Having Smoked A Pipe Together, Our New Allies Left Us, And
We Lay Down To Sleep.
CHAPTER XXII
TETE ROUGE, THE VOLUNTEER
The next morning, having directed Delorier to repair with his cart to
the place of meeting, we came again to the fort to make some
arrangements for the journey. After completing these we sat down
under a sort of perch, to smoke with some Cheyenne Indians whom we
found there. In a few minutes we saw an extraordinary little figure
approach us in a military dress. He had a small, round countenance,
garnished about the eyes with the kind of wrinkles commonly known as
crow's feet and surrounded by an abundant crop of red curls, with a
little cap resting on the top of them. Altogether, he had the look
of a man more conversant with mint juleps and oyster suppers than
with the hardships of prairie service. He came up to us and
entreated that we would take him home to the settlements, saying that
unless he went with us he should have to stay all winter at the fort.
We liked our petitioner's appearance so little that we excused
ourselves from complying with his request. At this he begged us so
hard to take pity on him, looked so disconsolate, and told so
lamentable a story that at last we consented, though not without many
misgivings.
The rugged Anglo-Saxon of our new recruit's real name proved utterly
unmanageable on the lips of our French attendants, and Henry
Chatillon, after various abortive attempts to pronounce it, one day
coolly christened him Tete Rouge, in honor of his red curls.
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