Page:The Columbia River - Its History, Its Myths, Its Scenery Its Commerce.djvu/284

232 declares that some of his operations are not often equalled in warfare.

Joseph's subsequent career was a melancholy one. Transported with his band to Oklahoma, the wild eagle of the Wallowa so pined away on the flat prairie and begged so piteously to be allowed to return to the waters of the Columbia, that his request was granted. But so intense was the feeling among the people who had suffered from their dangerous enemy that this poor fragment of the Nez Percés was placed on the Colville Reservation in Northern Washington. There the restless heart of the Nez Percé Bonaparte was eaten out by bitter yearnings for his loved Wallowa.

He had an occasional proud and interesting hour. At the time of General Grant's obsequies at New York, Joseph was in Washington to see the “Great Father” about his reservation. General Miles, who greatly admired the hero of the Lolo trail, asked him to ride with himself at the head of the funeral procession. Mounted on a magnificent charger, Joseph rode solemnly through the streets of the metropolis by the side of the conqueror of Bear Paw Mountain, and there were not wanting those who said that the Indian was the finer horseman and the finer-looking man.

But Joseph died at his camp on the Nespilem without ever seeing Wallowa. His last request was that he be buried there. He remained an Indian to the last, not ordinarily living in a house or wearing civilised costume or even speaking English, though perfectly able to do so. His life might have been happier had he never been known to fame.