Dec. 18, 1909.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
969 
my -saddle and looked after him. He rode like 
a Centauer, despite his advancing years. There 
was something about him that impressed me, 
something that bespoke the remarkable man. 
We were going away from my home when we 
met him and he was going in that direction. 
Upon my return that afternoon he was sitting 
in our apology for a parlor and my wife was 
trying to entertain him—apparently without very 
good success. Joseph either could not or would 
not speak English and my wife’s command of 
Sahaptin was not great. The old warrior was 
made known to me by Charley Allen, whose 
guest he was, and we were soon on very good 
• terms. Our conversation turned upon many 
things, but never upon the war of which he 
was the leading actor. 
If in the future you should read something 
written by somebody, purporting to be an utter¬ 
ance of Chief Joseph anent the so-called Nez 
Perce war, you will kindly set it down as a fab¬ 
rication. Joseph never, so far as I have been 
able to ascertain, spoke one word to a white 
man about the war. His lips were sealed with 
his defeat. It is possible that at times he did 
speak of it with his own people, but even with 
them he was very reticent. 
A few years ago someone wrote of how he 
and Joseph sat upon the stairway of a certain 
hotel in the city of Spokane, and while there 
Joseph told him all about the war. Most absurd 
of all, that Joseph made use of the Chinook to 
communicate his thoughts. I should like to 
know that author's name and I would crown 
him the chief liar of the Northwest. Joseph 
never talked with strangers. He required to 
know that persons with whom he talked were 
in complete sympathy with him and his people 
before he deigned to hold converse with them, 
then his talk was on general topics and not 
about himself personally. He was great enough 
to sink himself in his people, and their greatest 
good was his sole thought. 
General Miles has said that Joseph was a very 
remarkable man. He was even more than that; 
he was a very wonderful man. Had he occu¬ 
pied any sphere in life other than that of an 
obscure Indian chief, his sun of destiny had 
shone over the world instead of setting upon a 
lonely battlefield in the lava beds where he was 
endeavoring to lead a starving band of women 
and children into a land where liberty is some¬ 
thing more than a name. 
In person Joseph was about five feet ten 
inches and would weigh something near 180 
pounds. He was erect as all Indians are; his 
shoulders and chest were models for the sculp¬ 
tor. He had the sharp, aquiline features of the 
Indian with the same piercing black eyes. At 
the time I knew him his face was furrowed 
with the harrow teeth of time and of the sor¬ 
rows through which he had passed. At times 
he smiled and I have even known him to laugh 
heartily, but in general he was grave. He was 
a natural orator and at times even when dwell¬ 
ing upon some simple topic his voice would rise 
and ring out as if he were addressing a congre¬ 
gation. 
The actual name of Joseph was Ha’i-hali-keen 
(White Eagle Wing), though the whites named 
him Joseph, as they named every person with 
some outlandish Bible name. Old Scripture 
names are given without the slightest idea of 
fitness and scattered freely about over the 
Sahaptin land. If an Indian chanced to come 
to service once, the missionaries immediately 
tacked upon him some new Biblical cognomen. 
The original Indian names meant something; 
those given them by the missionaries do not. 
The original names were musical; the new ones 
are anything but harmonious to the ear. The 
Indian child at seven or eight was given a name 
that signified something. For instance, the name 
of Hali-hali-keen was given Joseph by his 
mother by reason of the fact that when she 
was ready to name him she went out and the 
first living object' that she saw was a great 
white eagle sailing in the blue sky. She called 
him then by a name that would signify that 
eagle’s wing. 
Although this narrative has already outgrown 
the length intended for it at the outset, I can¬ 
not refrain from setting down a few of the 
many legends of the Sahaptins. I select only 
those which are characteristic of the people and 
shed some light on their early beliefs and cus¬ 
toms. To recount all of the legendary tales 
would require a volume. 
