We Resolved On No Account To Miss The Rendezvous At La Bonte's Camp.
Our plan was to leave Delorier at the fort, in charge of our equipage
and the better part of our horses, while we took with us nothing but
our weapons and the worst animals we had.
In all probability
jealousies and quarrels would arise among so many hordes of fierce
impulsive savages, congregated together under no common head, and
many of them strangers, from remote prairies and mountains. We were
bound in common prudence to be cautious how we excited any feeling of
cupidity. This was our plan, but unhappily we were not destined to
visit La Bonte's Camp in this manner; for one morning a young Indian
came to the fort and brought us evil tidings. The newcomer was a
dandy of the first water. His ugly face was painted with vermilion;
on his head fluttered the tail of a prairie cock (a large species of
pheasant, not found, as I have heard, eastward of the Rocky
Mountains); in his ears were hung pendants of shell, and a flaming
red blanket was wrapped around him. He carried a dragoon sword in
his hand, solely for display, since the knife, the arrow, and the
rifle are the arbiters of every prairie fight; but no one in this
country goes abroad unarmed, the dandy carried a bow and arrows in an
otter-skin quiver at his back. In this guise, and bestriding his
yellow horse with an air of extreme dignity, The Horse, for that was
his name, rode in at the gate, turning neither to the right nor the
left, but casting glances askance at the groups of squaws who, with
their mongrel progeny, were sitting in the sun before their doors.
The evil tidings brought by The Horse were of the following import:
The squaw of Henry Chatillon, a woman with whom he had been connected
for years by the strongest ties which in that country exist between
the sexes, was dangerously ill. She and her children were in the
village of The Whirlwind, at the distance of a few days' journey.
Henry was anxious to see the woman before she died, and provide for
the safety and support of his children, of whom he was extremely
fond. To have refused him this would have been gross inhumanity. We
abandoned our plan of joining Smoke's village, and of proceeding with
it to the rendezvous, and determined to meet The Whirlwind, and go in
his company.
I had been slightly ill for several weeks, but on the third night
after reaching Fort Laramie a violent pain awoke me, and I found
myself attacked by the same disorder that occasioned such heavy
losses to the army on the Rio Grande. In a day and a half I was
reduced to extreme weakness, so that I could not walk without pain
and effort. Having within that time taken six grains of opium,
without the least beneficial effect, and having no medical adviser,
nor any choice of diet, I resolved to throw myself upon Providence
for recovery, using, without regard to the disorder, any portion of
strength that might remain to me.
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