CHAPTER XII

INDIAN STORIES

The next day was one of hard work--cutting cattle and branding calves; but as the number of cows in this bunch was small, the work of separating the brands and branding the calves was not so great as might have been expected from the number of cattle to be worked. There was an unusual number of strays, as the boys had noticed for several days past, and these were all turned into the big bunch which McIntyre proposed to send over to the home range on the Pick Ranch.

So it happened that night that the boys were less tired than after an ordinary day's work. Supper came early and they lounged about the fire talking and smoking, for the evening was cool and the warmth of the fire pleasant. A sharp shower of rain had fallen in the middle of the night before, more or less rousing the sleepers, who had hurried about looking up their slickers which they spread over their blankets. The early morning was clear and bright, but cool, and the higher hills in the distance showed that there the rain had been snow, for they were white for a long distance below their summits. The cool weather contributed something to the ease of the day's work, and during the morning there was less dust than usual, although by midday all the moisture had dried, and the powdery clouds of dust were as suffocating as they usually are when cattle are being handled.

Jack had not forgotten Mason's promise to tell him John Monroe's story of the movements of the Blackfeet tribes in early days; and not long after supper he spoke to him about this. Mason was slow to respond, declaring that Hugh Johnson probably knew the story better than he, and could tell it if he would. But after some persuasion Mason began.

"Well, according to old John Monroe, the way I remember what he told me, it was like this:

"The old men say that a long time ago, in the time of our grandfathers, or great-grandfathers, or even back before that, the Blackfeet people used to live out in the timber country away east of the Rocky Mountains. In that land they were at war with people, who fought with them and troubled them. Game was hard to get, for their only weapons were arrows pointed with bits of stone and with these weapons it was hard for them to kill food. They had never been a people that ate fish, but believed that all animals and all birds were fit for food and could be eaten.

"John said that the attacks of their enemies and the difficulty of getting food were the things that made them move from that lower country up closer to the mountains. He says that when he was a little boy, and afterward when he was larger, he used to hear in the lodge the talks between his mother and an old Blood Indian named Su' ta ne. This old man may have been some sort of relation to John, but about that I don't know. At all events, Su' ta ne was then very old, and the time he used to talk about was when he was a little boy. Su' ta ne had heard his father speak of the trouble that they used to have down in the timber country, and said that it was in his father's boyhood that they began to move westward, traveling up the Saskatchewan or some of the rivers that flow into it. Su' ta ne said that it was when he was a little boy that they first saw the Rocky Mountains; this, according to John, must have been a long time ago. John must be now sixty or sixty-five years old, and he said that Su' ta ne was very old when he used to hear him talk about this. If we say that John heard it fifty years ago and that Su' ta ne was born when his father was thirty, it carries the beginning of the movement back a hundred and thirty or a hundred and forty years, which, according to my guess, would be about 1745 or 50, and I reckon that was a long time before any white man got into the country where those people used to live. Maybe, though, it was a good deal longer ago than that. I guess all John meant was that it was long, long ago, and when Su' ta ne said that it was in his father's time that they began to move toward the mountains, he may have meant only that this move was before he knew anything."

"I guess you're right there, Jack," said Hugh. "Indians are mighty weak on dates, after they get back farther than they themselves can remember."

"Yes," went on Mason, "I don't believe it's any use to try to fix a date. It's bound to be guesswork. Anyhow, old John said that Su' ta ne, when he described the country that they lived in, said it was mostly timbered, with stretches of prairie among the timber--something like big parks, I reckon.

"It was in Su' ta ne's time, in his young days, as I understood, that the Blackfeet, who had been slowly drifting westward, at last reached the mountains. When they got to the rough country they found there lots of game of all kinds, and found it very much easier to get close to than it ever had been before. So they thought that the change they had made was a mighty good one; and that's the way they changed from a timber living people to a mountain people. It was a good while after this that they got horses and began to travel around out on the prairie. The old men used to tell John that the time they first ventured out on the prairie was when they began to travel along the old trail which still runs north and south along the mountains. Of course, you know the old Red River cart trail, Hugh, and very likely you too, Jack."