The legend of the peopling of the world with 
the Indians is easily the most important of all 
their traditionary stories. There was a time, so 
the story runs, when the earth had been made 
but no people lived upon it. Instead of the 
people the animals and birds were gifted with 
speech and lived very much as the people after¬ 
ward lived. Then, as now, the coyote was the 
most cunning and wisest of the animals. With¬ 
in the valley of the Kooskia lived a monster 
who subsisted upon animals. He filled the whole 
valley and did not need to roam about for his 
food, for he had the power of attracting them 
to him; when he simply opened his great mouth 
they went in. There they stayed alive until he 
grew hungry when he would swallow as many 
as he needed to supply his needs and digested 
them, rejecting the bones until they filled the 
whole valley. The only animal that this mon¬ 
ster could not attract was the coyote. One day 
the coyote, seeing his friends being destroyed 
so rapidly, resolved to slay this monster. He 
procured some sharp flints and a quantity of 
pitch pine, and while the monster was asleep 
crept up alongside of him and struck him sharply 
on the jaw. The monster awoke with a start 
and opened his mouth. This was what the 
coyote was waiting for, so in he jumped. The 
monster was very much surprised and went into 
a great rage, tearing up the hills and making 
canons all over the country, some of which you 
can see to this day. The little coyote only 
laughed in his glee. He went down into the 
belly of the monster and made a fire with the 
pitch. He then chopped a hole in the body al¬ 
lowing his friends to escape, which they did, all 
running away to the mountains, except the fox, 
who was the coyote’s cousin. When the mon¬ 
ster had been burned to death, the coyote and 
his cousin were at a loss to know what to do 
with it, but for many moons the coyote had told 
the other animals that the people were coming, 
and they decided to make the people out of the 
monster. They cut him to pieces and created 
the various tribes out of parts of the body. 
These they sent to far countries, leaving the 
beautiful valley of the Kooskia untenanted. 
After the whole of the monster had been used 
in creating other people and they had departed, 
the coyote remembered that he had not peopled 
the Kooskia valley. On his hands he still had 
some blood 'from the monster and he told the 
fox to bring some water from the river. With 
this he washed the blood from his hands and 
sprinkling the earth with the bloody water, the 
Sahaptins sprang from the ground. 
In the legend of the seasons the coyote figures 
again. Heat and cold are beings. A long time 
ago the cold and heat met in their clouds and 
a great battle ensued. Heat drove cold back for 
a time, but he came again and this time he was 
successful and overcame his rival. Then they 
gave the contest over to their children. Each 
had five sons. These met and fought the battle 
out. The sons of the cold slew all of heat’s 
sons, but there remained a daughter who was 
pregnant. This daughter hurried back south and 
lived in a tepee until her child was born. She 
told him that the sons of cold were his enemies 
and he should live only to kill them. After 
many years he grew to be strong and power¬ 
ful. He journeyed north until he came to a 
great river where he met the grandsons of cold. 
They had the river covered with ice. A battle 
ensued. The grandparents, seeing the way things 
were going, took a hand in the fight. -The cold 
spread grease on the ice where the battle was 
being waged and this so angered the heat that 
he poured hot water on the ice and rotted it. 
The coyote, growing disgusted with the quarrel, 
took a hand and cut the throat of heat, saying: 
“It shall never be all cold or all hot, but there 
shall be some of each.” So the seasons were 
settled in that way. I have never found any¬ 
body who attempted an explanation of this 
legend. 
At last the time came for us to part. The 
iron steed came thundering up the valley, start¬ 
ling the Indian ponies and disturbing the peace¬ 
ful repose of the savages themselves. The rail¬ 
road brought settlers, whose houses soon began 
to crowd the Indian tepees along the river shore. 
The Government decided that the redmen were 
now able to care for themselves. We must part. 
I told them that I was going. They went about 
for some days, saying to each other, “Los Los 
Sikiptuat is going to leave. I regretted leav¬ 
ing almost as badly as they regretted hav¬ 
ing me leave. I had formed many warm and 
enduring friendships among them, friendships to 
which I now look back with fondness, for they 
were without guile. The last day came. They 
were all at the little station to see us off. We 
waved them a farewell from the rear platform 
of the coach, and I am free to confess that my 
eyes were so filled with tears that I could not 
see them as individuals, but only as a blurred 
mass of humanity, but I knew that the great 
heart of that people was beating for me. 
A Hunter’s Motor far. 
It is a fad of Baron Pierre de Crawhez to 
travel and shoot in countries where distances 
between habitations are far and comforts lack¬ 
ing, but his idea does not entail the giving up 
of such comforts, therefore he travels in the 
automobile shown in the illustration on page 
979. Popular mechanics say it is a large affair 
especially designed to meet his requirements, the 
chief of which is sufficient space for the carry¬ 
ing of all the little conveniences that life in the 
thickly populated centers of the world make al¬ 
most indispensable. 
