128 The Bison 



contact with the whites, they sometimes sold 

 such robes. 



My friend George Bent — son of Col. William 

 Bent, one of the historic characters of the early 

 West — tells me that during a long course of trad- 

 ing among the Cheyennes and Arapahoes, he has 

 seen but five robes that could fairly be called 

 white. One of these was silver-gray, another, 

 white, a third, cream color, the fourth, dapple 

 gray, and the fifth, yellowish fawn color. He tells 

 me that in ancient times the white buffalo was 

 regarded by the Cheyennes as sacred, and that, if 

 one of them killed a w^iite buffalo, he left it where 

 it fell, taking nothing from it, and not even putting 

 a knife into it. The Cheyennes believe that any 

 white buffalo belongs far to the north, and comes 

 from that region where, according to their tradi- 

 tion, the buffalo originally came out of the ground. 



A great many years ago a war party of Chey- 

 ennes went up north against the Crows. One day 

 they came to a hill, and when they looked over it 

 they saw before them great herds of buffalo lying 

 down, and among them a cow, perfectly white. 

 When the buffalo stood up to go to water, the 

 white cow also stood up, and went with them, and 

 it was observed that none of the other buffalo 



