Page:On the border with Crook - Bourke - 1892.djvu/342

 stripped of leaves and bark, and having each some distinctive mark, in the way of feathers, bells, fur, paint, or bright-colored cloth or flannel. These serve a singular purpose: the great object of the Shoshones, Crows, Cheyennes, and Dakotas in making war is to set the enemy afoot. This done, his destruction is rendered more easy if not more certain. Ponies are also the wealth of the conquerors; hence, in dividing the spoil, each man claims the animals first struck by his "coup" stick.

With the Snakes were three white men—Cosgrove, Yarnell, and Eckles—all Texans; and one French-Canadian half-breed, named Luisant. Cosgrove, the leading spirit, was, during the Rebellion, a captain in the 32d Texas Cavalry, C. S. A., and showed he had not forgotten the lessons of the war by the appearance of discipline and good order evinced by his command, who, in this respect, were somewhat ahead of the Crows. We were informed that on the march over from Wind River, the Snakes, during one afternoon, killed one hundred and seventy-five buffaloes on the eastern slope of the Owl Creek Mountains. In the early hours of the afternoon the Crows had a foot-race, for twenty cartridges a side; the running was quite good for the distance of one hundred and fifty yards.

At sunset we buried Private Nelson, who had died the previous night. The funeral cortege was decidedly imposing, because, as on all former occasions of the same nature, all officers and men not engaged on other duty made it a point to be present at the grave of every dead comrade; the noise of the parting volleys brought our savages up on a gallop, persuaded that the Sioux were making a demonstration against some part of our lines; they dashed up to the side of the grave, and there they sat motionless upon their ponies, feathers nodding in the breeze, and lances gleaming in the sun. Some of them wore as many as four rings in each ear, the entire cartilage being perforated from apex to base.