FOREST AND STREAM. 
[APRIL 28, 1906. 















XXII.—A Wolverine’s Medicine. 
We camped with Weasel Tail, whose good 
woman spread out a number of new robes for 
our use. Visitors came and went, and we were 
called to several smokes at different places. In 
the latter part of the evening, after the feasting 
and visiting was over, Weasel Tail and Talks- 
with-the-buffalo, the two inseparables, and I 
were again together, as we had been on many 
a previous night. There were no three smokes 
and then the polite dismissal when we got to- 
gether, no matter which of us was host. We 
would sit together for hours, smoking when 
we felt like it, talking or idly silent, as the mood 
The women passed around some 
berry pemmican, which was fine. ‘Friend,” 
said Talks-with-the-buffalo, after we had eaten 
and the pipe was again filled and lighted, “I 
have a present for you.” 
Ah? Tireplied. Lan 
presents.” 
“Yes,” he continued, “and I will be glad to get 
rid of this. I want you to take it to-morrow 
morning, lest something happen that you never 
get the thing. It is a wolverine skin. Listen, 
and I will tell you what trouble it has caused 
me. First, as to the way I got it: One morn- 
ing my woman here told me to kill some big- 
horn; wanted their skins for a dress. I 
said that those an.mals were too difficult to get; 
that she ought to make her dress of antelope 
skins, which also makes fine soft leather when 
well tanned. But, no; they would not do; they 
were uneven, thick on the neck, too thin on the 
belly; nothing would do but bighorn skins, be- 
cause they were all of the right kind—neither 
thick, nor very thin in any place. I tried to 
get out of it by saying that if she must have 
them I would require her to go on the hunt 
with me, and help pack down what I killed. I 
thought that when I said this, she would make 
up her mind that antelope skins were good 
enough. I was mistaken. ‘Of course, I'll go 
with you, she said. ‘Let us start in the morn- 
struck us. 
always glad to -‘get 
she 
ing.’ 
“T made up my mind that I would pretend to 
be sick; but when I awoke in the morning I had 
forgotten all about the hunt, and after I had got 
up and washed, I ate a big meal. When I did 
remember, it was too late. I couldn’t get her to 
believe that I was sick, after making her broil 
meat twice. We started, and rode as far as our 
horses could carry us, up the north side of the 
west Sweetgrass Mountain; then we tied the 
animals and went on afoot. It was pretty steep 
climbing; in places the pines grew so closely 
together that we could hardly squeeze between 
them. My hunting partner was always behind. 
‘Come on; come on,’ I kept saying; and ‘Wait, 
wait for me,’ she was always calling, and when 
she caught up she would be breathing like a 
horse that has run a race, and sweat would 
just drip off her chin. ‘It is very pleasant, this 
bighorn hunting,’ I told her; and she said, “You 
speak the truth. Just look how high up we are, 
and how far we can see the plains away north- 
ward.’ 
“After that I did not tease her, because she had 
good courage, and did her best to climb. I 
traveled slower, and she kept close behind me. 
We approached the summit. The top of that 
mountain—you have seen it—is a mystery 
place. When Old Man made the world he 
painted the rocks he placed there with pretty 
colors, red, brown, yellow and white.* Some 
say that it is a lucky place to hunt; others, that 
if one kills anything there, he will have bad luck 
of some kind. I thought of this as I climbed, 
and at last I stopped and spoke to my woman. 
I told her that we had, perhaps, better go back 
on account of the bad luck we might have if I 
made a killing there. But she just laughed and 
laughed, and said that I was getting to be very 
foolish. 
“Well,” I said to her, ‘if you must laugh, do 
so with your hand over your mouth, else you 
will scare everything on this mountain.’ 
“We continued climbing, and in a little while 
came to the summit. Looking out at it from 
the cover of some pines, I saw a band of bighorn, 
maybe twenty or more, all she ones, and their 
young, except a two-year-old male. I took a 
careful aim at him—he was close by and stand- 
ing side to me—and as it was handy, I rested 
my gun ona limb of a tree. I took a very good 
aim, right for his heart, and fired. I don’t know 
where the bullet went, but I am sure that it 
never hit him, for we could find neither hair 
nor blood where he had stood nor along his 
trail. When I shot, the smoke hung like a 
little cloud before me, and when it blew away, 
I saw the animals, just as they disappeared into 
the timber down the slope. I was much sur- 
prised that I had not killed the animal, most 
surprised when I found that I had not even hit 
him, for I had aimed so long and so carefully. 
“*You must have hit him,’ said my woman. 
‘Let us look again. We will likely find him 
lying dead somewhere not far away.’ 
“We followed his trail for some distance down 
in the timber; it was easy to follow, for his 
track was Jarger than that of the others; but 
there was no sign at all that he was hurt. We 
climbed up on top again, and sat down at the 
edge of the bare rocks, in the shelter of a low 
pine. I thought that, if we stayed there a while 
some more bighorn might come along. But 
none appeared, although we sat and watched 
until long after the middle of the day. We were 


*Phey are porous burnt quartz, that seems to have been 
thrown up through a seam in the porphyry. 
about to leave, when a big wolverine appeared, 
walking among the rocks, smelling and snuf- 
fing, sometimes climbing up on top of a big 
rock to look all around. He looked very pretty, 
his hair just shining in the sun. He soon came 
near, and the next time he climbed upon a rock 
I shot him. He fell off it and hardly kicked. I 
told my woman to skin it carefully. I knew you 
would want it to go with those you got last 
winter. She said that she would tan it very 
soft, and we would make you a present of it. 
The bad luck began right there. She cut her 
hand—the knife slipped—before she had half 
got the hide off, and I had to finish the work. 
Then we started homeward. When we got to 
the horses I tied the skin behind my saddle 
and got astride. The horse had been standing 
with his head to the wind, and when I turned 
him he got the scent of the wolverine for the 
first time, and it frightened him so that he went 
crazy. He snorted and made a big high jump 
down the mountain, and when he struck, the 
jar threw me off, right on my back into a lot 
of stones. I thought I was broken in two. The 
horse went on, jumping and kicking, and snort- 
ing, right into a pile of big rocks, where he got 
caught by a foreleg, and broke it. As soon as I 
got my breath and could walk and my woman 
found my gun I had to go down and shoot him. 
We were late getting home, for we rode double 
on the’other horse, and had to hang on to my 
saddle and other things. One thing we had 
learned: It was bad luck to kill anything on 
the painted rocks. Maybe, if I had killed the 
sheep also, my back would have been really 
broken when I was thrown by the horse. 
“It was some days before I recovered from 
the soreness caused by my fall. My woman 
could not tan the wolverine skin on account of 
her sore hand, so she got a widow to do it. 
The next morning the old woman brought back 
the skin. “Take it,’ she said. ‘I have been sick 
all night, and in my dream a wolverine came and 
tried to bite me. It is bad medicine. I will not 
tan at. 
“You know old Beaver Woman? Yes? We 
gave the skin to her. She said that she wasn’t 
afraid of wolverines, that her medicine was 
stronger than theirs. Well, she took it to her 
lodge and went to work, fleshed it, put on the 
liver and brains, rolled it up and laid it away 
for two or three days. When it was well soaked 
with the mixture, she cleaned it and began to 
dry it, working it over the sinew cord, when 
she suddenly fell over dead for a short time. 
When she came to life her mouth was drawn 
around to one side and she could hardly speak. 
She was that way about four nights. Of course, 
the skin came back to us. The cut on my 
woman’s hand had healed, so she went to work 
and finished the tanning, and without any mis- 
hap. 
