[Aug. II, 190^. 
Cusief as a Goveracieat s-cout in 1874, and reiimned wuk 
tiie army in that position until in mjg, when everj'thing 
had quieted down, In January, 1877, ^t^ellowstone Kelly 
and some other scouts captured seven Cheyenne women 
m the Big Horn Mountains, and tliey were held as hos 
cages. In March Scout John Bruyer wais sent to the 
camp with two of these women, and they returned with 
twenty Cheyenne warriors. A conlerence was held, and 
the w'hole camp surrendered and rame in. No sooner 
was this done than the Cheyenne.s asked ior guns and 
ammunition, expressing their desire to join us agamsi 
the Sioux. Many of the officers laughed at this, saying: 
It was only a plav to get a stock ot ammunition, when 
they would again join the Sioux. But the Cheyennes 
said. 'No;' they liked to light, aiid didn't care much 
whom they fought with; and now that they were vvith 
Che whites they would fight for the whites, finally, alter 
considerable talk, it was concluded to grant their re- 
quest, and a limited amount of ammunition and guns 
was issued them, and they were enlisted as scouts, with 
a salary of ?io per month. o i a 
•'In the spring of ',77 I was sent down to l:*orl Bulord 
with dispatches, and in June I boarded the^steamer Far 
West to come back up the Yellowstone. General, then 
Colonel, Miles was also on board. At the mouth ot 
Powder River we were hailed by three Indians, and on 
landing found them to be Cheyenne scouts w;ith dis- 
patches from Col. La Selle, who had left that point three 
days previous in pursuit of a large camp of Sioux. After 
readies: the papers, Gen. Miles called me aside and said, 
•Jackson, 1 have here some «lispatches from Col. La 
Selle; and it is very important that 1 should communicate 
with 'him at once. I wish you would try and overtake 
him.' I hesitated. 1 was only a hoy. remember, and 
here I was asked to go alone through a hostile and t« 
me unknown country in pursuit of a party already three 
and a half days away. The General noticed my hesitancy, 
for he put his hand on ray shoulder, and said, 'My boy, 
1 know it is a dangerous undertaking, but it very, very 
important that I should communicate with Col. La belle. 
I will-aiot— I cannot— order you to go; but I wish you 
would. T ..1 
" 'General,' I replied, 'write out your papers, in the 
meantime I will get my horse off the boat and prepare to 
atart.' ... ^, ,, 
"As 1 stepped ashore, one of the Cheyennes, a small, 
wiry, bright-looking fellow, came up to me and asked 
whese I "was going. I replied that I was going to over- 
take the command. 'We will go with you,' he ex- 
claimedj 'the prairie is covered with Sioux. Let us jom 
you and you will find us true friends. We will fight tor 
you, and if one is to die we will all die, fighting hke 
men/ , -ir r 
"Again 1 hesitated, for I distrusted them. Yet 1 rea- 
soned thus: If they want to kill me they will follow and 
kill me anyhow; as well let them go along, then. So I 
went back on the boat and told the General what they 
said. 'Bring them in here,' he replied, 'and let me see 
them.' ; - . 
"Well;- after >some talk, the General said to me. We 
will let them go. I think they mean well, and you know 
the whole; camp is up at the fort. If they should harm 
vou you -w-ill be amply avenged. They know this, too. 
I am sureithey will stay with you.' 
"The: papers ready, we were about to start, when the 
Cheyennes asked lor ammunition. 'See,' they said, point- 
ing to their belts, 'we have not ten rounds apiece. We 
can not fiight with a brave heart when we have so few 
shots/ . . » 
" 'He.lj> yourselves," the General said, pointmg to an 
open ca.se on the floor, and help themselves they did, 
each one taking 200 cartridges or more. 
•'At last we were ready. The boat pushed out from 
her moorings and disappeared around the bend. I 
watchediber out of: sight with a heavy heart, and theii we 
mounted fand rode .away on the trail. My companions 
were a happy set of fellows. Of course, we could talk 
to each' other only by signs, but as you know signs 
among Indians take the place of words, and we managed 
10 keep up:-a pretty lively conversation at the same time 
riding ahead at a surging gait. We kept on. the open 
ground as much as possible, and stopped on every hill 
and rise of. ground to reconnoiter. At sundown we 
stopped and ate supper, and after dark we moved on a 
couple of miles and camped. 
"I didn't- sleep much, for I still distrusted my com- 
panions, and lay all night with rifle in my hands and 
pistol handv. prepared to kill the first one who made a 
break; but" with the morning light all my doubts and 
fears gave way, and from then on I felt that I could trust 
them. : .-. 
