308 
F QREST & AND •„ S TREAM.* 
[Dec. 17, 1904. 
Immediately after breakfast camp was broken up, 
and we proceeded along up the banks .of the river with- 
out again getting in the vicinity of the thoroughly 
frightened animals. We camped again about halt a 
mile from the river, and during the night I was awak- 
ened by a stir in the camp, and on turning out was 
informed that there were evidently lions in the vicin- 
ity The warning of their proximity had been given 
by the oxen, which detected their scent, and immedi- 
ately rose up, snorting and rattling the traction chains 
to which they had been tied by bits of rawhide, the 
Kaffirs hurriedly kindled huge fires, which served to 
frighten away the intruders, and the camp resumed its 
usual quiet. . . a . 
The next morning the Boers prepared to inflict pun- 
ishment on the midnight marauders, mounting their 
horses and riding off, guided by the scent of about 
half a dozen dogs, which were kept purposely for such 
occasions. Of course I accepted the invitation to ac- 
company the party, as the proceeding was a novelty 
to me and I was eager to see how success was to be 
accomplished. We cantered off for about half a mile, 
when a partially open country was reached, ihe dogs 
began to circle and in a comparatively short time they 
surrounded a small copse and squatted on their 
haunches, giving vent to sundry growls and barks. 
The Boers immediately formed a cordon just outside 
of the canines, which, at a prolonged shout from their 
masters, advanced toward the edge of the thicket with 
increased baying. They did not reach its margin be- 
fore a portion of them turned tail in a hurry, being 
followed by a huge male lion which was instantly rid- 
dled by the bullets of about half a dozen rifles _ in the 
hands of the Boers seated on their horses within a 
short distance of the ferocious animal. Ihe whole 
affair was brought to an end completely and success- 
fully in so short a time that I was astounded at the 
shrewdness and dexterity of the human and canine par- 
ticipants. . . , , 
A few days subsequent Victoria Falls were reached, 
and after thoroughly examining them we_ turned our 
faces southward, bent 011 securing more ivory Sev- 
eral days passed before the scouting party, who al- 
ways kept ahead of us, brought news of having found 
the trail of quite a large herd. Camp was immediately 
formed, and the scouts again started to locate the 
game precisely. Our patience was not severely tried, 
as within a day they returned, reporting having seen 
a great many within a comparatively short distance. 
We immediately left the camp and followed the guides 
to a spot where they proposed to drive the herd. I 
was again placed in ambush and succeeded in securing 
another tusker without the contretemps of my preced- 
ing shot. Six was the number which were slaughtered, 
and my Boer friends seemed pleased at the prospect 
of securing a good crop of ivory. As their proposed 
route diverged from the one I intended taking, we 
parted company, and I wended my way back into the 
Transvaal without any more exciting incidents. Some 
time subsequent I happened to meet with some of the 
party, who informed me that they returned from the 
hunt with over a hundred tusks. . 
While connected with the Zoological Garden in Cin- 
cinnati I received a letter from Mr. Bailey, manager 
of the Barnum show, requesting me to call on him 
during a proposed visit to Cincinnati, as he wished to 
consult me relative to a female elephant in the collec- 
tion. On reporting he told me that he wished me to 
examine the animal and try to ascertain if she was 
with young. He accompanied me inside the . tent and 
handed me over to the keeper with directions to give 
me all the information in his possession. After ques- 
tioning him closely, I got him to stand alongside the 
animal while I tested her teats, when I discovered that 
she was bearing milk. Going back to Mr. Bailey I 
told him that he might expect a calf about the first of 
the March following. He seemed much astonished and 
pleased, and acknowledged that there was not a party 
about the entire establishment who knew the period of 
gestation of an elephant. On the 10th of the following 
March I received a telegram from him announcing the 
birth of the calf, and while passing along the streets 
I met Uncle John Robinson, an old showman. On 
showing him the dispatch he burst out in a volley of 
oaths, asserting that the whole Affair was an imposture, 
and he was surprised that I believed a word of it. As 
many of the readers of -Forest and Stream may feel 
some interest in the matter, I append the following 
data, taken from experiments conducted in India: 
Period of gestation of an elephant, about 20 l / 2 
months; height at birth, 2ft. nin.; first year, 3ft. ioin.; 
second year, 4ft. 6in.; third year, 5ft.; fourth year, 5ft. 
