The Feast Was
Finished, And The Pipe Began To Circulate.
It was a remarkably large
and fine one, and I expressed my admiration of its form and
dimensions.
"If the Meneaska likes the pipe," asked The Whirlwind, "why does he
not keep it?"
Such a pipe among the Ogallalla is valued at the price of a horse. A
princely gift, thinks the reader, and worthy of a chieftain and a
warrior. The Whirlwind's generosity rose to no such pitch. He gave
me the pipe, confidently expecting that I in return should make him a
present of equal or superior value. This is the implied condition of
every gift among the Indians as among the Orientals, and should it
not be complied with the present is usually reclaimed by the giver.
So I arranged upon a gaudy calico handkerchief, an assortment of
vermilion, tobacco, knives, and gunpowder, and summoning the chief to
camp, assured him of my friendship and begged his acceptance of a
slight token of it. Ejaculating HOW! HOW! he folded up the offerings
and withdrew to his lodge.
Several days passed and we and the Indians remained encamped side by
side. They could not decide whether or not to go to war. Toward
evening, scores of them would surround our tent, a picturesque group.
Late one afternoon a party of them mounted on horseback came suddenly
in sight from behind some clumps of bushes that lined the bank of the
stream, leading with them a mule, on whose back was a wretched negro,
only sustained in his seat by the high pommel and cantle of the
Indian saddle. His cheeks were withered and shrunken in the hollow
of his jaws; his eyes were unnaturally dilated, and his lips seemed
shriveled and drawn back from his teeth like those of a corpse. When
they brought him up before our tent, and lifted him from the saddle,
he could not walk or stand, but he crawled a short distance, and with
a look of utter misery sat down on the grass. All the children and
women came pouring out of the lodges round us, and with screams and
cries made a close circle about him, while he sat supporting himself
with his hands, and looking from side to side with a vacant stare.
The wretch was starving to death! For thirty-three days he had
wandered alone on the prairie, without weapon of any kind; without
shoes, moccasins, or any other clothing than an old jacket and
pantaloons; without intelligence and skill to guide his course, or
any knowledge of the productions of the prairie. All this time he
had subsisted on crickets and lizards, wild onions, and three eggs
which he found in the nest of a prairie dove. He had not seen a
human being. Utterly bewildered in the boundless, hopeless desert
that stretched around him, offering to his inexperienced eye no mark
by which to direct his course, he had walked on in despair till he
could walk no longer, and then crawled on his knees until the bone
was laid bare. He chose the night for his traveling, lying down by
day to sleep in the glaring sun, always dreaming, as he said, of the
broth and corn cake he used to eat under his old master's shed in
Missouri. Every man in the camp, both white and red, was astonished
at his wonderful escape not only from starvation but from the grizzly
bears which abound in that neighborhood, and the wolves which howled
around him every night.
Reynal recognized him the moment the Indians brought him in. He had
run away from his master about a year before and joined the party of
M. Richard, who was then leaving the frontier for the mountains. He
had lived with Richard ever since, until in the end of May he with
Reynal and several other men went out in search of some stray horses,
when he got separated from the rest in a storm, and had never been
heard of up to this time. Knowing his inexperience and helplessness,
no one dreamed that he could still be living. The Indians had found
him lying exhausted on the ground.
As he sat there with the Indians gazing silently on him, his haggard
face and glazed eye were disgusting to look upon. Delorier made him
a bowl of gruel, but he suffered it to remain untasted before him.
At length he languidly raised the spoon to his lips; again he did so,
and again; and then his appetite seemed suddenly inflamed into
madness, for he seized the bowl, swallowed all its contents in a few
seconds, and eagerly demanded meat. This we refused, telling him to
wait until morning, but he begged so eagerly that we gave him a small
piece, which he devoured, tearing it like a dog. He said he must
have more. We told him that his life was in danger if he ate so
immoderately at first. He assented, and said he knew he was a fool
to do so, but he must have meat. This we absolutely refused, to the
great indignation of the senseless squaws, who, when we were not
watching him, would slyly bring dried meat and POMMES BLANCHES, and
place them on the ground by his side. Still this was not enough for
him. When it grew dark he contrived to creep away between the legs
of the horses and crawl over to the Indian village, about a furlong
down the stream. Here he fed to his heart's content, and was brought
back again in the morning, when Jean Gras, the trapper, put him on
horseback and carried him to the fort. He managed to survive the
effects of his insane greediness, and though slightly deranged when
we left this part of the country, he was otherwise in tolerable
health, and expressed his firm conviction that nothing could ever
kill him.
When the sun was yet an hour high, it was a gay scene in the village.
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