often a quarter of a mile
wide. Our horses jumped down the bank, and wading through the water,
or galloping freely over the hard sand-beds, soon reached the other
side. Here, as we were pushing through the tall grass, we saw
several Indians not far off; one of them waited until we came up, and
stood for some moments in perfect silence before us, looking at us
askance with his little snakelike eyes. Henry explained by signs
what we wanted, and the Indian, gathering his buffalo robe about his
shoulders, led the way toward the village without speaking a word.
The language of the Arapahoes is so difficult, and its pronunciations
so harsh and guttural, that no white man, it is said, has ever been
able to master it.
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