Selected, 
THE TALE OF THE TERRIBLE FIRE 
T WILL tell you the tale or tbe terrible Are : 
A It springs from the earth— It Is dreadful and dire. 
In the dark 
Wintry sky, 
See the spark 
Upward fly ; 
See It grow 
In Its frame— 
See It glow 
Into flame 1 
See It burning and blazing ; 
See It spring Into life 
With a vigor amazing— 
How It longB for the strife 1 
Hear the noise and the rattle— 
How It swells, how It grows, 
Like the crash of a battle, 
Like the clash of the foes I 
See it rushing and rising and roaring, 
See It trying to touch a tall star : 
It seems in the sky to be soaring 
Like a flag of fierce flame from afar. 
See It turning and burning and braving— 
See It streaming and gleaming and red I 
Ah 1 the smoke In the air Is now wavlDg 
Like a winding-sheet of dull lead. 
Hear It Iangh with wild glee at each futile endeavor 
To quench or to qnell Its exuberant force : 
It Is flaming and free and fantastic forever ; 
It delights and exults with no pang of remorse, 
With no pain, with but passion— mad passion— It quivers 
- With Its pennon of scarlet, the bloodiest huo, 
turn with Its gleaming streams and Its rearing rivers, 
It dares to do all things that flame dares to do. 
inf * 
How It darts, how It dances and dashes, 
As though It had taken for aim, 
To reduce all the world Into ashes 
And to fling all the stars Into Same I 
It Is glittering and glowing and glaring— 
And racing it rings Its own knell ; 
It Is showing Its wonderful daring— 
It Is turning the Bky Into hell 1 
How It lazily ltngeis 
With Its swell and Its fall ; 
With Its fiery fingers 
Wlerdly weaving a pall ; 
With Its horrible hisses, 
Like the wind In a storm ; 
With Itn blistering kisses, 
On face and on form I 
Of Its flashes 
Bereft, 
Only ashes 
Are left; 
Till Its cries 
Tell Its doom— 
And It dies 
In the gloom. 
I have told you the tale of the terrible Ore : 
It has sang its last song to its lamlnons lyre— 
It has sung Its last song, It has breathed Its last breath, 
It has lived without life, It has died without death. 
— Apple ton’ a Journal for July, 
- 
horqjeoev 
For Forest and Stream and Rod and Gun. 
#i the §hippewit gountrg. 
U NCLE SAM has large interests at stake in the northern 
and western portion of his dominions, and often has 
oocasion to send special commissioners or agents to those re- 
gions to look after the proper enforcement of his Indian and 
public land policies. The instructions given me in the spring 
of 1875 required that I should visit certain bands of the Sioux 
and Chippewa Indians in Dakota, Minuesota and Wisconsin, and 
assign to them, in severalty, allotments of land in accordance 
with previous treaty stipulations. About the first of June 
I turned my face from St. Paul toward the northwest, via the 
8t. Paul and Pacific Railway, in company with the agent for 
the Sissdon Sioux and his brother, whom I had found in St. 
Paul. Our first objective point was “Morris,” a small sta- 
tion about 175 miles distant, where we were to leave the rail- 
road and cross the prairie some seventy miles to the Indian 
agency. Arriving at Morris, we quartered for the night at 
the Falsom House, a small two-story frame with perhaps six 
or eight apartments, e*ch as many feet square and divided by 
pasteboard and wall-paper partitions, a fact that rendered all 
Caudle lectures the topic of mirthful conversation among the 
assembled guests the following morning. After breakfast a 
ride across the prairie to Foss’ Lake, some four miles distunt, 
was in order. A clumsy, flat-bottomed scow was the vessel 
Mr. Foss rented to amateur fishermen at fifty cents an hour. 
