We Leaped To The Ground, Threw Off Our Saddles, Turned Our
Horses Loose, And Drawing Our Knives, Began To Slash Among The Bushes
To Cut Twigs And Branches For Making A Shelter Against The Rain.
Bending down the taller saplings as they grew, we piled the young
shoots upon them; and thus made a convenient penthouse, but all our
labor was useless.
The storm scarcely touched us. Half a mile on
our right the rain was pouring down like a cataract, and the thunder
roared over the prairie like a battery of cannon; while we by good
fortune received only a few heavy drops from the skirt of the passing
cloud. The weather cleared and the sun set gloriously. Sitting
close under our leafy canopy, we proceeded to discuss a substantial
meal of wasna which Weah-Washtay had given me. The Indian had
brought with him his pipe and a bag of shongsasha; so before lying
down to sleep, we sat for some time smoking together. Previously,
however, our wide-mouthed friend had taken the precaution of
carefully examining the neighborhood. He reported that eight men,
counting them on his fingers, had been encamped there not long
before. Bisonette, Paul Dorion, Antoine Le Rouge, Richardson, and
four others, whose names he could not tell. All this proved strictly
correct. By what instinct he had arrived at such accurate
conclusions, I am utterly at a loss to divine.
It was still quite dark when I awoke and called Raymond. The Indian
was already gone, having chosen to go on before us to the Fort.
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