Page:On the border with Crook - Bourke - 1892.djvu/371

 face and bearing to the eminent divine, Henry Ward Beecher, was noticeable. This party had been delayed, waiting for the Utes and Bannocks, who had sent word that they wanted to take part in the war against the Sioux; but "Washakie" at last grew tired, and started off with his own people and two of the Bannock messengers.

Of these two a story was related to the effect that, during the previous winter, they had crossed the mountains alone, and slipped into a village of Sioux, and begun to cut the fastenings of several fine ponies; the alarm was given, and the warriors began to tumble out of their beds; our Bannocks were crouching down in the shadow of one of the lodges, and in the confusion of tongues, barking of dogs, hurried questioning and answering of the Sioux, boldly entered the "tepi" just vacated by two warriors and covered themselves up with robes. The excitement quieted down after a while, and the camp was once more in slumber, the presence of the Bannocks undiscovered, and the Sioux warriors belonging to that particular lodge blissfully ignorant that they were harboring two of the most desperate villains in the whole western country. When the proper moment had come, the Bannocks quietly reached out with their keen knives, cut the throats of the squaws and babies closest to them, stalked out of the lodge, ran rapidly to where they had tied the two best ponies, mounted, and like the wind were away

Besides the warriors with "Washakie," there were two squaws, wives of two of the men wounded in the Rosebud fight, who had remained with us. As this was the last campaign in which great numbers of warriors appeared with bows, arrows, lances, and shields as well as rifles, I may say that the shields of the Shoshones, like those of the Sioux and Crows and Cheyennes, were made of the skin of the buffalo bull's neck, which is an inch in thickness. This is cut to the desired, shape, and slightly larger than the required size to allow for shrinking; it is pegged down tight on the ground, and covered with a thin layer of clay upon which is heaped a bed of burning coals, which hardens the skin so that it will turn the point of a lance or a round bullet. A war-song and dance from the Shoshones ended the day.

On the 12th of July, 1876, three men, dirty, ragged, dressed in the tatters of army uniforms, rode into camp and gave their names as Evans, Stewart, and Bell, of Captain Clifford's company