Part 5

"She arose, still trembling, but now with some hope that he was not going to kill her, and led him to the place. His eyes were swelling shut so fast that one was entirely closed, but he could partly use the other. He looked at the things there on the brush: 'Ah! Here are the war clothes, the shield, the medicine pouch, but where are the weapons?' he asked.

"The woman did not answer. What could she say? There had been no weapons left on the brush. Falling Bear laughed a laugh that made her shiver, and told her to gather up all that was there and follow him. He unfastened the horse and led it across the camping-place, she following, and he had her take up his own weapons and things and fasten them to the saddle. He then mounted the horse, and told her to lead it and take the back trail home. Before he had ridden far his other eye closed; he was, for the time, wholly blind; but not afraid. He kept close possession of all the weapons, and made the woman do everything that he wanted done. She minded his every word.

"Traveling again at night, and hiding in the brush during the daytime, the two passed safely through the country of the Flatheads, and crossed the mountains. On the morning that they approached the camp here on Cutbank, Falling Bear had partly recovered the use of one eye. The other was still swollen shut; it seemed to have been poisoned by the woman's fingernails.

"When so near the camp that they could plainly see the lodges, Falling Bear told the woman to go on in and tell her relatives to come to him; that he would await them right where he was. They soon came out to him, his father-in-law and his brother-in-law, and when they saw his scarred face and swollen eyes, they cried out: 'Oh, what has happened to you? Have you been in a fight with a mountain lion?'

"'Worse than that,' he answered; 'this was done to me by the one I most loved and trusted.' And then he told them all about it, and concluded by giving them the horse and all the things that he had taken from the Nez Percé.

"When he finished his awful tale the two men, listening closely, were so overcome with shame and grief that for a time they could not speak. But at last Falling Bear's father-in-law said: 'I have made up my mind what to do. Come! Let us go on into camp.'

"They went in; Falling Bear to his own lodge--in which his father and mother lived. His woman was not there; she had gone to her father's lodge. He was glad that she had gone there; he never wanted to see her again. His father asked him to give the story of his war trail, and he answered that he had nothing to say. He was so sick at heart that he could not talk.

"Arrived in his own lodge, and finding his daughter, Otter Woman, there, Falling Bear's father-in-law told her to go out for a time; and when she was gone he told her mother all that she had done, and then, calling in their son, the three agreed upon the way the bad wife should be punished. They called her in and told her to braid her hair nicely, and to put on her best clothes. And while she was doing that, her father and mother and brother painted their faces black and let down their hair.

"As soon as Otter Woman was dressed, her father said to her: 'We will now go outside, and you will mount the Nez Percé horse. I will lead it, your mother and brother will follow, and we will go all through the camp, stopping here and there to tell the people all about the great wrong you did your man.'

"'Oh, no, no! Not that!' Otter Woman cried. 'I am ashamed enough as it is! I am sorry that I did it! I don't know how I came to do it; I shall never, never do such a thing again!'

"'You spoke the truth there,' said her father. 'No, you will never do it again!' And he ordered her to go out ahead of them and mount the horse. She did so and sat upon it, head cast down, looking neither to the right nor left nor ahead: shame was with her. Holding the horse's rope, the old man shouted: 'Listen, people, listen.' And when a crowd had gathered he told them what his daughter had done to her good man, and the people groaned with shame that one of their tribe could be so bad of heart. Some even wept at the horror of it.

"From one part of the camp to another the old man led the little procession, stopping often to tell the shameful story, until all knew it. And then at last he led the horse out into the center of the great circle of the lodges, and told his daughter to dismount. She did so, and, drawing his knife, he stabbed her in the heart and she fell and died. Said he then to his wife: 'Get women to help you; drag that body far off and leave it, and never let me hear again the name of her who was once my daughter!'

"And the women did as he said. Never again did any one mention Otter Woman in his presence."

* * * * *

"Ai! A sad story! A story to give one bad dreams! Let us have one of more cheerful nature before we go to bed," said Stabs-by-Mistake.

"An Old Man story, then," said Two Guns. "All are laughable."

"Elder brother, tell us the story of Old Man and the woman," said Black Bull to Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill.

"Ai! That I will," the chief answered.

But before I set down the story, I must explain Old Man.

Old Man (Näp´-i) was the god who created the world, and all life upon it, and he was _the_ god of the Blackfeet until, some centuries back, they got from some southern tribe another religion, of which the sun is the principal god. However, they still pray to Old Man, as well as to the gods of the later religion, although in time a great many stories have grown up about Old Man that make him appear to be more of a buffoon than a god. An interesting point about the word _näp´-i_ is, that, while it is the term for an old man, its real meaning is dawn, or the first faint, white light that gives birth to the day. And so, in common with the ancient Mexicans, various tribes of the plains, the Aryans and other ancient races of the Old World, the original religion of the Blackfeet was the worship of light personified.

