222 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[Oct. 15, 1885. 



THE FAMINE WINTER. 



I. — AxirosT-A dog's stoky. 

 ' ^ly/rANY years ago this country belonged to the Pegunny. 



jgpjjy 'River lived the Blackfeet; that was 

 their country. The Bloods owned all the ground between 

 Belly River and the Missouri. Tho North Piegans had their 

 home north of the Cypress Mountains, and the South Piegans 

 owned the country from the Missouri south to beyond the 

 Yellowstone. Then my people were strong and many in 

 number. When they went to war they had to go very far 

 south, for the country was all theirs and their enemies dared 

 not come on it. Only sometimes the Koottenais came out 

 of the mountains, and we fought them. Tar the men had 

 to go to war, so far that it often took two seasons to make 

 the journey; one summer they went and one they came back. 

 Sometimes they went so far south that there were no more 

 any mountains. When they made these long journeys to 

 war their clothing would be all worn out before they re- 

 turned, and because they had no women with them to make 

 buckskin, they made for themselves clothes from the skins 

 of coyotes and gray wolves, and moccasins from the skin of 

 the shank of the buffalo, sewing up the end where the hoof 

 was cut off. Things were so until the white men came. 

 Then the country was all oui-s. Now the white men own it 

 all, and we have to stay in one place; so little of our ground 

 is left to us. We talk much about this among ourselves and 

 say that the white men have taken all out country and never 

 paid us for it. But what can we do? We are poor and 

 weak now, though once very strong." 



The speaker paused, and his face was clouded with a look 

 of indescribable sadness as he recalled the former greatness 

 of his people. He was a venerable Piegan, whose erect form 

 and easy movements told little of his age. His long gray 

 hair and his face seamed with wrinkles, and marked with 

 more than one scar confirmed his statement that he was very 

 old. 



It was at the Piegan agency in Northern Montana. We 

 were sitting in Mr. Joseph Kipp's trading store, and that 

 gentleman was interpreting for me while I talked with Almost- 

 a-Dog. Mr. Kipp had told me that he was one of the oldest 

 men in the tribe, that he was truthful, had been a brave 

 warrior, and although he bore on his person more than one 

 scar made by ihe white man's bullet, he yet professed to have 

 been ever a fi-iend of our race. Almost-a-Dog and two others 

 were the only ones left alive out of the twenty lodges of 

 Piegans which were surprised in the Baker fight, and at that 

 time he had saved the life of a white man who now lives at 

 Fort Benton, Montana. I could feel when I shook hands 

 with the old man the crooked fingers, crippled by a ball in 

 that fight, and on his neck and cheek could seethe deep fur- 

 row ploughed by another which he had carried for years. 



"Father," said I, "when you were young what kind of 

 knives did the Pegunny use?" 



"When I was a young man and first began to hunt we 

 used knives made of rock. Om- arrow points, too, were of 

 stone, but they were hard and strong. A man could drive 

 one far into a buffalo. They were good for war, too, for 

 the rock was poisonous, and the wound which they made 

 festered and caused a bad sore, even if it did not kill at once. 

 We made the arrow points of the black stone which comes 

 from the South. Now we have none of the knives nor the 

 arrow heads. All have been lost. With these weapons we 

 could well kill buffalo. But before we had the elk dog 

 (horse) we used to drive the buffalo into piskans, and over 

 high cut banks, where they would kill themselves in falling. 

 There is one of these places over on Two Medicine Lodge 

 Creek, near Red Eagle's camp. That place was used by our 

 fathers. It is sacred, and you will see there a pile of horns 

 which have been gathered and given to the Sun. Once this 

 pile was large and high, but now there are no more buffalo 

 and we can no longer add to the heap." 



' 'Tell me, Father, did the Pegunny have horses when you 

 were a young man, and where did the horses come from?" 



' 'Yes, we had horses when I was young. 1 have been Wd 

 that the first ones we got came in this way: 



"Long ago a Piegan warrior's secret helper — some beast or 

 bird, I do not know what— came to him in a dream and told 

 him about a lake, far away, where were some large animals 

 which were harmless and which he could catch, tame and 

 use to pack on, like dogs. And because they were large and 

 could carry a heavy load they would be better to use than 

 the dogs, on which the people then used to carry their packs. 

 'Go to this lake,' said his medicine, 'and take with you a 

 rope, so that you can catch these large animals.' So the 

 man took a rope of bull's hide, and went to the shores of the 

 great lake, and dug a hole in the sand on the shore and hid 

 in it. While he watched he saw many animals come down 

 to the lake to drink. Deer he saw and coyotes and elk and 

 buffalo. They all came'and drank. After a while the wind 

 began to blow, and the waves to rise, and wash rzpon the 

 beach, saying sh-h-h-?i-7i; sh-7i.-h-h-h. And at last came a band 

 of large animals unlike any that the man had ever seen be- 

 fore. They were large like an elk, and had small ears and 

 long tails hanging down. Some were white, and some black, 

 and some red and spotted. All colors had they. The young 

 ones were smaller. When they came down to the water's 

 edge and stopped to drink, his secret helper said to the man, 

 'These are the animals; throw your rope and catch one.' 

