Seizer of eagles

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o

Chapter II

M y mother looked from them to me, and I said to them : “ Enemies or not, we must go! I have to go! And, somehow, it is given me to feel that we shall survive the dangers and in good time enter the camp of the South People.’’

“As he says, so do we,” my mother told the chiefs.

“I am old; it matters not how soon I go to the Sand Hills,” said my grandmother.

And at that the chiefs turned angrily away. Eagle Ribs saying to us over his shoulder: “Well, we have warned you ; it will be by no fault of ours that you all die, somewhere out there!”

We went inside and had a hurried meal, then down came our lodge, and many women friends helped my mother saddle and pack the horses. My young friends surrounded me, wondering how I could have the heart to part from them. Came more men and advised me to give up all thought 25 of going south until such time as the tribe would go to camp and hunt with the Pikuni, several moons later on. I told them, as I had the chiefs, that I could not wait; that I felt an urge to go, and must obey it. Our three pack-horses were soon loaded ; the poles of our little lodge were lashed to the saddle sides; then we three mounted each one slow old animal and I took the lead. As we drew out from camp, my grandmother cried so pitifully that all the camp dogs mourned with her; not until we were far out upon the plain did she dry her tears. All that time I kept watching my mother; her eyes were shining and there was a smile upon her lips. I heard her murmur: ‘‘At last! At last I am to rejoin my very own people!”

It was not long after noon of that day when we topped a low ridge and looked down into the valley of Many Dead Chiefs River, the southernmost of the streams that flow north into the Always- Winter land. Up and down the sparsely timbered valley as far as we could see, and beyond it up the long slope of Little River Ridge, were countless 26 bands and herds of buffalo and antelope resting, grazing, and others going to and from the water.

We brought our horses to a stand and watched them for a time, and my mother said to me: “If we go on across the river they will run from us in all directions, and so bring down upon us any enemies that may be in hiding hereabout. ”

“We are not going on,” I told her. “We will follow down this coulee to the river and cache ourselves in the willows until night.”

The coulee headed right where we stood ; we rode into it, and down it to the water without frightening any of the game, and there, after watering our animals, we unpacked them and picketed them in the high, thick brush, and rested and slept until sundown. We then ate some pemmican, packed up and forded the river, and drew out of the valley, leaving the mountain trail of our people and heading southeast. There was no moon; band after band of buffalo that we could not see went rushing out of our way with great thunder and rattle of hooves. We did not care; no enemies could see the 27 cause of the commotion. The gentle night wind was heavy with the odor of new-growing sage and greasewood crushed by the hooves of the fleeing game ; it was very pleasant in our nostrils.

Said my mother; “Oh, how I love it, that strong, crushed-weeds odor! It makes me light-hearted; I just want to sing of my happiness, sing as loud as I can!’’

“Oh, do so! Our enemies out there in the darkness will be so glad to hear you!” my grandmother scolded.

And just then, close on our right, a lone wolf began to howl, and others, near and far and all around, took up his cry. Long and loud and deep they howled. “I do not need to sing; they sing for me,” said my mother. Oh, how we loved it, the howling of the wolves! It was thus that they talked with one another. There have been times when I felt that I was almost on the point of understanding what they said.

All through the night we plied our quirts and kept our slow old animals on a trot. We early 28 crossed the North Fork of Little River, then its South Fork, these the northernmost waters of Big River (the Missouri), and at the edge of the last one we got down and drank.

Then my mother laughed happily and said to me: “There, my son! We have drunk from one of our very own streams! Oh, how I love it, and all those other streams of our Pikuni country, away off there to the south! Beautiful streams in beautiful wooded valleys. Valleys rich with berries in summer, and in winter warmly sheltering the people from Cold-Maker’s winds and storms. How much more pleasant is our country than the North country of the Kaina and the Siksika!”

My grandmother snorted. “Ha! What nothingtalk that is!” she cried. We did not answer her. “And anyhow,” she went on, “this South country belongs to us Kaina, and the Siksika, just as much as it does to the Pikuni.”

“Yes, that is true, but I notice that the Kaina and the Siksika camp in the North the most of the time, leaving the Pikuni to fight alone the Crows, 29

Assiniboincii, and other enemies who would take this rich South country from us/’ my mother told her. And to that she could make no reply.