5in.; fifth year, 5ft. ioin.; sixth year, 6ft. il^'m.; seventh 
year, 6ft. 4in. Frank J. Thompson. 
Satank's Raid. 
Editor Forest and Stream : 
The old Kiowa chief Satanic was probably one of the 
meanest Indians that his tribe has ever produced, and 
none of his tribe are angels without wings, either. 
He had been keeping our Government in hot water and 
the cavalry chasing after him for years before the Civil 
War and since then, but had retired now to his reserva- 
tion at Fort Sill. 
Early in the spring of 1871, I think it was, General 
Sherman started on a visit to all the frontier posts, and 
in the course of time got up to our post, Fort Richardson, 
Texas. To get there he had to travel in an ambulance 
up from Fort Griffin, the next fort south of us, and the 
old chief somehow found out that he was coming, and 
conceived the brilliant idea of capturing him. He was 
not going to kill the General, he afterward told us, only 
going to make him a prisoner. "And how about the 
many soldiers General Sherman would have with him, 
were you going to kill them?" I asked him. He only 
grunted in reply. Those soldiers would have had a short 
shift of it with him, had he met them, and they not put 
him out of business. 
Satank got up a big war party of young Kiowas and 
Comanches, and took as his aides a Kiowa chief Santanta, 
and a young, good looking Comanche named Big Tree. 
I had known Big Tree for a number of years now, and 
was surprised when I heard of his going. I thought he 
had more sense than to let this old fraud trail him off 
with him. 
When Satank left his camp, he headed west, the place 
that he meant to go to was south of him, and a plain 
wagon road ran right to it, but he had no use for wagon 
roads just yet; he might need one later on. Going the 
way he did, he would have to make a big circle to get to 
where he meant to go. He made the circle too big, and 
got to the road he expected to meet Sherman on just 
twenty-four hours after the General had passed. He was 
in Richardson now. Satank got there in time though to 
strike a camp of three wagons that were hauling corn up 
to the post, and, killing three of the men, he tied them to 
the hind wheels of their wagons with trace chains, built 
fires in them, then cut the front spokes out of one wheel 
on each wagon, cut open the sacks, spilling the corn all 
over the country ; then taking the team horses and 
harness, put out west again. 
Two at least of these three men he had burned before 
they were dead, as I testified when the Indians' trial took 
place. The shape that these men's bodies were in when 
we got to them convinced me that they had been burned 
alive. Why he had not burned these wagons, instead of 
going to the trouble of disabling them as he did, always 
was a puzzle to me, and when I asked Big Tree about it 
years after this, he could not tell me. He did not know. 
There had been a citizen traveling with these wagons. 
After being shot, he got away, and hiding until after dark, 
then made his way to Richardson, getting in at day- 
light next morning. A detail of twelve men under a ser- 
geant and myself was sent off right away to bury these 
men. We went at a fast gallop, and got to the place, 
twelve miles from the post, in an hour. 
This was the worst sight I had ever seen, and I saw 
that burned battle field in the Wilderness, Virginia, with 
the dead bodies all over it. The sergeant and' I stood 
looking at these men. 
"What do you think of this?" he asked me. 
"I'll' tell you what I will think after this. Always be- 
fore this, when we have killed a Kiowa, if I have been 
there I have stopped our Tonkawas when they began to 
cut him up. We can't very well stop them from scalping, 
and I don't try; but hereafter if the Tonkawa does not 
scalp and cut up the Indians, I'll do it myself." 
The most of the men we had here did not want to 
touch these burned bodies ; one young fellow, a mere boy, 
sat down on a wagon tongue and began to cry. 
"Get up and grab a pick," the sergeant said to him, 
"and go to work. When you have been here as long as 
we have, you won't mind these things any more than we 
do." 
The sergeant and I, with one or two of these men who had 
seen too many dead men before this to care much about it 
now, got the chains off these men, and after straighten- 
ing them out as well as we could, laid them in the wide 
grave that the rest of the men had dug, covering them 
with the empty grain sacks. 
"You should be able to repeat the burial service," the 
sergeant said to me. "Try it." 
While the men stood there uncovered, I repeated the 
Episcopal service, and then the Lord's prayer. Then the 
grave was covered up. 