 So the man coiled his rope and jumped up and threw it, 

 and caught one of the largest of the animals. It palled and 

 struggled, and dragged the man about, and he was not strong 



enough to hold it, and at length it pulled the rope out of his 

 hands, and the whole band ran into the lake and under the 

 water and were not seen again. So the man went back to 

 the camp feeling very sorry. And he prayed for help to Old 

 Man, but he would not help him, but he said: 'Four times 

 you may try to catch these animals. If in four times trying 

 you do not get them, you will never see them again.' Then 

 the man fasted, and made presents to the Sun and to Old 

 Man, and prayed to his secret helper, and in a dream it told 

 that he was not strong enough to catch a big one, and that 

 he ought to try to catch one of the young, then he could 

 hold it. So the man went again to the shores of the big 

 lake, and again dug a hole in the sand, and lay hidden there. 

 x\gain he saw all the animals come down to drink ; the deer, 

 the wolves, the elk and the buffalo. At last the wind began 

 to rise and the waves to roll and to say s7i-h-h-h-h, sh-h-h-h-h, 

 upon the shore. Then came the band of strange animals to 

 drink at the lake. Again the man threw his rope, and this 

 time he caught one of the young, and this he was able to 

 hold. He caught all the young ones out of the band, and 

 took them to the camp. At first the people were afraid of 

 these new animals, and would not go near them, but the 

 man who had caught them told everybody that they were 

 harmless. After a while they became tame, so that they 

 did not have to be tied up, but followed the camp about 

 as it moved from place to place. Then the people began to 

 put packs on them and to ride them. And they called them 

 Pd-noTcah'-me-ta, that is elk dog. because they are big and 

 shaped like an elk and carry a pack like a dog. This is how 

 the Pegunny got their horses. 



"Some say that the first horses we had were found far to 

 the south along a white man's trail. Anyhow when I was 

 young we had plenty of horses. 



"In those days the buffalo were very plenty. The plains 

 were dark with them. Then we had meat enough to eat and 

 robes and cowskins, more than we could use. Sometimes 

 we got a white robe and that we gave to the Sun. There 

 was nothing to do but to hunt and eat, and sleep and dance 

 and sing. We were happy. 



"My father and his father had told me about white men 

 who had passed through the country before I was born. 

 They had guns and knives and many other strange things 

 that we had never seen, but they had come and gone. We 

 talked about them, but did not expect to see them again. 

 Then when 1 was a young man [in 1832] came Joe's father, 

 and after him other white men. We were glad to see them 

 come. They brought guns and knives, and beads and sugar, 

 and traded them for robes and furs. Their medicine was 

 very .strong." 

 He paused for a moment and then broke out again: 

 "Our god is a poor god. He must be part devil, I think. 

 See what your god has done for you; how strong he is. He 

 has given you many things; guns and wagons and steam- 

 boats and everything that you could want, and he has taught 

 you how to do many strange things, to put words on paper 

 and to talk a long way off. Our god gave us nothing but 

 the buffalo, and now he has let you cache them, so that we 

 have nothing to eat. He cannot be strong or he would care 

 for his people. He must be part devil. He has done noth- 

 ing for us. We are poor and foolish. We know nothing 

 and can do none of the things that the white man knows. 

 We do not even know how to farm and make things grow. 

 As long as we had the buffalo and plenty of ground we did 

 well, but our god has let you take away our country and 

 cache the buffalo and now there is nothing left to us. When 

 the buffalo went away we were hungry. The agent had 

 nothing for us to eat, and we starved. One-quarter of the 

 people died. We knew, for we kept the count, and when- 

 ever a person died the chief of the band cut a notch in a 

 stick, and when spring came the chiefs took these sticks to 

 the agent and he counted them. The people who starved to 

 death were mostly the young and the old. The little chil- 

 dren wasted away. They had no strength to fight hunger 

 and the weakness that comes with it. Their arms and legs 

 grew .small like my finger and then they died. The old 

 people had nothing at all to eat, for those who were young 

 and strong took from them what little food was given them 

 by the agent. So they drew their blankets over their heads 

 and waited, and one, by one they went to the Sand Hills. 

 That winter there were many dead persons. Out on the 

 bluff south of the stockade you can see many graves where 

 the bodies of those who starved were placed after their 

 shadows [souls] had started for the Sand Hills. There were 

 not trees enough on all the creek to hold the burial scaffolds, 

 so many died." 



n. — AGENTS AND THEIR WARDS. 



When Major Allen, the present agent of the Piegans, 

 reached the agency in March, 1884, he found matters there 

 in a most deplorable condition. The man who had been his 

 predecessor had represented in his reports to the Indian 

 Bureau at Washington, that these Indians had eleven hun- 

 dred acres of land under cultivation, and were practically 

 self-supporting. As a matter of fact there were about forty 

 acres of land broken, on which had been raised the previous 

 year a few oats. Just what the object of this false report 

 was cannot of course be Imown, but it is supposed that the 

 man wanted to make a good record for himself at Washing- 

 ton, and hoped that by carrying on his agency in an econom- 

 ical way he would retain his position for a long time. So he 

 reported 8,000 Indians at the reservation — when the real 



number was under 3,500— and that they were practically 

 self-supporting. His last estimate for provisions for the en- 

 suing year called for about enough to feed the 2,500 that he 

 had there for three months. 