Soon after daylight we struck Cutbank River, just above its walled canyon in the prairie, and made camp in a grove of cottonwoods and willows. As soon as we had taken the loads off the horses, I drove them to water, and in a sandbar running out into the stream I came upon the fresh tracks of a war party of twenty or more men. In the wet, hard sand at the edge of the water were the imprints of their hands and knees where they had sprawled out to drink, and from there they had gone on up the valley. My heart beat fast as I stared at the timber upstream, and at the slopes of the valley as far up as I could see them. Not a head of any kind of game was in sight. I feared that the enemy might be in hiding for the day close to us. I hurried the horses back into the timber, and told the women what I had found, and they were so frightened that for once even my grandmother was speechless. We resaddled and repacked the horses 30 in no time, and mounting, and plying our quirts with all our strength, rode out of that timber on the jump, the dragging lodge-poles filling the valley with the noise of their rattling. Across the river we went with great splashings, and out over the open bottom and up the slope to the edge of the plain, and there made a halt and looked back. Right where I had watered the horses the enemy were lined along the sandbar, staring up at us, and as we came to a stand they let off their guns and some of the balls thudded into the ground very close to us; and then they let out loud, mocking yells, and we lashed our horses and got out of their sight and kept going as fast as we could off across the plain.

On a high ridge midway between Cutbank and the Two Medicine Lodges River we let our sweatwet horses rest, and looked back at the trail that we had made, and saw that the enemy were not following us. We remained there a long time and made sure of that, and talked about our narrow escape from them, and gave thanks to Sun for it.

I said then, and I believe to this day, that Sun led me to that sandbar and those enemy tracks in it. There they were, those twenty and more men, hiding close by — up the river a little way; had I watered the horses below the sandbar — well, we should never have left that timber, for that was the one place in a long shore-line that revealed the enemy tracks; above and below, slopes of coarse stones and large rocks ran down into the stream; even a passing herd of buffalo would have left no trail in them.

We went on as soon as our horses were rested, and at noon struck the Two Medicine Lodges River, so named because, in a summer in the long ago, the Pikuni and the Kaina each built a lodge to Sun in its lower valley. We made camp beside the river in a long, wide, timberless bottom, and after watering the horses, we picketed them close by, removing their packs, but not the saddles. Here we felt fairly safe. Enemies could not possibly sneak in upon us; if any came in sight, we should have plenty of time to pack up and make our escape. With flint and steel my mother made a fire with dry driftwood that my grandmother brought from the river slope, and then, opening one of our parfleches, she got out some dried buffalo meat and roasted it for us.

As soon as we finished eating, my mother ordered grandmother and me to lie down and sleep while she kept watch on the country. I made her promise to awake me in the middle of the afternoon, so that she could have some sleep, and so be fresh for the long night ride that we were to make. She did not keep her word ; Sun was not far above the mountains when she called me. I sat up and scolded her, but she just laughed and was herself asleep before I finished. My grandmother slept on.

We had but one dog, a big, wolflike female that had lost her newborn pups a few nights back; she had gone away from camp to have them, and we thought it likely that while she was out from her hole hunting food, coyotes, or perhaps a lynx, had killed them. Now, as I sat there on the edge of the river-bank and watched all up and down the valley, 33

I saw that Sinuski (Striped Face) as I called her, was very uneasy; she kept thrusting up her head and sniffing the west wind — blowing fairly strong — and now and then mournfully whining. That made me uneasy; suspicious that danger of some kind threatened us. But look as I would, I could see nothing alarming. Every part of the grassy bottom stretching away up to the far timber was in view, and there was no living thing upon it. Midway between me and the timber, however, there was a small, breast-high patch of rose-brush on the slope of the river-bank, and I decided that in it was whatever was making the dog so restless. ‘‘Sinus'ki!” I hissed to her. “Sinus'ki! What is it up there.? Go take it!” I spatted my hands together and she was gone ; never had I seen her run so fast ; behind her rose a smoky trail of fine dust. I sprang up and fitted an arrow to my bow and called to the women; they came out of their sleep with a quick spring and we all ran to the horses; as we began untieing their picket ropes, we saw Sinuski leap into the rose-brush. No enemy sprang 34 out from it; we heard no outcry; the brush quivered where the dog made her way into it. Ropes in hand, we just stood and stared; stared curiously; fear had left us. And then, soon, we saw the dog come out from the brush with something lightcolored drooping from her mouth. It was something alive, we could see it wiggle ; she came trotting toward us, head held high, and presently my mother cried out that it was a wolf pup that she brought. So it was. A fuzzy, gray-white wolf pup. Straight to me she came and dropped it sprawling at my feet, then rose up whining, placed her forepaws upon my shoulders and licked my face, and her eyes begged me to have pity for her find.