"TowTrA the close of the second day we were approach- 
ing a broken country, and were Hearing the head of a 
timbered coulee, when suddenly Medicine Fly— the 
Cheyenne who first proposed they should accompany me 
—who v;as ahead jumped from his horse, and said he 
saw a war party coming up the coulee. We all dis- 
mounted and prepared to fight. I never saw such a 
happy fellow as Medicinfe Fly. He danced about and 
grinned, iiM said we would have lots of fun. '1 saw the 
war bonnet- of the leader,' he said. 'We will now have 
some scalps. Maybe we will be killed; but if they kill 
us it is good/ 
"Well, we waited a little while, and presently a great 
bull elk 'came up out of the coulee, followed by twelve 
others. They were the war party. I felt greatly relieved, 
for from the first i had tried to get them to go on at full 
speed, for I was thinking of my ilispatches. but Medi- 
cim Fly Would not remount, and we could not go off 
and leave him, One of the Cheyennes shot a yearling, 
and taking what meat we wanted we rode away. 
"About sundov/n of the third day we overtook the 
^oldicrs, already camped for the night.. I went to Col. 
La Selle's camp and delivered my dispatches. He 
thanked me^ and telling us to all come back to his tent 
by and by sent us to the mess for supper. After a while 
we went back to the Colonel's tent. He found seats for 
us passed around a package of cigarettes and then said: 
'Jackson, I have got the worst lot of deadhead scouts 
here you ever saiv. They Svill not go far enough ahead 
to get out bf sight of the command, and it seems as if I 
never would catch up with these Sioux. They keep just 
ahead all the time. When I camp they camp. Wheii I 
move they move. Now, I wish you would go ahead with 
vour Cheyennes and find out where they arc camped, and 
if possible we will fight thein to-morrow. I've heard a 
goo deal about you, and believe you are )u.t the man ior 
this busines,"-:.' 
"Boy that 1 wa.s, I still lealiznl thai the ( tiloncl was 
soltsoaping nu-, and I wa> fool eiiuugli to be pleased. 1 
tcld the Cheyennes vvliat he said, :ifid they instantly sig 
nified their willingne-^s to go if the Colonel would give 
fresh horses. He agreed to do thai, said the guard 
would call us at 1:30, and sent us off to bed. 
"Prompt to the minute llie guard awoke us, and 
showed us the horses the master of transportation had 
selected for uh. There were two mules and two horses— 
none of them sery good, but the best they had, We 
saddled up, and by 2 o'clock were on the trail. There was 
bright moonlight, and the lieavy trail made by the 
Sioux camp svas easily lollowed. At daylight we were 
within a few miles of Sentinel Butte. On the .south 
side of this, at a place called Ash Springs, as we sub-' 
sequently learned, the .Sioux w^ere camped. 
"Most of the warriors were out hunting whitetail that 
niorning, but a number of them were left to guard the 
camp, and some of these from the top of the butte saw 
Its coming and laid a trap for us. .At a place where the 
trail passed between two quaking asp groves they am- 
buslied, but by some misunderstanding, or before they 
had time to surround us, a warrior suddenly rose ujj 
behind us and gave a warwhoop. We instantly dis- 
mounted, and at the same time a dozen men came over 
a little ridge ahead and charged down on us'. Medicine 
Fly's mule was instantly shot, and the bullets whistled 
all' around us. One fellow, mounted on a fine black 
horse, charged right down on Medicine Fly. The boy 
stood his ground, smiling, and taking deliberate aim 
fired. The ball pierced the Sioux- through the heart, and 
he fell almost at our feet. Medicine Fly instantly caught 
the rope which was trailing and stopped the horse, and 
then he scalped his man. The other Sioux wheeled and 
turned back up the trail, and we gave them another 
round, and killed one man and a horse. Then we all 
mounted and dashed into the quaking asp grove at oiir 
right. 
•'Here we found a coulee, followed this down, turned 
up a fork of it, and so out on to the prairie again, and 
were at least 600 yards away before the Sioux knew 
what had become of us. Had we stayed there a few 
moments more we would have been surrounded and 
killed. As it was, they gave us a sharp chase, and it is 
a wonder they didn't kill some of us, for they kept up 
shooting a long time. -After going three of four miles, 
we came in sight of the soldiers, who were coming up 
as fast a§ they could, and then the Sioux quit us. An 
hour later' we were all back at Ash Springs, but the 
camp had gone. From this plac^ they scattered out in 
bunches of three or four lodges, and the chase was 
abandoned. 
"From that time on Medicine Fly waas* Wy constant 
companion on scouting trips. I never saw a man who 
f^o enjoyed a fight. At t;he least prospect of a scrimmage 
he would dance about, smile and say, 'Now for fun. If 
we are killed we will die like men. What is the use 
of growing old and sick?' 