Up to the summer of 1883 the buffalo bad been sufficiently 

 numerous to feed the Indians, so that they weie by no means 

 dependent on the supplies issued to them from the agency, 

 but that summer the buffalo disappeared, and they had to 

 depend entirely on the Government supplies. These being 

 wholly insufficient, they turned to the smaller game of the 

 prairies, and killed almost all the deer and antelope on the 

 reservation. Fortunately it was a great berry year, and the 

 women collected and dried a crop of these fruits far larger 

 than is customary. It did not take long to clear the reser- 

 vation of antelope and deer. The prairies were scoured, and 

 the creeks and ravines- so thoroughly hunted that, by the 

 time winter set in, almost all the wild meat that was within 

 reach had been captured. It is true that there was a little 

 game in the mountains, but the Piegans are essentially a 

 prairie people, and never hunt in the mountains if they can 

 help it. They are afraid of them because they know that 

 bad .spirits hide among the peaks, and there are many bears 

 in the timber. Really then during the winter they had noth- 

 ing to eat except the berries which they had dried, and the 

 scanty supplies issued them from the agency. These were 

 at first half ration.s, but as time went on even this issue was 

 reduced, for the agent cared little about the sufferings of the 

 people, but a great deal about making his supplies last to the 

 end of the year. Toward the end of the winter he was re- 

 moved, and shortly afterward Major Allen reached the 

 agency. 



He had heard rumors of the suffering among the Piegans, 

 and when he reached Helena these rumors were confirmed, 

 and he telegraphed the facts to Washington. Continuing 

 his journey he reached the agency, and there was informed 

 by his predecessor in office that the Indians had plenty to 

 eat. Their wretched condition could not long remain a 

 secret, however, and the new agent began an investigation 

 for himself. 



The story of the frightful suffering which he found among 

 these hapless people is most heartrending. They were dying, 

 literally of hunger, at the rate of from two to six each day. 

 In his attempts to find out exactly what was their condition. 

 Major Allen one day went into twenty-three houses and 

 lodges to see for himself just what these Indians had to eat. 

 In only two of these homes did he find anything in the shape 

 of food. Ih one house a rabbit was boiling in a pot. The 

 man had killed it that morning, and it was being cooked for 

 a sick (starving) child. In another lodge the hoof of a steer 

 —the hoof mind you, no flesh nor skin, only the hoof — was 

 cooking, to make soup for the family. Twenty-three lodges 

 Major Allen visited that day, and the little rabbit and the 

 steer'shoof were all the food he found. And then, as he told me 

 with tears in his eyes, "I broke down. 1 could go no further. 

 To see so m\ich misery and feel myself utterly powerless to 

 relieve it was more than I could stand." 



From the time of his arrival he had been telegraphing to 

 Washington the condition of affairs, but help was slow in 

 coming. In the first place, the wheels of the Government 

 are so tied up with red tape that nothing can be done 

 promptly; and in the second, the lying agent who was the 

 cause of all this misery had gone on to Washington and was 

 busily engaged in contradicting all the reports made by 

 Major Allen. Happily help was had nearer at hand. The 

 noble people of Montana and the army officers stationed at 

 Fort Shaw did all they could to get supplies to the sufferers. 

 One or two Montana contractors sent on flour and bacon on 

 Major Allen's personal assurance that he would try to have 

 them paid. 



But oh, how long it took to get the supplies in over the 

 roads, sometimes hub deep in mud and again rough with 

 great masses of frozen clay. And all this time the people 

 were starving. 



Major Allen had calculated with exactest care the supplies 

 on hand, and was at this time issuing one-seventh rations. 

 The Indians crowded around the agency buildings and 

 begged for a little food. Mothers came to the windows and 

 held up their starving babies that the sight of their dull, 

 pallid faces, their shrunken limbs and their little bones sticking 

 through their skins might move some heart to pity. Many a 

 woman brought her young daughter to the white men in 

 the neighborhood and said: ''Here, you may have her, if 

 you will feed her; 1 want nothing for myself; only let her 

 have enough to eat that she may not die." One day a depu- 

 tation of the chiefs came to Major Allen and asked him to 

 give them what he had in his storehouses. He explained 

 to them that it must be some time before the supplies 

 could get there, and that only by dealing out what he had 

 with the greatest care could the people be kept alive until 

 provisions came. But they said: "Our women and children 

 are hungry and we are hungry. Give us what you have 

 and let us eat once and be filled. Then we will die con- 

 tent; we will not beg anymore." He took them into the 

 storehouse and showed them just what he had, how much 

 flour; how much bacon, how much rice, coffee, sugar and 

 so on through the list, then he told them if this was issued 

 all at once, there was no hope for them, they would surely 

 die; but that he expected supplies by such a day. "And," 

 said he, "if they do not come by that time you shall come in 

 here and help yourselves. That I promise you." They went 

 away satisfied. 