Our circuit of this small lake resulted in the capture of a 
dozen or more large pickerel, upon which we amply dined and 
breakfasted. A team and driver from the Indian agency ar- 
fb® next morning, and we pursued our journey, having 
added to our company a companion in the person of Carlow, 
a hue setter dog. Carlow bad been the property and com- 
panion of an English sportsman in that neighborhood the 
previous year, but having had the misfortune to lose an eye 
through the awkward shooting of his master, was left in 
charge of the freight agent, Mr. Fisher. Carlow was a 
thoroughly educated gentleman of the moat refined and tender 
instincts and feelings, and since his residence in Morris had 
been deeply humiliated at the manner of his treatment ; no 
one seemed to assume the roles of patron ; no one encouraged 
him with kindly sympathy or friendly greeting ; bad boys 
cast loose stones and stray clods of dirt at him as he rapidly 
disappeared around friendly corners; proletarian curs snarled 
their displeasure or vented their deeper malice upon him at 
every opportune occasion. Borne down with the weight of 
these afflictions and the want of an occasional nut ritious bone, 
Carlow had degenerated into a mere shadow of his pristine 
strength, beauty and activity. A casual glance at him was 
sufficient to tell the whole story, and I found no difficulty in 
procuring Mr. Fisher’s permission to take charge of the un- 
happy dog and use him during the summer. A hearty meal 
of boiled beef and potatoes— doubtless fhe first in many 
months— with a few friendly pats upon the head, at once ren- 
dered me the focal point of Carlow's affections and inspired 
him with a new life that was fully manifestin his joyous bark 
and scampering antics as we started for the Indian agency on 
the morning of the 9th of June. Our course was due west, 
and as far as the eye could reach on either side stretched the 
boundless prairie, a novel sight to one whose life has been 
spent in the older States, q’he grass was fresh and green, and 
the numerous small lakes studaiog the bosom of the prairie 
like diamonds of rare brilliancy set in the brightest emerald, 
relieved all sense of monotony. As we wound along the black 
and snake-like trail, first skirting the hank of some beautiful 
little lake, whose bosom was literally alive with wild ducks 
and geese, and anon far out upon the prairie that swarmed 
with plover, curlew and an occasional prairie chicken, our 
spirits became buoyant and we drank in the inspiring sights 
on that beautiful day until our hearts became filled with won- 
derment at the marvelous extent, richness and variety of na- 
ture's creative genius. The material instincts of humanity, 
however, soon overcame all dreaming propensities and Carlow 
was kept busy retrieving ducks aud birds throughout most of 
the day. In this connection I noticed a peculiarity of the 
curlew— it may be familiar enough to those who have had 
much experience in shooting them, but was novel to me— 
which is, that thesouud of a gun seems to attract rather than 
frighten them ; thus at times, after firing, there would be 
three to half a dozen of these birds rapidly circling around tho 
wagon, within easy range and uttering their shrill screams, 
which they would continue for half a mile or more unless 
sooner victimized themselves. 
Thirty miles west of Morris we reached Lake Toqua, a fine 
sheet of water several miles in length, a peninsula at the north 
end of which is covered with a dense cluster of oaks, the only 
timber sighted since leaving the former place. Two squatters 
had already fastened themselves upon this priceless grove and 
had erected comfortable log-houses within its shelter at a dis- 
tance of thirty miles from the nearest neighbor. One was a 
man who had in early life been a newspaper editor in Connec- 
ticut, but, crossed in love, had left the comforts of civilization 
and was now the husband of as dirty and ugly a squaw ns 1 
remember to have met with. Fish were so abundant in the 
lake that a reasonable number could be caught almost any 
time by standing upon the bank, casting a trolling spoon as 
far out as one could readily throw, and rapidly hauling in. 
After dinner we resumed our journey over a country similar 
in all respects to that we had been traversing all day, aud at 
dark reached Brown’s Valley, twelve miles distant from the 
agency, where, to avoid a drenching, wo ate suppor and 
spent the night. Brown's Valley took itsname from a former 
Indian Agent and person of considerable local prominence 
and wealth in the earlier history of Minnesota. He married 
a Sioux squaw, and though he died some years since in New 
York City— where he was attempting to perfect an invention 
of a steam wagou for navigating the prairies— his widow, 
three sons and three daughters still reside in the valley. Two 
of the daughters were educated at Georgetown College, D. C., 
and are fine scholars, musicians, equestrians or sportswomen. 
This valley occupies a singular position ; it is a depression 
of an hundred feet below the general level of tho surrounding 
country; perhaps a mile in width and two in length, and as 
far as the eye is capable of judging is perfectly flat. At one 
end of this valley lies Lake Traverse whose waters find an 
outlet through the Traverse des Sioux, Red River of the 
North, etc., into Hudson’s Bay; at the opposite end is Big 
Stone Lake which, through the medium of the Minnesota and 
Mississippi Rivers, eventually mingles with the Gulf of Mexi- 
co, and )et the nearest point of approach of these widely di- 
verging currents is not much in excess of a quarter of a mile. 
