Page:The Columbia River - Its History, Its Myths, Its Scenery Its Commerce.djvu/261

Rh that Lawyer's powerful division of the Nez Percés was sustaining the little band of whites, they did not execute their design. Lawyer and his Nez Percés saved the day for the whites.

And yet the sequel is one of the most lamentable examples of the miscarriage of justice in Indian affairs that we have any record of. The friendly Nez Percés saved the whites. The unfriendly faction of the Nez Percés, led by Joseph and Looking Glass, finally yielded and accepted the treaty. But they did this with certain expectations in regard to their reservation. This was set forth to the author by William McBean, a half-breed Indian, son of the McBean who was the commandant of the Hudson's Bay post at Wallula. McBean the younger was a boy at the time of the council at Walla Walla. He was familiar with all the Indian languages spoken at the council and in appearance was so much of an Indian that he could pass unquestioned anywhere. Governor Stevens asked him to spy out the situation and learn what the Nez Percés were going to decide. The result of his investigations was to show that the whole decision hinged on the understanding by Joseph's faction that, if they acquiesced in the treaty and turned their support to the whites, they might retain perpetual possession of the Wallowa country in Northeastern Oregon as their special allotment. Becoming finally satisfied that this would be granted them, they yielded to the Lawyer faction and thus the entire Nez Percé tribe made common cause with the whites, rendering the execution of the great plot of Kamiakin and Peupeumoxmox a foredoomed failure. But now for the sequel. Though it was thus clear in the minds of