An Upper Missouri Trip 
III.—Irv the Ice 
By DeCOST SMITH 
■ „ orl j + v,;c weP r- ;= a well-known New York artist who has traveled widely in 
West D 'nd°L S g^n m h ucJ UnrTto "the^smdythe Indian/ hT has pXted^To the high qualities’ of artist he adds that keenness of observation which belongs 
to the naturalist, and he is well known “ ° n the h ^°"*' of seventeen he began the study of art at the Art Students’ League, New York,' and later was for 
Mr. Smith was born in Skaneateles N 1^- ^ ^ ^ & gpecia , ty of painting Indians and other Western subjects, and his pictures have been shown 
in "many "of th^prindpaf'eStTons and international expositions, both here and abroad. He has done much work in black and white, dlustratmg books and periodicals, 
and has written occasional magazine articles and ethnological contributions.^ extended trip, in the West was in 1884, passing the following winter with the 
At the age of nineteen he began visiting the Elding Low Dog, Long Dog, Gall, Rain-in-the-face, Sitting Bull and Charging 
Sioux Indians of the then Dakota Territory, w mr. ^ ^ best> he yet had the opportunity of studying him during the last years of the buffalo, while the painted 
Thunder. Though it was then too a e o s c war part ies, though carefully watched over by the military, sometimes succeeded in getting away at night in 
and embroidered robe was still worn, ” VvLb, chiefs had not then all been killed or reconciled, and incorrigible hostiles would sometimes take a long shot at a 
search cf scalps and horses. le o a- im_ ^ agk {or to h acC o. Nor was it always considered politic to resent such minor insults. 
white man, or ride up to him, strike him wit v, Shoshones and many other tribes, and have taken him, by wagon, or by saddle and pack 
Studies in the field brought him mto dose the Mi»ouri River to the Pacific Ocean. 
outfit, through much of the wilder Portions Indians for many months at a time, he has acquired a speaking knowledge of one or more tongues, and 
Having frequently hunted, traveled ana campcu 
is proficient in the sign language. Editor.] 
O N Oct. 27 we traveled about fifteen miles 
and camped in a rather extensive tim¬ 
bered bottom on' the left bank. On the _ 
beach were many tracks of deer, coyote fox and 
a few old bear tracks. There was also the piint ^ 
of a long moccasined foot, probably an Assia- 
niboin, as we were not very far from the 
Fort Peck reservation and within the range of 
that tribe. At this point we were a few miles 
below the conical Trill which is marked on the 
maps as Round Butte. This is the Half Way 
Pyramid of Maximilian, half way -between Milk 
River and the Musselshell. It is not conspicu¬ 
ous, and except for its symmetry, and the fact 
that it is visible for miles below, it would scarcely 
be noticed in this land of buttes, and yet it seems 
always to have been a landmark. Judson Elliott 
Walker, in his “Campaigns of General Custer; 
Etc.” says that in 1865 Sitting Bull’s band was 
camped for two months at Round Butte and fired 
on the steamer General Grant, killing four men, 
and four days later repeated the offense in the 
case of the Effie Deans, but without fatalities in 
the latter instance. Both boats were bound for 
Benton. Church Butte, a few miles above, we 
failed to identify, though we saw several which 
might answer to that name. 
About 8 o’clock on the 28th a strong gale came 
from the west and lasted perhaps half an hour. 
The water was soon lashed to a deep mud color, 
the waves tipped with dirty gray whitecaps, and 
the sky and hills opposite almost obscured by 
clouds of dust and sand. It was lively while it 
lasted, sticks and leaves flying everywhere, and 
trees bending and straining, but boat and tent 
were both well secured and sheltered, ’and we 
weathered the storm without mishap. After the 
blow we walked down the river about four miles 
and found old bear tracks on the beach as far 
as our explorations extended. At dusk, while I 
was watching for deer, a large horned owl lit 
on a stub about fifty feet away. I could see him 
distinctly against the sky, and there he sat for 
several minutes, hooting at intervals to his mate, 
and the latter answering from somewhere off in 
the timber. We had heard owls of this species 
DE COST SMITH. 
and others, almost constantly at night, and had 
seen many, but this was the first time in my 
life that I ever saw a horned owl in the act of 
hooting, and the position he assumed was not 
at all what I should have expected. He would 
throw his head down, and forward, until it was 
lower than the tail, the latter standing almost 
upright and the body nearly ■ horizontal. Then 
he would hoot, “Hoo, hoo, hoohoo, hoo, hoo, 
hoo,” in the manner familiar to every woods¬ 
man. Rising at once to an upright posture he 
would appear to listen intently for an answer, 
which was usually forthcoming, but sometimes 
there was no reply or the delay was long. Th?n 
he would appear to be anxious, impatient, or 
annoyed, and the way iri which he woilld look 
back over his shoulders or draw himself up in 
a dignified way, throwing out his “chest’ and 
drawing in his “chin,” was very expressive and 
amusing. But if the answer came immediately 
he seemed entirely satisfied, and until the proper 
time arrived for his next hoot’he would interest 
himself in peering down into the brush as though 
searching for a mouse or rabtjit. After this per¬ 
formance had been repeated a dozen times or 
so, bis mate flew across an opening and he imme» 
diately followed her, both alighting in the same 
tree with an exchange of twittering, cooing 
sounds, very suggestive of endearment. Often 
at night we would hear an owl uttering a single 
cry, over and over again, “Hoo-ooh” (with a 
slight rising inflection), repeated every four or 
five seconds until it became decidedly monoto¬ 
nous. The sort of cooing noise,- described above, 
would usually terminate this aggravating sere¬ 
nade, and from this I concluded that it was prob- ( 
ably a call note. 
