Page:Thirty-One Years on the Plains and in the Mountains.djvu/651

Rh all stopped. I rode up and asked them where they were going. They could all speak a little English.

There was one in the crowd named Mary, with whom I was well acquainted, who said: "We heap hungry, too much hungry, we go Clear Lake catch fish." I told her that we would have to take them prisoners and take them all back to headquarters and keep them there until we got all the Modoc Indians and then they would have to go on to the reservation. "No, too much hungry, you all time fight Captain Jack, Injun no catch fish. All time eatem hoss. No more hoss now; Injun eatem all up, eatem some cow too. No more hoss, no more cow. Injun all heap hungry."

It was some time before I could make them believe that they would be fed when at headquarters, but they being acquainted with me and knowing that I had been a friend to them in time of peace. I finally succeeded in getting them to turn and go to headquarters. These were the first prisoners that had been taken to the General's quarters during the Modoc war.

Gen. Wheaton was away from his quarters, so I left the prisoners in charge of George Jones and the other scouts, with instructions to let no one interfere with them while I went to hunt the General.

I soon found him and with him returned to where the Indians were. The General asked me to question the one of them that talked the best English and had done the most talking, concerning the number of men that Captain Jack had in his stronghold. When I asked her she said: "Some days twenty men, some days thirty men, no more, some go away. No more come back, some