530 The Book of Woodcraft 



us. We hope he may let you come. What we have we will 

 share with you. But, remember, what he directs, that you 

 must do. 



"We cannot help you. The snows are thick on the hills. 

 Our ponies are thin. The game is scarce. You cannot 

 resist, nor can we. So Hsten to your old friend and do with- 

 out complaint what the Great Father tells you. " 



The old Cheyenne war chief, Dull Knife, then stepped 

 slowly to the centre of the circle, a grim, lean figure. 



Erect, despite his sixty-odd years, with a face of a classi- 

 cal Roman profile, with the steady, penetrating glance and 

 noble, commanding bearing of a great leader of men. Dull 

 Knife stood in his worn canvas moccasins and ragged, 

 threadbare blanket, the very personification of the great- 

 ness of heart and soul that cannot be subdued by poverty 

 and defeat. 



Never when riding at the head of hundreds of his wild 

 warriors, clad in the purple of his race — leggings of golden 

 yellow buckskin, heavily beaded, blanket of dark blue 

 broadcloth, warbonnnet of eagles' feathers that trailed 

 behind him on the ground, necklace of bears' claws, the 

 spoils of many a deadly tussle — never in his life did Dull 

 Knife look more a chieftain than there in his captivity and 

 rags. 



He first addressed the Sioux: 



*'We know you for our friends, whose words we may 

 believe. We thank you for asking us to share your lands. 

 We hope the Great Father will let us come to you. All we 

 ask is to be allowed to Uve, and to live in peace. I seek no 

 war with any one. An old man, my fighting days are done. 

 We bowed to the will of the Great Father and went far into 

 the south where he told us to go. There we found a Chey- 

 enne cannot live. Sickness came among us that made 

 mourning in every lodge. Then the treaty promises were 



