Page:On the border with Crook - Bourke - 1892.djvu/303

 *faloes were seen close to camp during the day, one of which animals was shot by General Crook. When our guides returned from the Yellowstone, they brought with them the carcasses of six deer, five white-tailed and one black-tailed, which were most acceptable to the soldiers. All the trails seen by this reconnoitring party had led over towards the Powder River, none being found in the open valley of the Yellowstone. The Sioux and Cheyennes would naturally prefer to make their winter habitations in the deeper and therefore warmer cañons of the Rosebud, Tongue, and Powder, where the winds could not reach them and their stock. The country hereabouts was extremely rough, and the bluffs were in many places not less than seven hundred and fifty feet in height above the surface of the stream. It had again become cold and stormy, and snow was falling, with gusts of wind from the north. The mercury during the night indicated 10° below zero, but the sky with the coquetry of a witch had resumed its toilet of blue pinned with golden stars. Our course led north and east to look for some of the trails of recent date; the valleys of the creeks seemed to be adapted for agriculture, and our horses did very well on the rich herbage of the lower foothills. The mountains between the Tongue and the Powder, and those between the Tongue and the Rosebud as well, are covered with forests of pine and juniper, and the country resembles in not a little the beautiful Black Hills of Dakota.

This was the 16th of March, and we had not proceeded many miles before our advance, under Colonel Stanton, had sighted and pursued two young bucks who had been out hunting for game, and, seeing our column advancing, had stationed themselves upon the summit of a ridge, and were watching our movements. Crook ordered the command to halt and bivouac at that point on the creek which we had reached. Coffee was made for all hands, and then the purposes of the general commanding made themselves known. He wanted the young Indians to think that we were a column making its way down towards the Yellowstone with no intention of following their trail; then, with the setting of the sun, or a trifle sooner, we were to start out and march all night in the hope of striking the band to which the young men belonged, and which must be over on the Powder as there was no water nearer in quantity sufficient for ponies and families. The day had been very blustering and chilly, with snow clouds lowering over us.