Let us have now, the old chief's story of

OLD MAN AND THE WOMAN

"Having created the world, the animals, grass, trees, all life upon it, Old Man realized that by having men live by themselves, and women by themselves, he had made a mistake. He saw that they should live together. The camps of the two sexes were far apart: the women were living here at the foot of the mountains, in Cutbank Valley, and the men were away down on Two Medicine River. Each camp had a buffalo trap, and subsisted wholly upon the buffalo that were decoyed into it.

"As I have said, Old Man saw that he had made a mistake in keeping men and women apart. In fact, he found that he himself wanted a woman; so he went to the men and said: 'You shall no longer live by yourselves. Come! We will go up to the camp of the women, and each of us get one of them.'

"The men were more than glad to do that; it was what they had been hoping to do for a long time; so they hurried to put on their best clothes, and neatly braided their hair, and then started off with Old Man for the women's camp. When they came in sight of it, Old Man told them to stop right there, and he would go ahead and plan with the women just what should be done. They sat down, and he went on to the women's camp. Himself, he had on his old, soiled clothes; his fine clothes he had left back with the men.

"Arrived in the camp, he found only two or three women there; the woman chief and all the others were down at the buffalo trap, butchering the animals that they had that morning decoyed into it. When he told the few women that he found why he had come, he greatly excited and pleased them, and they started at once to run and tell the others to hurry up from the trap and meet the men.

"'But wait. Not so fast. I want a word with you,' Old Man called out; and when they came back to him, he asked: 'What kind of a woman is your chief?'

"'Everything that is good, and kind and brave, that is our chief,' one answered. And another said: 'Ai! She is all that, and more; and she is the most beautiful woman of us all!'

"This pleased Old Man. He said to himself, 'That is the woman for me. I must have her.' And to the waiting women he said: 'It is right that chief woman should mate with chief man. You women are to come to us, and each select the man you want. Now, tell your chief woman that the chief man is brave and kind and handsome, and that she shall select him for her man. She will know him by the way he is dressed. He wears buckskin shirt and leggings, embroidered with porcupine quills, and a cow-leather robe with a big porcupine-quill embroidered sun in the center of it. You tell her to take him for her man!'

"'We will do so!' the women cried, and started off for the buffalo trap as fast as they could run.

"Old Man hurried back to the waiting men, and hurriedly put on his fine clothes, the ones that he had described to the women.

"Trembling with excitement, and out of breath from their long, swift run, Old Man's messengers arrived at the buffalo trap and told their wonderful news,--that men had come to marry them; that each woman was to choose the man that she thought would best suit her. The butchering of the animals ceased at once, and the women started for their camp to put on their good clothes and recomb their hair. They wanted to appear as neat and clean and well dressed as possible, before the men. Yes, all ran for their camp, all except the chief woman. Said she: 'I cannot leave here until I finish skinning this spotted medicine calf. Go, all of you, and I will join you as soon as I can.'

"The work took more time than she thought would be required, and when she arrived in camp with the valuable skin, she found all the other women dressed and impatient to go and choose their men. 'Oh, well, it doesn't matter how I look,' she said. 'I am chief; I have a name; I can go choose my man dressed just as I am. How did you say the man chief is dressed?'

"They told her again what he wore, according to what the messenger man had told them, and she said: 'I'll choose him. Chief, I suppose, must mate with chief.'

"And so she went right on with the others, wearing her butchering dress, all stiff with blood and grease from the neck down to the bottom of the skirt; and her moccasins were even more foul than the skirt. Her hands were caked with dried blood, and her hair was not even braided.

"Their chief leading, the women approached the waiting men, all of them standing in a line, and singing a song of greeting. Old Man stood at the head of the line, very straight and proud, and of fine appearance in his beautiful new porcupine-embroidered clothes. By these the chief woman recognized him from afar, and said to herself: 'He is a fine looking man. I hope that he will prove to be as good of heart as he is good to look at.' And, leading her women, she walked straight up to him and laid a hand on his arm: 'I will take you for my man,' she told him.

"But Old Man shrank back, his face plainly showing his loathing of such a bloody and greasy, wild-haired woman.

"'I take you for my man,' the woman chief repeated; and then he broke away from her hold and ran behind his men: 'No! No! I do not want you, bloody, greasy woman,' he cried, and went still farther off behind his men.

"The woman chief turned to her followers: 'Go back! Go back to that little hill and there wait for me,' she told them. And to the men she said, 'Remain where you are until I return. I shall not be gone long.' And with that she turned and hurried to her camp. Her women went to the hill. The men remained where they were.

"Down at her camp the chief woman took off her old clothes and bathed in the river. Then she put on her fine clothes, a pair of new moccasins, braided her hair, scented herself with sweetgrass, and returned to her women. She was now better dressed than any of them, and they had told Old Man the truth when they said that she was beautiful of face and form: she was the most beautiful woman of them all.

