Page:The Early Indian Wars of Oregon.djvu/39

Rh with the Blackfeet, with whom, in the course of their hunting expeditions, they coine in frequent collision, and have desperate battles. Their conduct as warriors is with out fear or reproach, and they never can be driven to abandon their hunting grounds." He added that they believed in dreams, charms, and a charmed life.

In spite of their opposition to wanton warfare, they were not averse to some practice in the art of war. "War," they said, "is a bloody business, and full of evil, but it keeps the eyes of the chiefs always open, and makes the limbs of the young men strong and supple. In war, every one is on the alert. If we see a trail we know it must be an enemy; if the Blackfeet come to us we know it is for war, and we are ready. Peace, on the other hand, sounds no alarm; the eyes of the chiefs are closed in sleep, and the young men are sleek and lazy. The horses stray into the mountains; the women and their little babes go about alone. But the heart of a Blackfoot is a lie, and his tongue is a trap. If he says peace, it is to deceive. He comes as a brother: he smokes his pipe with us; but when he sees us weak and off our guard, he will slay and steal. We will have no such peace; let there be war!"

Wyeth gave the Flatheads equal, or even greater praise, saying he had never known an instance of theft among them, neither quarreling nor lying; that they were brave when put to the test, and more than a match for the Blackfeet. What is here said of the moral character of the Flatheads, applied, with the exception already made, to the Nez Perces; especially to the upper division of that tribe. Concerning the religious feeling of these Indians, the early American traders remarked upon their observance of the Sabbath, to which Bonneville adds: "We must observe, however, in qualification of the sanctity of the Sabbath in the wilderness, that these tribes, who are all ardently addicted to gambling and horse-racing, make Sunday a peculiar day for recreations of this kind, not deeming them in any way out of season."