^‘Yes, Sinuski! Yes. It shall be your wolf pup and mine,” I told her, and stooped and stroked the little one’s head and back. It didn’t try to flinch from me, nor bite. It feebly wagged its tail; it was very gaunt, as though it had had no milk for some days back. We wondered how its mother could have lost it. Sinuski lay down beside it and nuzzled 35 it to her; it seized one of her swollen teats and drank thirstily with a loud sucking noise.

We repicketed the horses and the women lay down and were soon sleeping again. I took up the wolf pup and carried it to the river-bank, Sinuski close at my heels. There I gave it back to her, and after taking more milk it went to sleep at her side. Pleased I was that she had found it, for I had often wished for a young wolf for a pet. I considered a name for it, and, as it was a male, decided to call it Nipokana, or, for short, just Nipoka. Little did I think that day, as I sat there watching it in its heavy, full-fed sleep, that it was to be my great helper, protector of my life, in time to come.

Near sunset I aroused the women, and we ate more of our dried food, then packed up, and, crossing the river, and climbing the south slope, rode eastward along the ridge dividing the Two Medicine Lodges and Badger River valleys. Then we crossed the latter stream, and at midnight forded Birch Creek. There we rested for a time, and I got die wolf pup out of the sack in which I was carrying it, and let Sinuski nurse it.

Bear River begins where Cutbank River runs into the waters of Two Medicine Lodges, Badger, and Birch Creek Rivers. When daylight came, we were out on the plain straight south of the head of the river, and at sunrise we rode down into its valley at a place we called Apukwitsipeska: Wide Willow Flat. No game of any kind was in sight, and in all the trails in the bottom were numerous horse tracks and dog tracks, sure signs that a big camp of people was not far off. Of course they could be no other than the Pikuni. ‘‘Oh, we shall soon be with them, our very own people!” my mother said, half-laughing and half-crying, and in a voice all trembly she began to sing and I sang with her.

Twice we forded the river, and then came into a great bottom, the third one below Apukwitsipeska, and there, at its lower end, was the great camp of the Pikuni, hundreds and hundreds of lodges. The great herds of horses, thousands of head, had 37 been driven in to water, those needed for the day had been caught, and the rest were now stringing their way out of the valley again to graze upon the plain. Far as the camp was from us, we could hear its droning, humming noise like a great swarm of bees, the talking, laughing, singing of men and women, shouting of children, barking of dogs, impatient neighing of tethered horses. How we hurried then, close-herding our pack-animals along to keep them from joining the outgoing herds. We passed into the great circle of the camp, people greeting us on all sides. Straight through it we went to its east side and the more than two hundred lodges of the Small Robes clan, our own clan. We passed the huge, double lodge of Lone Walker, chief of our clan and chief, too, of the tribe. He was a great man; the greatest warrior, the wisest, most kind-hearted chief of all those of the three tribes of us plains people.

And now women here and there began to cry out : “Here is Deer Woman, come back to us, and with her is Little Otter, her son!’* None of them, how- 38 ever, paid any attention to my grandmother, riding in our rear. They came crowding around us, all talking at once, as we drew up before the doorway of Heavy Runner’s lodge, he who was my mother’s elder brother — my uncle. His women came hurrying out and embraced us as we slid from our horses. We went inside and my mother ran across the lodge and knelt and threw her arms around my uncle and kissed him, and cried. He stroked her hair and said to her — and his voice was a little trembly: “There! There! Don’t cry, sister. lam so glad that you have returned to us, you and Little Otter. How he has grown! This is a good day; let us be happy in it.”

My mother soon dried her tears and sat leaning against him, and he said tome: “Yes! How you have grown, nephew mine! You are almost a man! No doubt you have begun to hunt — to keep your mother well supplied with meat and skins? And now you will soon be taking your sacred fast?”

“Oh, I am proud of him! He is a good hunter!” my mother cried.

want to be a seizer of eagles,” I told him. ‘‘Those Kaina Sun priests — seizers of eagles — would not help me. Will you help me, uncle? I want to seize many of the far-blue flyers now, this very summer!”

