Page:History of the Ojibway Nation.djvu/377

Rh of the Minnesota River, the morning after the return of the Dakota war party. On the point just below Fort Snelling, which was then covered with trees and brush, they pulled up, and hiding their canoes, they laid in ambush, commanding the confluence of the Minnesota with the Mississippi.

They could distinctly hear the drums beating in an adjacent village of their enemies, as they held rejoicings over the scalp which their warriors had brought home. Towards evening a canoe load of young women came floating leisurely down the sluggish current of the Minnesota, chatting and laughing, in anticipation of the magnificent scalp dance which they were going to join, after having adorned their persons with profuse ornaments, and painted their cheeks with vermilion. Little did they dream of the fate that awaited them—that their own long scalp-locks would so soon dangle in the belt of the fierce Ojibway warriors, and that the women of their foe would so soon be rejoicing over them.

When the canoe had reached opposite the Ojibway ambuscade, at a whistle from the leader, a volley of bullets was fired into it, and the men, rushing into the water, a struggle ensued, who should secure the scalps. Five Dakota women suffered on this occasion, and their bodies being dragged on shore, the war-club which their people had left sticking in the body of their victim at Gull Lake, was left, with peculiar marks, on the body of one, to warn the Dakotas that the revenge of the Ojibway was quick and sure.

The party returned in safety to their village, and their exploit, though comparatively of trivial importance, is mentioned by their people to this day with great satisfaction. The quick revenge was sweet, and withal it acted as a check in some measure to the continually repeated forays and war parties of the bloodthirsty Dakotas.