From this point to tho Indian Agency, tho country con- 
tinues level or gently rolling prairie. Tho Agency itself oe- 
elevated silo upon tho summit of the first terrace or 
Tm , aa lt i8 commonly called. These “Coteaus" 
or inns of the prairie are of singular formation. They traverse 
the country from N. W. to 8. E. for a distance perhaps of a 
hundred miles or more ; they rise abruptly from the level 
prairie to the height of two to five hundred feet, but, unlike 
other ranges of hills, terminate in no sharp summits or peaks, 
and, viewing them from tho plaiu below, resemble a great ter- 
race or military earthwork. A closer inspection indicate s 
that they are intersected in ull directions by deep ravines; 
these ruviues are filled with a heavy growth of oak timber, 
sufficient to supply the needs of the Indians for many years to 
come. On the summit of tho *‘ Coteaus" os far west us tho 
eye can reach, and in fact nearly to the crossing of tho James 
Kiver, the country is decidedly broken and Bcarred with alter- 
nate hillocks and ravines, with scarcely more than a mile cr 
two in any directfou without a lake. These lakes are all shal- 
low with but two or three exceptions, scarcely exceeding ten 
to twenty feet in extreme depth, and muuy of them that pre- 
sent quite formidable sheets of water in June are nothing hut 
meadows of succulent grass by the middle of August, that but 
a 4 few years since were the delight of the thousands of buffalo 
frequenting this regiou. Tho water of the lakes aud streams 
is quite strongly impregnated with alkali, which increases in 
proportion as you travel westward. At Fort Wadsworth, 
tweuty-seven miles beyond tho Indian Agency, it is absolutely 
unfit for drinking purposes, and the only resource of tho 
troops stationed there is to put up large quantities of ice in 
winter and drink nothing but melted ico in summer (spiritous 
fluids of course excepted). The presence of this baneful sub- 
stance is manifest in tho milk, butter and eggs, and the hard- 
ness of the water must be broken with ashes or strong lye be- 
fore it is available for washing purposes. Tho Indians occu- 
pying this reservation number some 1,700, and are the rem- 
nant of those formerly residing at Yellow Medicine and other 
points on the Minnesota River -, they were largely engaged in 
the Sioux massacro at New Ulm and thereabouts in 1802, 
though numbers of them were theu loyal to tho Government 
and, at great personal risk, aided and rescued unprotected 
settlers from their bloodthirsty brethren. They are now pro- 
vided by treaty with a reservation of nearly a million of ecrep, 
one-fourth of which is os fine agricultural land as any section 
of the country affords. The entire reserve furnishes fine 
grazing for stock, the only drawback being the length and 
severity of the winters. 
After a few days spent in resting from the fatigues of 
travel, and in preparations for beginning the practical work 
contemplated by my instructions, 1 fouud myself armed and 
equipped after the following style— viz , one army ambulance 
and pair of good horses ; one one-quarter blood Sioux inter- 
preter, who also acted in the capacity of driver ; one sur- 
veyor, with necessary instruments; one canvas wagon cover 
to be stretched across the wagon tongues and used in tho 
capacity of a tent ; one pair of blankets each ; a rubber blan- 
ket, a gossamer waterproof coat for myself ; one Fowler split 
bamboo rod ; one breech-loading and one muzzle-loading shot- 
gun ; necessary cooking utensils and food, and Carlow, to- 
gether with a native Sioux pony, which I purchased from a 
roaming band of Yanktonai Sioux, at that time veiling at the 
Agency. 
It was our custom in this shape to leave the Agency each 
Monday morning, and after prosecuting assiduously through- 
out the week the work of surveying, marking and assigning 
to the various Indians their several allotments of land for 
future residence and cultivation, os well as, incidentally, the 
sport of shooting and fishing, to return to the Agency on Sat- 
urday night for a rest. 
One Monday morning in the latter part of June found us 
en route for “Enemy” Lake, as tho Indians designate it, 
near the western edge of the reservation, upon whose bunks 
lived, or camped, a band of perhaps half a dozen lodges of 
the least civilized portion of the tribes, but who, hearing of 
my arrival at the Agency, had sent in word of their desire 
to receive allotments of laud, and in future to follow the? 
wlute man’s mode of life. The road from the Agency leads 
directly to the foot of tho “ Coteaus " some half mile away, 
and winds along the sides thereof for a considerable distance, 
gradually ascending to the summit, from which a view of 
unparalleled magnificence and novelty is spread before the 
gaze. To the northwest and southeast, beyond the limits of 
human vision, stretches the huge back-bone or ridjjc, inter- 
sected in all directions with deep ravines, from which rises 
the thick, dark foliage of the great oak groves, while far out 
to the north and east and three hundred feet below you. is 
spread a vast expanse of perfectly level prairie, covered with 
the greenest and moat succulent of grasses. From this point 
the road was simply au Indian trail, over a country more or 
less rugged and not particularly interesting until we reached 
“Enemy" Lake, some twenty-five miles west of the Agency. 
I at once assembled the Indians and had each one designate 
as near as he could the tract of land desired for his allotment, 
after which I caused the lines to be surveyed and marked, by 
which time the day was well nigh gone, and after moving a 
mile or so to the north, pitched camp on tho shore of the 
lake, cooked our supper, and went to bed tired. 
In the morning I rose bright and early, determined to have 
some fish for breakfast if possible, while “Billy," the inter- 
preter, took a gun and went in quest of birds. A small “dug* 