"At one time four of us were out, and we saw seven 
persons on horseback whom we thought to be Sioux. 
Medicine Fly got oft' his horse, threw the saddle off" and 
waited for the rest to follow suit. The others threw 
their saddles oft' and stripped for fighting. I did not. I 
had a big, pow-erful liorse, and felt more secure with 
a saddle under me. As usual Medicine Fly was im- 
patient. 
'■ "Come on! Come en!' Ke said. 'Why so slow? Are 
you afraid? I believe you are. Hurry, hurry! Let's 
fight them/ 
"Away we dashed. Four to seven was big odds, but 
we could do no less than follow Medicine Fly. The 
seven persons seeing us coming got down and prepared 
to fight. We were getting pretty clSsc, when one of 
them held up his hand and. asked who we were, and then 
we saw they were whites. Medicine Fly was disappointed 
and wouldn't speak all the rest of the day. The whites 
]>roved to be a scouting party from Fort Keogh. One 
of them was my brother Robert, and another Lieut. 
Casey. 
"Five of Medicine Fly's brothers and his father had 
been killed in battle. But one relative was left now, an 
elder brother named Starving Elk. One day this man 
walked up to another Cheyenne and said to him, 'I heard 
you had called me a coward. Here I am now. If you 
do not shoot I shall think you a coward.' The man 
pulled a pistol and pointed it at Starving Elk, He 
never flinched nor raised a hand. Crack! went the pistol, 
and down fell Starving Elk, with a bullet through his 
heart. This happened while Medicine Fly and I were 
on our last trip together, or that would not have been 
the end of the affair. 
"In March. 1878, we were sent from Keogh to 
Fort Peck with dispatches. We had been paid off a few 
days before, and Medicine Fly had $30 in gold. This he 
squandered at the traders' store at Peck, buying, among 
other things, a pair of fine boots and an accordeon. He 
had no use for either of these, for he never wore anything 
but moccasins, and knew nothing about music. 
"On our return trip along toward evening of the sec- 
ond day we were nearing a creek. 1 saw a band of 
buffalo not far off, and told Medicine Fly to go on and 
make camp and I would kill some meat. So he went on 
with the pack mule and I went over and killed a young- 
cow, and took as much of the meat as I thought we could 
use. Instead of .sneaking up as I should have done, T 
chased the band, and had quite a run before 1 got a shot. 
Well, I went on and found Medicine Fly had camped, as 
I said, in a place like this. 1 didn't like the looks of it. 
but said nothing for a while. After we had had supper 
I said, 'Let us pacJc up now and go on a few miles. 
There is a place near here called Crow Hill where the 
vSioiix once killed a whole war party of Crows. There 
is a queer rock fort there, and I would like to see it.' 
" 'This is a good place,' said Medicine Fly. 'Here is 
wood, water and good grass. Let us stay here to-night, 
and to-morrow we will go and see Crow Hill.' - 
'' 'But,' I said, 'this is a bad place. We are shut in 
here. VVe can't .see anywhere. The enemy might come 
to the top of that cutbank and kill us.' 
•'It was no use, I couldn't get him to move; so I was 
obhged to stay It seemed as if the very devil was 
in him that night. He sang war song's, yelled, and tnade 
a noisc- with hi? ac.cordeon, as it trying to attract acien 
lion. Finally we made dowii our brds. Medicirie Fly 
niade his by (he fire, but I made mine between the forki 
of a fallen Cottonwood. I couldn't sleep, howerer, T fell 
uneasy. . _ ■ 
"It niigliL have been an hour or more' a iter .lying down, 
when I heard some gravel fall off the cutbank and rattle 
down into the water; ihtjn there was a shot. Medicirie 
h^ly immediately jumped up and fired back, and then 
there a fearful flash, an«I twenty or more, shots vyetr 
fired at him. The horse's were frightened and running 
about on their ropes. I didn't get up, but kept hallooing 
"Whoa, Billy. Whoa, boy.' It was no use to call. They 
either broke tlieir ropes or pulled the picket pins and 
■stampeded. There was no more sound from the cat 
bank. I could hear Medicine Fly groan occa.sionally, 
and knew that he was wounded. .After a while I got 
up and went over to him. 'Oh,' he said. 'I thought., you 
were gone. Leave me now and get away if you can. I 
shall never go. They have killed me.' 
"I replied that I would not go. In fact, 1 couldn't ^o. 
tor the horses had stampeded. I fixed a bed. -lor. 
Aledicine Fly, got him as comfortably placed as possible 
and then went oft' a little way and waited for .daylight. 