My grandmother had come in and seated herself near the doorway: “Hal” she snorted. “He is still crazy! Heavy Runner, I can do nothing with this boy; tiy you to put some sense in his head!”

My uncle laughed. “I like your talk,” he said to me. “It is good for the young to desire to do great things. In time to come, no doubt you will be a seizer of eagles. But now you have to endure your sacred fast. Then, having obtained your vision, you must go to war, many, many times. You must sit often with the Sun priests, listening to their wise talk, and you must yourself pray and make sacrifice to the gods. So doing, maybe by the time you have seen thirty or thirty-five winters, you can become a seizer of eagles.”

By the time he had finished speaking, my heart was just about dead. I had been so sure that my 40 uncle would help me to do what I wanted to do at once, and now he, just as the Kaina men had done, declared that only in far-oflF summers to come could I become a seizer of eagles ! I gave him no answer, but I said to myself: ‘‘All hopes and plans come to nothing; may as well give up all thought of becoming a seizer of eagles!” Yes, I felt very, very sad.

My mother and grandmother went out to unload the horses, and set up our little lodge. Some men came in to visit and smoke with my uncle, and I replied shortly to their requests for news of the Kaina. I did tell, however, about the war party from which we had so narrowly escaped, and before I had quite finished, my uncle and his guests were hurrying from the lodge and shouting to the Ikunuhkahtsi ^ to bring in their fast horses and sad-

^ I-kun-uh-kah-tsi: All Friends. The society of warriors. It comprised twelve different bands: Little Birds, Pigeons, Mosquitoes, Braves, All Crazy Dogs, Raven Carriers, Dogs, Tails, Homs, Kit Foxes, Seizers, Bulls. Of these, the Little Birds was the band which the youths first joined. The Braves, comprising great warriors, was the greatest of the bands. The Bulls was the very old men’s band.

die them, and go in search of the enemy. A great roar of excitement arose in the camp; men were everywhere calling to their young herders to run in the herds; women began loudly to call upon Sun to protect their loved ones in the coming fight; children cried and dogs howled. I went outside and watched the warriors assemble, and. then, when Lone Bull, our war chief, gave the word, go charging westward out from camp, singing at the top of their voices our tribal song of battle. Dressed all of them in their war clothes and war bonnets, and with shields uncased, they were a heart-stirring sight as they rode away. Watching them, I for the time forgot my trouble. And then, when they had gone out of sight over the rim of the plain, it all came back; though Sun was shining in a clear sky, the day was black — all was black to me.

Our lodge was set up. I called Sinuski to follow me inside, took the wolf pup from its sack, and gave it to her to nurse. My mother came in with food that my aunts had given her, pemmican, dried 42 service berries, a set of roasted hump ribs from a cow buffalo, and she put some of it all before me, but I could not eat. Some women came in and began to chatter; then some boys came to visit with me. I could n’t talk with them. I took up the pup and went out, Sinuski at my heels, and climbed the valley slope and sat down on the rim of the plain. Sinuski whined for the pup. I let her have it, and lay down and slept.

The low growling of the dog awoke me, and opening my eyes I saw that the day was gone; Sun had just trailed down behind the mountains. I sat up; an old man was approaching me, climbing slowly up the slope. He paused and raised his head and I saw that he was Red Wings, my mother’s uncle. He was a great Sun priest, owner of the sacred Thunder Pipe.

^^Ha! Here you are!” he said, as he came on, and seated himself at my side. “Your mother said that I should find you here, and that you are very low-hearted. I come to lift your load of sadness.”

^‘Show me how I may become a seizer of eagles, right now in the moons of this summer, and the load will be lifted,” I shortly — and no doubt crossly — answered.

“Now, now, my son, be calm, think gently, speak gently; the gods know your thoughts, hear your words. Always bear that in mind,” he said.

“They all say, the Kaina Sun priests, and my uncle, down there in camp, that many, many more summers must pass, and that I must myself become a Sun priest, before I even think about seizing eagles.”

He did not answer that at once, and I said to myself that I would get no help from him. I turned my back to him and watched the pup, heavy with the milk it had taken, sprawling all over Sinuski and playfully biting her, and I wished that I was as happy as he.

