140 
som wasencumbered. Occasionally the quick, 
gurgling swirl of the angry water against a 
drifting tree which had suddenly become an- 
chored in the midst of the stream, would be 
borne to my ears, or a huge fragment of earth 
from an overhanging bank would descend with 
a rumbling plunge into the waiting depths be- 
low. In marked and pleasing contrast, how- 
ever, to the brooding temper of the restless and 
complaining river, was the mellow whistling of 
the arctic tohees in the secluded copses, and 
the soft halloos of the mourning doves floating 
sweetly through the rustling boughs. 
After the lapse of about an hour I shook the 
ashes from my pipe, saddled and mounted my 
pony, and again pushed forward, arriving 
within sight of Devil’s Island late in the after- 
noon. When almost opposite the island the 
trail emerged from the smiling greenness of 
the river groves into a spacious bluff-sheltered 
valley, in the midst of which the wigwams of a 
large encampment of Sioux, comprising the 
band of Chief Yellow Owl, were scattered in 
picturesque confusion among clumps of wahoo 
bushes and the fire-charred stumps and snags 
of once majestic cottonwoods and cedars. 
Wishing to ascertain the whereabouts of the 
cabin of Narcisse Rencounter, a French-Cana- 
dian with whom I hoped to pass the night, I 
I directed my course to where a bareheaded 
and athletic-looking warrior attired in a gaudy 
red blanket, with fringed leggings of elkskin 
and moccasins beautifully worked with stained 
porcupine quills, was superintenaing the move- 
ments of a fine herd of ponies grazing on the 
outskirts of the camp. In response to my in- 
quiry the Indian, with an expression of dignity 
like unto an ancient Roman senator, indicated 
the direction to be taken by a deliberate mo- 
tion of his pony whip, remarking at the same 
time that the white man’s cabin was still a half 
mile above, and added, moreover, that I would 
find it necessary to wyunka nopa (look twice) 
before discovering it, inasmuch as it was hid- 
den like a wolf, in a thicket. 
The Indians in this encampment were com- 
posed in part of the wilder portion of the Sioux, 
who, after the battle of the Little Big Horn, 
had escaped with Sitting Bull into the British 
possessions, and who had recently been trans- 
NATURE'S REALM. 
ferred from Standing Rock to this, the Cheyenne: 
reservation. But being without weapons, with 
the exception of hunting bows, their hostile: 
character was apparent only in their strict ad- 
herence to the native costume of the tribe, and. 
in the wildly fantastic dances in which scores. 
of disaffected braves with paint-streake4 faces,. 
and resplendent with ornaments and bells, held. 
nightly carnival. 
Next to Yellow Owl, the acknowledged. 
leader of the band, the most potential factor in. 
the camp, was Thunder Hawk, a subordinate: 
chief, whose unclad but symmetrically propor- 
tioned form during the exulting evolutions of 
the war dance was rendered still more conspic- 
uous by the ostentatious display of ancient 
battle scars with which his body was liberally 
disfigured. Circular spots of lamp black dis- 
tributed over various portions of the subtle In- 
dian’s anatomy indicated the previous visitation 
of white men’s bullets, and painted arrows di- 
rected the observer’s gaze to where the pointed 
shafts of the hated and cowardly Crows had. 
found a lodgment, while crimson streaks and 
blotches of verniilion, from which cleverly imi- 
tated rivulets of gore trickled profusely down, 
betokened a close and cordial familiarity with 
knives and tomahawks. But the redoubtable 
Thunder Hawk’s popularity rested not entirely. 
on his reputation as an inviacible warrior. 
Pretty Cloud, his daughter, was a maiden 
famed for her beauty throughout the whole 
Sioux nation—a girl whose strikingly handsome 
features of a decided Hebrew cast had won for 
her the complimentary appellation of ‘the 
handsome Jewess” from the military officers at. 
Standing Rock. 
Suitors innumerable had yearned to adorn 
their wigwams with this forest flower, but only 
to be encountered by the frown of an adverse 
fate. Even Whistling Elk, the youthful and 
favorite son of Yellow Owl, on whose copper- 
colored visage a few peculiar stripes of ochre 
and vermilion proclaimed the pining melan- 
choly of an unrequited affection, had been fa- 
vored with no privilege of exemption from the 
common lot. Indeed, the very desperate ex- 
pedient to which the sullen and despairing 
savage had resorted, with a view to elevating 
himself in the tribe’s regard and likewise win- 