That was an awful night. My old friend and companion 
was mortally wounded, I knew, and felt as badly about h 
as if he had been my brother. I couldn't think what had 
become of the war party. T wondered why iliey did not 
come in. and finish us. and I made up my mind that if, they 
did conu' I 'would kill enough f)f them to avenge us 
both before they took my hair. At last day began to 
break, and I sneaked out and took a lc)ok around. Not 
a living thing was in sight. I even went up on top of 
the cutbank, but could see no trails on the hard, dry 
grass. I went back to my friend. Mis eyes lighted up 
when he saw me. and he said, '.Still here! Our hearts 
are the same. I like yon.' .And presently, 'T am not 
afraid to die. This is the way to die; shot down by the 
enemy. I am glad.' 
''After a while he asked lor water. I got a cupful, raised 
him up and held it to his lips. He took only a .swallow, 
shivered and died in my arms. For the rest of that day 
I must have been crazy. I remeniber nothing until about 
dark 1 found myself at the fort, forty .miles from where 
Medicine Fly was killed. 1 told my story, and lay down 
and slept. Next day. with some others, 1 went back and 
buried Medicine Fly, and got our saddles and other 
things. And while' we were burying him, [ told the 
boys what a friend he had been to me, and how hrstMe he 
was. Then one of the boys made a little speech. I can't 
remember all he said. He said something about every 
one doing their best according to their lights, and how 
Medicine Fly had always done the best he could; that 
he had always done more than his duty, and that if there 
was any hereafter Medicine Fly stood as good a sho.vv 
^o be happy as the next one. 
"And then we got on our horses arid fr(!jd6''away. 
"I found out afterward that it was the Assinaboines 
who killed him. They told me about it themselves. 
They saw me running buffalo and heard Medicine. Fly 
singing, and thought we were Crows. But when they 
heard me halloo at my horse they recognized my voice and 
weotoff. I did not tell them that they killed the Oieyeime'. 
1 wouldn't give them that satisfaction. I only said thai 
they wounded him a little, and that he got all right in a 
week or two. I have often thoughi about. that ni^ht. 1 
shall never forget it, nor Aledicine Fly. T wish lor no 
better friend and companion than he was." 
PlEG.\N, Mont. 
The Blacklick. 
The Blacklick is a branch of the Conemaugh, whi-ch 
Hows into i( about two miles below Blairsville. It 
comes in from the east and northeast, and has its rise 
among the hills along the border of Cambria and Indiana 
counties. Its length is not less than thirty miles. In rny 
boyhood it was one of the most pleasant of streams. .It 
flowed through a country of farms and primeval forfcsts- 
No manufactories of any kind or town of any description 
stood upon its shores. Its waters were as clear and un- 
sullied as in the days when the red Indian speared its fish 
from his frail canoe. It is many years since I have looked 
upon the waters of the Blacklick; but I understand that a 
railroad has been built along its bank, and the sylvan 
quiet is now broken by the screech of the locomotive 
and its pure current polluted by the refuse of coal mines. 
It looks as though no stream in the LTnion is to be 
sacred from the railroad. Bad luck to the man that in- 
vented the iron horse! But the Blacklick as it exi.sted at 
the time to wdiich my mind now reverts was such a 
stream as Walton wotdd have liked, or Henry Van L')yke 
would lovingly place among his "Little Rivers." 
Three points of contact wnth the Blacklick remain most 
permanently fixed in my memory. One was a place 
known as Campbell's Mill. It is more years than I 
would like to say since T have been at Campbell's Mill, 
My Uncle Henry lived there and operated the grist mill, 
and I remember going out with him, four miles away. 
How well T remember clinging to his waist as 1 rode be- 
hind him on the back of old Nell, the gray mare, with my 
little legs stuck out nearly at right angles with my body, 
much as if I should ride astride of an elephant how. 
What an immense beast she set- mt d to be, and what a 
vast world was that which I viewed in round-eyed 
wonder from my lofty position. 'Hiat .same old world 
has been a i>uz?.lc and a matter of wonderment to nu- 
ever since. 
There was a mill pond there where the gee.se and the 
little fluffy go.'ilings were swimming; there was a cov 
ered wooden bridge across the creek that seemeil the 
haunt of queer shadows and strange sounds; there wa.s 
an orchard behind the house where oats were growing 
among the trees and fallen apples were lying among 
the oats. I recall even the tall clock., vvith its broad 
swinging pendulum and its great metal weights hanging; 
from their long cords; and even a book which I saw 
there-, and have never seen a copy of it since — .some work- 
on ""The Revelations." with a highly colored picture of 
the scarlet Svoman seated on the beast with the seven 
