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Show 192 THE CALIFORNIA AND OREGON TRAIL. tree, h e s t eal thily moved towards the wagons, as if he were approac hm. g a b a nd of buffalo. Eluding the vig. ilan.c e of the guard , w h o were probca bly half asleep, he met h1s mistress b•y appo·m tmen t a t the outskirts of the camp, mounted her on hrs •s pare h orse, an d made· off with her through the darkness. The sequeI o f tl 1e a d venture did not reach. our ears, . and we never I earne d I1 ow the l'mprudent fair one hked an lnd1an lodge for a dwelling, and a reckless trapper for a bridegroom. At length the Whirl wind and his warriors determined to move. They had resolved after all their preparations not to go to the rendezvous at La Bonte's camp, but to pass through the Black Hills and spend a few weeks in hunting the buffalo on the other side, until they had killed enough to furnish them with a stock of provisions and with hides to make their lodges for the next season. This done, they were to send out a small independent war-party against the enemy. Their final determination left us in some embarrassment. Should we go to La Bonte's camp, it was not impossible that the other villages should prove as vacillating and indecisive as the Whirl wind's, and that no assembly whatever would take place. Our old companion Reynal had conceived a liking for us, or rather for our biscuit and coffee, and for the occasional small presents which we made him. He was very anxious that we should go with the village which he himself intended to accompany. He declared he was certain that no Indians would meet at the rendezvous, and said moreover that it would be easy to convey our cart and baggage through the Black Hills. In saym· g th I' s, he told as usual an egregrious falsehood. Neither he nor any white man with us had ever seen the difficult and obscure defiles, through which the Indians intended to make their way. ILL-LUCK. 193 1 passed them afterward, and had much ado to force my distressed horse along the narrow ravines, and through chasms where daylight could scarcely penetrate. Our cart might as easily have been conveyed over the summit of Pike's Peak. Anticipating the difficulties and uncertainties of an attempt to visit the rendezvous, we recalled the old proverb, about 'A bird in the hand,' and decided to follow the village. Both camps, the Indians' and our own, broke up on the morning of the first of July. I was so weak that the aid of a potent auxiliary, a spoonful of whisky, swallowed at sbort in~ t€rvals, alone enabled me fD sit my hardy little mare Pauline, through the short journey of that day. For half a mile before us and half a mile behind, the prairie was covered far and wide with the moving throng of savages. The barren, broken plain stretched away to the right and left, and far in front rose the gloomy precipitous ridge of the Black Hills. We pushed forward to the head of the scattered column, passing the burdened travaux, the heavily laden pack-horses, the gaunt old women on foot, the gay young squaws on horseback, the restless chil~ dren running among the crowd, old men striding along in their white buffalo-robes, and groups of young warriors mounted on their best horses. Henry Chatillon, looking backward over the distant prairie, exclaimed sudden I y that a horseman was approaching, and in truth we could just discern a small black speck slowly moving over the face of a distant swell, like a fly creeping on a wall. It rapidly grew larger as it avproached. 'White man, I b'lieve,' said Henry; 'look how he ride ! Indian never ride that way. Yes; he got rifle on the saddle before him.' The horseman disappeared in a hollow of the prairie, but |