Just as we were through, General Mackenzie, with all 
the cavalry at the post, got there. He only halted long 
enough for us to tell him that we had these men buried 
and to show him Satank's trail. Then we took the trail 
after him. We followed the trail for the next two days, 
and seeing that it headed for Fort Sill now — the Indians 
had only gone this far out of the way to throw us out — 
we left their trail and went direct into Fort Sill, but it 
took us two days more to get in. There we found all 
three of the chiefs in the guard house; General Sherman 
had got up here now, and as soon as the Indians had got 
in, he arrested them. 
The officer in command here, a colonel of colored 
cavalry, told him that if he did anything to their chiefs 
the Kiowas would go out now. 
"Let them go out," Sherman is reported to have said, 
"and be blessed to them. I have Mackenzie down here 
at Richardson to help them in again, if you can't do it." 
The three chiefs were now turned over to us to be 
taken to Texas and tried by the civil court. We put 
handcuffs on all of them, and as a- mark of honor, Mac- 
kenzie, had a pair of leg irons put on Satank; the General 
knew him. They were put in an army wagon that had no 
cover on, then three men were put in with them as a 
guard, and a heavy mounted guard rode on each side of 
the wagon. 
We had not gone a mile — the post of Fort Sill was still 
in sight — when old Satank made a grab for one of the 
guard's carbines ; he got it, but before he had time to 
use it, this mounted guard had him full of pistol balls. 
His body was thrown out on the road now for his 
friends to pick up and bury. He had started this row 
just to get shot. He knew what was waiting for him 
down in Texas, and wanted to start for the happy hunt- 
ing grounds from here and take a few soldiers with him. 
He had to go alone, though. 
One of the balls that was fired at the chief flew wide 
of the mark, going clear through a young Mexican who 
drove the wagon. We picked him up for dead and sent 
him to Sill. Four years after I met him again. He was 
still driving mules, but he drove for a square man now; 
we soldiers were too ready to shoot, he said. 
When we camped that night the two remaining chiefs, 
Satanta and Big Tree, were taken out of the wagon, 
laid on the grass, then with a few soft lariat ropes we 
proceeded to stake them out. I had the job, doing it 
while the officer of the day, one of our captains, stood 
there to see it done properly. I tied a rope to each of 
Satanta's wrists and ankles, then _ hauling them taut, 
pinned the other ends down. I did not use any extra 
care not to hurt him ; he was a Kiowa. Next I began on 
Big Tree, and tried to leave his ropes a little slack; I 
did not want to hurt him. 
"Haul out those ropes," the officer of the day said. 
"You are not trying to tie that man. What do you want 
to save him for?" 
I hauled them out now, while Big Tree lay looking this 
captain right in the eye. 
"It is lucky for you,"T thought, "that this man is going 
straight to the gallows, or he would hunt you up and have 
you out if it took him a lifetime to do it." 
When we had got to within twenty miles of Jacksboro, 
the town alongside of Fort Richardson, we camped for a 
day. Here Mackenzie was told that about every man in 
this part of Texas was in town, ready to lynch these 
Indians. We started early next morning, and when within 
two miles of town, the Indians were taken out of the 
wagon, two men in our troop were taken off their horses, 
the Indians put on them with their legs tied under the 
horse's belly, the troop formed by fours, and the Indians 
put right in the center of it. Then we were told to fill our 
magazines, load, and advance carbines, and we moved on 
again. When we had got within sight of town, we could 
see that every street there was packed with men and 
horses. "If there is as much whiskey there to-day as 
there generally is, some of you and us will go to sleep 
in the next hour," I thought. "I won't be one of them, 
but I don't want to see any of you or us killed." 
When we had got to the foot of the main street, the 
men here crowded back, giving us just room to ride in 
between them, and closed in behind us as soon as we had 
passed. I noticed that all were sober, and began to breathe 
freely. These men were no fools. When sober they would 
never try to get these Indians. Not a man here said a 
word; a few of them would just nod to those of us they 
knew. The cross streets were also packed solid with 
men and horses; if some half-drunken fool should fire a 
shot now— that is what I was afraid of— these men would 
have been shot down by dozens before our officers could 
stop the firing. We rode to the jail, and here found one 
of our troops that had come in around us holding both 
ends of the street ; they had cleared it and kept it clear. 
The Indians were turned over to the sheriff now, and we 
went home. 
