Page:Life Among the Piutes.djvu/141

 CHAPTER VII. THE BANNOCK WAR.

the winter of 1878, I was living at the head of John Day’s river with a lady by the name of Courly. On the 21st of April I had some visitors from the Malheur Agency.

They were my own people. There were three of them, and they said they had come to see their sister. They had had a hard time to get over the mountains. There was a great deal of snow at one place on the summit.

“You see, dear sister,” they said, “don’t we look like men who have lived a long time without eating?” “Yes,” I said, “you look poorly indeed. You had better come in and have something to eat, so that you can talk better.” The good lady got them something to eat. Bread and meat tasted very good indeed. It put one in mind of old times when meat and bread were plenty. One of the men said,—

“We have come to see if you can help us in some way. We know that you are always ready to help your people. We will tell you so that you can judge for yourself. Our agent, Reinhard, has been very unkind to us since you left us. He has not given us anything to eat; he is not issuing rations to us as our father Parrish used to do, and our poor children are crying to us for food, and we are powerless to help our little ones. Some two months ago the agent bought a good many beef cattle, but the cattle