"Yes," replied Hugh, "I know it; but I don't believe son here has ever been on it."

"Old John Monroe believes thoroughly in this story, and he naturally would, because it comes from his mother, and his relations, but he says that all the old Indians in that northern country believe in it just the same as he does. He believes that the Crees and the Blackfeet are relations, though he doesn't pretend that they are very close relations.

"Well, according to old John, a while after the Indians got up close to the mountains there, up North, the white man came into the country; and when the white men came, the Indians began to get guns. Before that they had begun to get horses, maybe through the Kutenais on the other side of the mountains; and when they got guns and horses they began to take courage and to venture out on the prairie. They began to find out that they could fight their enemies and take care of themselves. Besides this, they had learned that while there were no horses north of them, the tribes to the south had horses; and of course that led to their going more and more to war, because everybody wanted horses. They were about the most valuable things that a man could get hold of. These journeys to war and their fightings led to the Indians moving south along the foot of the mountains, and out on the prairie.

"Now of course I'm just telling you what John Monroe told me. I don't know anything about it myself."

"Well," said Hugh, "I guess that's gospel; and it always seemed to me that the names that the Blackfeet have for the different points of the compass were very good evidence that the Blackfeet did come from the north. The Blackfeet word for north means back, or behind, direction; while the word for south means ahead, or before, direction. It seems to me mighty natural that if people were traveling they should call the direction that they had come from, behind direction, and the one that they were going to, ahead direction. Of course the two words for east and west they called down direction and up direction. That doesn't mean anything more than that the streams that they crossed were flowing down hill toward the lower land; while they were flowing from the higher land which lay to the west."

"I never heard that before," said Mason. "That's mighty funny; and it certainly seems to back up John Monroe's story about their having come from the north."

"Did John tell you," asked Hugh, "about the story of the people getting separated?"

"Yes," Mason answered. "He told me that all the Piegans believe that somewhere off in the southern country, there's a tribe of Piegans--at least a tribe of people who speak the same language that the Piegans talk--and they believe that those people are a part of the Piegan tribe. I don't just remember how they got separated, but I do recall that it was when they were crossing a big water that the separation took place. Do you remember it, Hugh?"

"Yes," said Hugh. "This was the story, as I heard it. A long time ago a big camp of people, the whole Piegan tribe, were traveling south and they came to a big river and started to cross it on the ice. Of course, in those days the tribe was a big one, and when they marched they were strung out over a long distance. Some of the people had already crossed the river; some were yet on the ice; but most of them had not yet come to the stream. As they were going along, a child saw frozen in the ice a buffalo horn that was shiny and pretty and cried for it. Some old woman began to knock it loose, and while she was doing that, suddenly the ice in the river broke up. Pretty much all the Indians on the ice were drowned; and now there was a big wide swollen stream full of running ice separating the two portions of the tribe. Of course the people could not sit down on the bank and wait for the stream to go down, and starve to death. Each party had to start out and look for food, and the two parties never met again. So it is that the north Indians still believe that somewhere off to the south there are a lot of Blackfeet living as a tribe. Men say that in their travels, either on the war-path or visiting other tribes, they have met people who speak a language so much like their own that they could understand them. Nobody really knows anything about it."

"Well," said Jack, "that's a great story. Wouldn't it be fun to go around among the Indian tribes and try to hunt up those Blackfeet and tell them about their relations up North?"

"Yes," added Mason, "that's a good story. I remember now that that's just about what John Monroe told me; but I couldn't have told it the way Hugh did."

"It's a good story," said Hugh, "but it's a story that a good many tribes of Indians tell. I've heard the Cheyennes tell the same story; and the Sarcees, and the Crows. Now I wonder if it isn't just some old legend founded on something that maybe really did happen once, but that has been adopted by half a dozen tribes that don't seem to be any kin to each other, as far as we know?