I met ( one of the citizens a few hours after this, and 
asked, "Where was all your whiskey to-day? I saw 
none." 
"There was none. The marshal closed the barrooms 
when he heard you were coming," he said. "He did not 
want a battle fought here over two blanked Indians." 
In a few weeks the Indians were given their trial, and 
I was called as a witness. I was glad of it. I wanted to 
get into that court room. I was anxious to see how a 
Texas lawyer would go about defending the Indians. He 
had been assigned by the court to defend them, and he did 
it j ust as I would have done— put the whole of the blame 
on old Satank. He had so much influence over the young 
men, he said, that they dared not disobey him. But all 
the lawyers in Texas could not have saved those Indians. 
That jury had them convicted long before it had been 
told to "step into the box." They were sentenced to be 
hung; then the President commuted it to life imprison- 
ment, and in a few years pardoned them. 
Satanta soon after this died; it was said that a squaw 
had poisoned him ; he is buried in the cemetery at Sill, 
and for years after his death the squaws kept his grave 
covered with colored glass, broken chinaware, and such 
stuff Big Tree got to be a good Indian; he never was a 
very bad one, and he never gave us any more trouble. 
In the winter of 1876 I was out with a band of 
Comanches all winter hunting buffalo, and one day going 
on a hunt of my own in company with two Indian boys, 
we got so far off that we had to camp out. I met Big 
Tree and his party, and he and I went into camp together. 
This was the first time I had seen him since he had been 
pardoned. That night, as we lay on his blanket at the 
fire, I got him to tell me all about this raid. He began 
when they had left camp to go on it, and wound up with 
his life in Huntsville prison; then he said "But why need 
I tell you all this ? You know it ; you were there " 
"How is that, Big Tree?" 
/Why, you were the little chief who tied me down that 
night when the big chief made you pull my ropes out 
tight. 
"I thought you had forgot that, Big Tree." 
. " N °. I never forget anything. Why did you want to 
tie me the way you were doing? Did you want me to get 
away?" I have always thought that you did." 
"No, I knew you could not get away. That man at 
your head, who stood there all night, would have shot 
you had you tried to get away, and if he did not do it, 
then 1 would. We were told to shoot you if you got 
loose Had we let you escape, we might have been shot 
ourselves ; but I did not want to hurt you, Big Tree " 
This was stretching it, of course. We would not have 
been shot, but would have been given six months or a 
ye <a r *r m i, the guard house and a dishonorable discharge 
Well, I have looked long and far for that big chief who 
told you to pull those ropes tight on me. I want to see 
him, but I never can find him," said Big Tree 
"And you never will find him. He died many moons 
ago, I replied. C abia Blanco. 
[Many pi our readers are old enough to recall the 
trouble with the Kiowas in 1870 and 1871, and the cap- 
ture and trial of Satank, Satanta and Big Tree; the two 
former Kiowas and the last a Comanche. 
The history of that time— that is to say the old In- 
dian Bureau and Military Reports— together with much 
other data, have been brought together in Mr. James 
Mooney's admirable "Kiowa Calendar," published by 
the Bureau of Ethnology at Washington. These re- 
ports differ m - minor details from that given by Cabia 
Blanco, but the testimony which we print to-day is that 
of an eye witness and a close observer, and so is far 
better entitled to credence than the general and per- 
functory reports made to the different Government de- 
partments. In these reports it is intimated, if not dis- 
tinctly said, that the three Indian prisoners were taken 
from Fort Sill, each riding in one army wagon, and 
each accompanied by two guards, and that Satank at- 
tacked with a knife the sergeant of the guard who was 
riding in the wagon with him. 
Cabia Blanco, however, tells us that the three pris- 
oners left Fort Sill in one wagon; that he assisted in 
putting them into the wagon; that Satank had no knife, 
so far as any of the soldiers knew, and that no one was 
cut by Satank; moreover, that the sergeant of the guard 
was not riding in the wagon, but on his horse by the 
side of the wagon. 
Satank, spelled by Mr. Mooney Set-Angya, means 
Sitting Bear. 
Mr. Mooney quotes Mr. Laurie Tatum, at that time 
agent for the Kiowas, as saying that the prisoners were 
put into two wagons, Satank being in one, with soldiers, 
while Satanta and Big Tree rode in another. George 
