I had too many plans for the
future to risk a shot from a hostile redskin who might be hunting white
men along my way.
At daylight I unsaddled my mount and made a hearty breakfast of bacon
and hardtack. Then I lighted my pipe, and, making a pillow of my
saddle, lay down to rest.
The smoke and the fatigue of the night's journey soon made me drowsy,
and before I knew it I was fast asleep. Suddenly I was awakened by a
loud rumbling noise. I seized my gun instantly, and sprang toward my
horse, which I had picketed in a hidden spot in the brush near by where
he would be out of sight of any passing Indians.
Climbing a steep hill, I looked cautiously over the country from which
the noise appeared to come. There before me was a great herd of
buffalo, moving at full gallop. Twenty Indians were behind it, riding
hard and firing into the herd as they rode. Others near by were cutting
up the carcasses of the animals that had already been killed.
I saddled my horse and tied him near me. Then I crawled on my stomach
to the summit of the hill, and for two hours I lay there watching the
progress of the chase.
When the Indians had killed all the buffalo they wanted they rode off
in the direction whence they had come. This happened to be the way that
I hoped to go on my own expedition. I made up my mind that their camp
was located somewhere between me and Glendive Creek.
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