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Show 288 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF withdrawn from you; by continuing in your obstinate ways, you will assuredly be rubbed out as a nation." The sacrifices that they offer on such occasions are curious. One sacrifice is made by shaving the manes and tails of some of their best war-horses, and painting on their bodies a rude delineation of the sun. They then turn them out, but never drive them away; and if they follow the other horses, it is a sure sign 1 hat the Great Spirit is following them also. I had become so sickened with their constant mourning, which was kept up through the whole village day and night, that I determined to take a small party and see if I could not change the face of affairs. Accordingly, I raised fifty warriors, and started for. the Cheyenne village, near the site of the present Fort Laramie. The first night we encamped on the SweetWater River. The morning ensuing was clear and cold, and we started across a plain twenty miles wide, with neither trees nor bushes in the whole distance. Across this plain was a mountain, which I wished to reach that night, in order to provide ourselves with fire-wood and have .a warm camp. When we had traversed this desert about midway, a storm came on, which is called by the mountaineers a Poo-der-ee. These storms have ~roved fatal to great numbers of trappers and Indians 1n and about the Rocky Mountains. They are composed of a violent descent of snow, hail, and rain, attended with high and piercing wind, and frequently ~ast three ?r four days. The storm prevented our seeIng the obJect for which we were directing our course. w.e all became saturated with the driving rain and hai~ and our clothing and robes were frozen stiff· still we kept moving, as we knew it would be certain death to pause on our weary course. The winds swept with JAMES P. BECKWOURTH. 289 irresistible violence across the desert prairie, and we could see no shelter to protect us from the freezing blast. Eventually we came to a large hole or gully, from eighteen to twenty feet deep, which had been made by the action of water. Into this place we all huddled, and were greatly protected from the wind. Being exhausted with our exertions, we wrapped ourselves as well as we could in our frozen robes, and lay down. How long we lay there I could form no idea. When I attempted to stir, it required the exercise •of all my strength to free myself from the mass of snow that had fallen upon me while asleep. I saw that if we tarried there it would be inevitable death to us all, and it was still storming furiously. I aroused my second in command, named "A Heap of Dogs," and told him that we must arouse ourselves and bestir our warriors, or we should all perish. "No," said he; "it is too pal.nful ; let us stay here and all die together." I told him that I should go at all risks, and made a spring thereupon, he laying himself down again. I had not proceeded much more than three hundred yards when I came upon a gulch, or dry creek, in which was a drift pile composed of a large accumulation of dry wood. I made an opening and crawled in; then striking fire, I got it well burning, and returned to my perishing warriors to relate my discovery. They arose and shook off the loose snow from their robes, and essayed to proceed. But many of them were so weak and stiffened·that they could but crawl along. After getting thawed and comfortably warmed before a blazing fire, I found there were two of our party missing. I returned with two or three others to search for them, and we had to dig away the snow to arrive at them; N |