"One time, when I was younger and heard this same story told by two tribes, I thought maybe I'd found the people that used to belong to the Blackfeet; but I reckon that's not so. You know, if you've traveled around, that you'll find lots of different tribes that have the same story and each tribe thinks the story belongs to it. Nobody knows where that story originally came from, nor to whom it actually belongs."

"Say, Hugh," Mason asked, "did you ever hear that story told by John Monroe, about the first time the north Indians saw the white people?"

"Yes," replied Hugh, "I've heard that story; but a good while ago, and I don't feel sure that I could tell it. Do you remember it well enough to give it to us?"

"Well, I don't know that I do; but, if you'd like, I'll try it."

"Pitch in," said Hugh; and McIntyre added, "Go it, Mason."

"This happened a long time ago, old John Monroe said, but how long, of course, I can't tell, any more than he could; but, according to the story, this was the first time the Blackfeet ever saw any white people. John said that old Su' ta ne told him the story and Su' ta ne said that his grandfather was one of the Blackfeet people. It happened when the Blackfeet were living up North, as I've just told you about. Here's the story:

"A party of Indians were traveling south, and while they were going through a big patch of timber on the north of some big river, they saw something that they could not understand. It looked like beaver work where beavers had been cutting down trees, but when they looked at the stumps and the cuttings they could see that no beaver that they knew anything about could possibly have opened its mouth wide enough to cut such chips. They talked and wondered about this and finally concluded that the tree must have been cut down by some mysterious animal. You know the Blackfeet are great fellows for believing that there are strange animals and people living under the water, and they thought that this work must have been done by under-water animals.

"Presently they came to a place where one of the trees that had been cut down, after having its branches lopped off, had been dragged along the ground. They followed the trail, anxious to find out what was happening, and as they followed it they saw that all through the timber there were many other trails like this, and that presently they all came together in one big trail, and in this trail they found tracks that looked like the tracks of people, but they were not shaped like the track of a human foot, and besides that, at the back of this track there was a deep mark.

"Well, they followed the trail which was now getting to be a big one, and presently they came to where they could see that the timber ended and there was an open spot beyond, and as they looked out through the timber they saw some animals walking around on their hind legs. For a minute they thought that they were bears playing with sticks, but then they saw that these looked like people, and that they were lifting up logs and putting them in a great pile. As they looked, they saw that some of these animals had a great deal of hair or wool on their faces; they seemed to be naked, for they wore no robes. Some had red bodies and some black ones. So they saw that they could not be people. As they talked about it, they concluded that these were certainly some under-water animals, but they wondered what they could be doing with these sticks.

"They were frightened by what they saw, and fearing that these animals might discover them and hurt them, they finally started away and went back to their own country without being seen. When they reached home they told their story and the people who heard it could not understand it, for they were told of something that was wholly outside of their own experiences. Here were people who were naked, who had red bodies, or again were dark colored everywhere, except for a red stripe around the body and a red tail.

"The story was so strange that pretty much all the men in the camp wanted to know more about it--to see this wonderful sight for themselves; and so quite a party started back to the place. When they reached the open part of the timber, these mysterious animals were still at work there. The head man of the Blackfeet must have been a pretty plucky fellow, for he ordered all his party to stay where they were, and said that he would go out and meet these animals and try to find out something about them. But he told his men that if these strange creatures attacked him, they must come out and help him.

"That Indian sure had plenty of sand. He walked down toward these people; and when they saw him, one of them walked up to him and stuck out his hand and took the Indian's hand and moved it up and down. The Indian looked at the white man and at the white man's hand, but he had no idea what this meant, and did nothing. Presently other white men came up to him, and the Indian discovered that they were people like himself, except that they had different voices and different colored skin and hair.

"After a while, when the Indians in the timber saw no harm had come to their chief, they came out a few at a time and went down toward the white people. The white people talked to them and made signs to them, but the Indians could not understand what they meant. At last, however, the whites managed to make some of the Indians understand that they wanted them to go into the house with them, and a number of them went in; and as some time went by without anything terrible happening, all the Indians began to take courage.

