Page:On the border with Crook - Bourke - 1892.djvu/376

 fishing, drilling, and hunting. The greater the crowd assembled, the greater the pleasure they took in showing their rare skill in riding and managing their fleet little ponies. The course laid off was ordinarily one of four hundred yards. The signal given, with whip and heel each rider plied his maddened steed; it was evident that the ponies were quite as much worked up in the matter as their riders. With one simultaneous bound the half-dozen or more contestants dart like arrow from bow; a cloud of dust rises and screens them from vision; it is useless to try to pierce this veil; it is unnecessary, because within a very few seconds the quaking earth throbs responsive to many-footed blows, and, quick as lightning's flash, the mass of steaming, panting, and frenzied steeds dash past, and the race is over. Over so far as the horses were concerned, but only begun so far as the various points of excellence of the riders and their mounts could be argued about and disputed.

This did not conclude the entertainment of each day: the Shoshones desired to add still more to the debt of gratitude we already owed them, so they held a serenade whenever the night was calm and fair. Once when the clouds had rolled by and the pale light of the moon was streaming down upon tents and pack-trains, wagons and sleeping animals, the Shoshones became especially vociferous, and I learned from the interpreter that they were singing to the moon. This was one of the most pronounced examples of moon worship coming under my observation.

The Shoshones were expert fishermen, and it was always a matter of interest to me to spend my spare moments among them, watching their way of doing things. Their war lodges were entirely unlike those of the Apaches, with which I had become familiar. The Shoshones would take half a dozen willow branches and insert them in the earth, so as to make a semi-cylindrical framework, over which would be spread a sufficiency of blankets to afford the requisite shelter. They differed also from the Apaches in being very fond of fish; the Apaches could not be persuaded to touch anything with scales upon it, or any bird which lived upon fish; but the Shoshones had more sense, and made the most of their opportunity to fill themselves with the delicious trout of the mountain streams. They did not bother much about hooks and lines, flies, casts, and appliances