Then the old man began to speak, at first more to himself than to me: “As I see it, the doing of sacred things need not depend upon one’s age ; it is only that the young are not of serious mind. 44

Youths give but little thought to the gods; all that they think about, all that they care for is a good time; dancing; in fine clothes strutting around where the girls can see them; gambling; trapping, not for furs to wear, but wherewith to buy from the traders mirrors to hang from their wrists; bright paints for their faces ; fancy cloths for shirts. Now, if a youth would abstain from all this ~ if he would from the very beginning be of thoughtful mind, seek constantly knowledge of the gods and pray for their help—

He ceased speaking, stared absently at the ground, and after a long wait I cried out: “You mean, then — ”

“I mean this,” he broke in, with a loud spat of his hands: “Young though you are, it is possible that you may soon become a seizer of eagles if you will follow the trail that I mark out.”

“Never once shall I step out of it!” I agreed.

“Good! You must, then, at once endure your sacred fast,” he said.

“And after I have done that, what next?”

“I shall not tell you now. It is best that you think of but one thing at a time,” he answered.

I took up the pup, and we started down the slope, I so encouraged, so happy that it was hard for me to keep at the old man’s side. I wanted to sing; to dance my way home to my mother and tell her what Red Wings was to do for me.

When we entered the great circle of the lodges, the camp crier was making the round of them, pausing often to shout: “Listen! Listen, all you people, thus say your chiefs: ‘To-morrow morning camp is to be broken. We shall move up Two Medicine Lodges River to the mountains, where all who need new lodge-poles may cut them.’ ”

This first moon of summer, the New Grass moon, was also called, in that long ago time. New Lodges moon, for it was at this season that the women, after tanning many cow buffalo hides — making soft, white leather of them — now cut them to proper shape and sewed them together, making new lodge-skins, and, of course, new lodge-poles were required for them.

Said Red Wings to me, as we parted in front of his lodge: “This does please me, my son! The Two Medicine Lodges mountains are very Sun favored! I would rather you endure your fast there than in any other place in all our great country!’’

Chapter III

I HAD thought the Kaina a rich and powerful tribe, but when, the next morning, I saw the Pikuni strung out upon the trail to the west, I learned that the Kaina were nothing compared to these my mother’s and my very own people. I saw that the Pikuni was by far the largest of the Blackfeet tribes; that the men and women and children were all of them beautifully clothed; that their horse herds were as numerous as the grass of the plains, and that the animals in use carried all of them fine pack-saddles and riding-saddles with cruppers, breechings, and saddle-cloths all glittering with quill-work and bead-work of fine patterns, and colors of Old Man’s Lariat itself! I saw, too, that the men were better armed than those of the Kaina, and more alert; they rode their powerful, prancing horses with perfect ease, and with eager eyes kept watch upon the country, hoping always to discover a party of our enemies. At the head of the great caravan was our own clan, 48 the Small Robes, almost a tribe itself, and well in the lead of it rode Lone Walker with his under-chiefs and several Sun priests. I said to myself that some day, not far off, I myself would be riding with them.

Late in the afternoon of the second day out from Bear River, we made camp right in the mountains, at the foot of the lower one of the lakes of Two Medicine Lodges River. By the time night came, the women had the lodges up, wood and water at hand, and were cooking over their little fires. My mother was about to set food before me when Red Wings sent for me to feast with him, and I went to his lodge, a fine one of twenty-four skins, so more than large enough for himself, his four women, and a widowed daughter and her children. All around, inside, the lodge was lined with a band of beautifully painted leather, fastened to the poles and extending well above one’s head when standing. In the spaces between the couches were piled numbers of shiny parfleches, painted with red and blue and green and yellow designs, and filled with the 49 dried meats and pemmican, and clothing and various belor^gings of the family. With the setting of Sun, the old man’s sits-beside-him wife had brought in his Thunder Pipe, from the tripod behind the lodge to which it was fastened during the day, and it was now, in its many wrappings, tied to the lodge-poles just over his head, along with the several ancient, painted and fringed rawhide pouches containing his sacred paints, perfumes, and other things used in the ceremony of the pipe. I had never seen the pipe, but had heard of its wonderful power, and now, as I took my seat upon the couch at the old man’s left, I looked up at the roll with great respect and silently prayed: “Hai-yu! Ancient Thunder Pipe! Pity poor me!”

‘‘Well, here we are in this place favored by Sun! My boy, are you still minded to do in all things as I advise?” the old man said to me.

“Yes! Yes! No matter how hard your trail, I shall follow it,” I answered.

And as he nodded his head in approval, the women clapped their hands, and one said to the SO others: ‘^Sisters, we are going to be proud of our young Kaina relative!’’