"Again she led her women to the line of waiting men. Again Old Man stood first, stood at the head of them. But she passed him by, as though she did not see him, and he, with a little cry, ran after her, took her by the arm, and said: 'You are the woman for me. I am the chief of the men: you must take me!'

"She turned upon him, and her eyes were like fire. She tore his hand from her arm, and cried: 'Never touch me again, good-for-nothing, proud-and-useless man. I would die before I would mate with you.'

"And to her women she said: 'Do not, any of you, take him for your man.' And with that she turned and chose a man. The others then, one by one, took their choice of the men. When all had chosen, there was one woman who had no man; all had been taken except Old Man. She would not have him, and became the second wife of one of the men. The choosing over, all started for the women's camp. Old Man, now very sad-hearted, was for following them; but the chief woman turned and motioned him off. 'Go away. There is no food for you, no place for you in our camp,' she told him; and he went away, crying, by himself.

"And that is what Old Man got for being so proud."

_July 30._

We break camp and move northward to-morrow. For the past two days some of us have been riding about on this "Backbone-of-the-World," as the Blackfeet call the Rocky Mountains, and we have ridden our horses where, in former times, nothing but a bird could go. The Park Supervisor and his engineers and miners and sappers have blasted out trails over the highest parts of the range, making it easy and safe for tenderfeet tourists to view the wonders of this sub-Arctic, greater than Alpine range of mountains. One of the most impressive views is from the summit of the trail from Upper Two Medicine Lake to Cutbank River. The Dry Fork Trail, it is called. At its extreme height the trail is along a mountain crest about thirty feet in width. Mr. L. W. Hill graphically described the stretch the other day, when, after crossing it, he said: "On its east side one can spit straight down three thousand feet into a lake, and on the other side cast a stone that will go down much farther than that!"

Indeed, the view of the mountains and cliffs and canyons from that height is so grand, so stupendous and impressive, that one cannot find words to describe it all.

On another day we went over Cutbank Pass and down the west side of the range, far enough to get a good view of the Pumpelly Glacier, and see the huge ice blocks break from it and drop from a cliff more than two thousand feet in height. They strike the bottom of the canyon with a reverberating crash that can be heard for miles. Just below this glacier, down Nyack Creek three or four miles, is a fine alkaline spring and clay bed where, in other days, old Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill and I were wont to go for bighorn, goats, deer, and elk. All these animals came to it in great numbers, and drank the waters, and ate great wads of the salty mud. We once killed a large grizzly there, whose late autumn coat was as black as that of a black bear.

This afternoon we have had further talk about the naming of these mountains. For a wonder, the topographers have not taken away the original name for the outer mountain on the north side of this Cutbank Valley: we find on the map that it is still White Calf Mountain. It was named for one of the greatest chiefs the Montana Blackfeet ever had. As a young man, fresh from his first war trail, he witnessed the signing of the treaty between his people and the representatives of the United States, at the mouth of the Judith River, in 1855, so he must have been born in 1836 or 1837. As a warrior, his rise to fame was rapid, and many are the stories told of his indomitable bravery in facing the enemy. In later years, because of his great interest in the welfare of his people, he became their head chief. He died in Washington, in 1903, while there on tribal business.

The right names of the other mountains walling in this valley are as follows: The unnamed mountain next west from White Calf Mountain is Ahk´-sap-ah-ki (Generous Woman); Mount James is Ah´-kow-to-mak-an (Double Runner); Mount Vorhis is O-nis-tai´-na (Wonderful Chief). The west one of the Twin Buttes is Little Plume; the east one is O-nis-tai´-mak-an (Wonderful Runner). And, as I have said, the outer mountain on the south side of the valley is Muk-sin-a´ (Angry Woman). All but the last one were named for old-time great chiefs and warriors of my people, and we intend that they shall be so named on the official maps, even if we have to petition the House of Representatives and the Senate, in Washington, to make the change! And you, my readers, lovers of these grandest mountains of our country, will you not be with us in this perfectly proper request?

Said Takes-Gun-Ahead to me this afternoon: "Who are these white men, James, and Vorhis, for whom the mountains were named? Were they great warriors, or presidents, or wise men?"

I had to confess that I had never heard of them.

"Huh!" he exclaimed. And "Huh!" all the others, even the women, echoed.

III

KI-NUK´-SI IS-SI-SAK´-TA (LITTLE RIVER)

_August 2._

We moved over here on Little River--or, as the whites have named it, Milk River--day before yesterday, and made camp at the lower edge of the great body of timber in which the stream has its source. We are here on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation, and several miles from the boundary line of the Glacier National Park. The state game laws do not apply to the reservation, hence we have the right to hunt upon it when and where we please.