"In this house there were a great many wonderful things. The white people carried knives in their belts and showed the Indians how these would cut. The Indians were nearly tickled to death with the knives. Then a great big white man showed them an ax, and while they stood by he cut a big log in two in a very short time; and when the Indians saw the chips fly they began to understand the strange beaver work that they had seen.

"One of the white men took down from the wall something that the Indians thought was a long, straight stick but when the man showed it to them they could see that while part of it was made of wood a part was made of a hard black stone. The white man kept making signs about this stick, but they didn't know what he meant. Pretty soon the man took a white cow's horn, and out of it poured some black sand into his hand and poured this into a hole at the end of the stick. Then he made a little ball of grass and pushed this into the hole with another stick; then out of a bag he took something that was round and heavy and put that into the hole, and pushed down some more grass; then he poured some of the black sand into the side of the stick. The Indians watched him do all these things, and of course had no idea as to what it all meant. After he had finished doing these things, the white man made signs to the Indians and made a great noise with his mouth, and pointed to the stick. He put the stick to his shoulder, holding it out in front of him, and made motions of many kinds. Presently he gave the stick to one of the Indians, and put his finger on a little piece of stone sticking out from beneath it. When the Indian touched this under part, the stick made a terrible noise and a big smoke, and flew out of the Indian's hands, and he nearly fell down.

"All the Indians were very much scared, and some of them fell down, but all the white men laughed and nodded, and made signs, but of course the Indians did not understand them.

"Now the white man picked up the stick from the ground where it had fallen and again took the horn of black sand and did the same things to the stick as before, but this time the Indians all stood away from him. They didn't know what was going to happen. After the white man had finished doing these things, he persuaded them to come out of doors with him. Then he sat down on the ground and put the stick to his shoulder, pointing it toward a log that was lying on the ground. Again the terrible noise was heard, but the white man didn't let go the stick. He held it in his hand. Then he got up and walked over to the log and showed the bullet hole, and pushed a little stick into it. Then he loaded the gun again.

"By this time the Indians were beginning to understand the power of this stick; and at last, after the white man had loaded the gun again and encouraged the Indians, he took one of them close to the log and showed him how to point the gun and how to pull the trigger. The Indian fired and hit the log. I reckon when he found that he had hit it he thought that he was one of the biggest men in the country.

"Well, after a while the Indians and the white men got to be pretty friendly. The Indians could see that knives and axes and copper cups, to say nothing of guns, were a heap better than anything they had; and the white men on the other hand wanted the furs and dresses that the Indians wore. They traded for them, and after a while the Indians and the white people got to know each other pretty well, and commenced to trade regularly.

"And that's the story as I heard it."

"You told that mighty well, Mason," commented Hugh; "a great deal better than anybody else could tell it, except perhaps old John Monroe, or some of those old Piegans."

"But I want a lot of explanation," said Joe. "What about those fellows with the red tails? I don't savvy that a bit. I can understand about the red bodies, because I suppose that means they wore red shirts, but what about the red tails?"

"Well, Joe," replied Hugh, "you've never been out in that northern country or else you wouldn't ask a question like that. The old voyageurs and people in the North always used to wear a red sash tied around their waist with the long ends hanging down in front. When they were working, to get these ends out of the way, they used to pass them around their body, and then under the sash, so that they hung down behind."

"Well," laughed Joe, "that certainly is the limit."

"And," Jack said, "just think of their taking a tree chopped down with an ax for one cut down by a beaver; and their not knowing the foot-prints of a person wearing a shoe!"

"Sho," drawled Hugh; "haven't I told you time and again that we all of us measure up things by what we ourselves have seen, and we find it hard to believe anything that's outside the range of our own experience. If there was any way of proving it, I'd be willing to bet a good horse and saddle and bridle that if we'd been there we'd all have acted just the way those Indians did."