Yesterday Takes-Gun-Ahead and I oiled our rifles and started out after meat. We went up the river, passing the old beaver dams that White Fur and Loud Slap built in the long ago, and presently, in the dense growth of pine, cottonwood, and willow, came upon old and fresh tracks of deer and elk. We followed for a time the trail of four or five elk, and left it to take the very fresh trail of a moose. Takes-Gun-Ahead was in the lead, and within ten minutes he saw the animal not fifty yards away, standing partly concealed behind a clump of willows and watching our approach. Its head was in plain view, and he fired and struck it just at the base of the ear, and it fell, gave a convulsive kick or two, and was dead when we got to it. It was a three-year-old bull, and carried a very ordinary set of antlers, velvet-covered and still soft at the points. I dressed the carcass while my companion went back for a horse, and before noon we had real meat--_ni-tap´-i-wak-sin_--in camp. We distributed it among the lodges, and there was great rejoicing. Later in the day, Two Guns and Black Bull brought in a fine buck mule deer, and at sunset Big Spring returned with the meat and skin of a yearling ram that he had killed on the outer point of Divide Mountain. It was like old times,--the camp red with meat,--and we all felt rich and happy.

The killing of the moose in this particular place brought out a lot of reminiscences of happenings here on Little River in other days, and of them all I think that Takes-Gun-Ahead's story was the best. As the pipe went the first round after our feast of roast moose ribs in Black Bull's lodge, said he: "I will tell you the story of

"OLD MAN AND THE WOLVES

"One day in that long ago time, Old Man was wandering along the edge of this forest, having come over from Cutbank way. He was feeling very lonely, and wondering what he could do to have a more lively time, when, as he approached the river here, probably right where we are camped, he saw a band of six wolves sitting on the bank, watching him. He stopped short, watched them for a time, and then approached them, whining out: 'My younger brothers! My younger brothers! I am very lonely! Take pity on me: let me be a wolf with you!'

"As I have said, the wolves were six: the old father and mother, their two daughters, and their sons, Heavy Body and Long Body. The old father wolf answered Old Man. 'Just what do you mean?' he asked. 'Is it that you want me to change you into a wolf--that you want to live just as we do?'

"'I want to live with you, hunt with you,' he answered, 'but I don't want to be changed wholly into a wolf. Just make my head and neck to look like yours, and put wolf hair on my legs and arms, and that will be about enough of a change. I will keep my body just as it is.'

"'Very well, we will do that for you,' said the old wolf; and he took a gray medicine and rubbed it on Old Man's head and neck and legs and arms, and made the change. 'There!' said he. 'My work is done. I would like to have made you all wolf, your body as well as the rest of you, but you will do as you are; you are quite wolf-like. And now, let me tell you something about our family. My old wife and I don't hunt much. Your two younger brothers there are the runners and killers, and their sisters help in the way of heading off and confusing the game. Your younger brother there, Long Body, is the swiftest runner, but he hasn't the best of wind. However, he generally overtakes and kills whatever he chases. Your other younger brother, Heavy Body, is not a fast runner, but he has great staying power, never gets winded, and in the end brings down his game. And now you know them. Whenever you feel like hunting, one or the other of them, as you choose, will go with you.'

"'You are very kind to me,' said Old Man. 'I am now very tired, but to-morrow I shall want to hunt with one or the other of them.'

"'We are also tired; we have come a long way; it is best that we all rest during this night,' said the old wolf; and he led the way up to the top of a high ridge on the north side of the valley, where all lay down.

"'But why rest out on top of this barren, windy place, instead of in the shelter of the timber?' Old Man asked, his teeth beginning to chatter from the cold.

"'We never rest in the timber,' the old wolf replied. 'There enemies would have a good chance to take us unawares. Here we can see afar everything that moves, and as one or another of us is always on watch, we can keep out of danger. Also, we can look down and see the different kinds of game, and make our plans to chase what we want, head it off, tire it out, and kill it. We always, summer and winter, do our resting and sleeping on high places.'

"Before the night was far gone, Old Man became so cold that he trembled all over, and, try as he would, he could not keep his jaws together.

"'You annoy us with your tremblings, and your teeth chatterings; you keep us from sleeping,' the old wolf complained.

"'Well, I shall not annoy you long,' Old Man answered, 'because I shall soon freeze to death!'

"The old wolf aroused his wife and children: 'This tender-bodied elder brother of ours is freezing. I suppose we have to protect him. Lie down in a circle around him and cover him with your tails,' he told them.

"They did so, and he was soon overcome with heat: 'Take your ill-smelling tails from my body; I am wet with perspiration!' he gasped. They removed their tails and he soon began to shiver. 'Put them back! I freeze!' he cried; and they did as he commanded. During the night he had them cover him many times with their tails, and as many times remove them. He passed a miserable night, and so did the wolves, for he kept them from sleeping.