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Show 248 AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF of them the cause. Adams then related that he had been robbed of every thing he possessed by some of his men confederated with a number of my Indians, and that they had sent him off in the forlorn condition in which I now saw him. I asked him to describe the appearance of the Indians who took part in robbing him. " One of the party," said he, "was not an Indian, but a mulatto." " There was no mulatto when I left," I answered, "and you must be mistaken." '' No," he replied, '' I am not. You will find him there on your return." '' Well," said I, '' get up and return to the village with me; I will sift this matter to the bottom." He declined to accompany me. " They told me, if I returned," he urged, "that they would kill us all ; and I dare not go back." " Come with. me," I said. "If there is any killing to be done, I Will have a hand in it." He at length consented to return with me. On gainin? t:~e villa.ge, ~ rode up to my father's lodge, and said, How IS this? You allow white men to be robbed in the village, directly under your eyes! Do you wi~h to call down the vengeance of the great white chief upon the Crows? Do you wish them to be made poor and miserable, like the other tribes? Rave I not often told you of the immense number of white warriors ; that they were like the sand of the prairie-as the leaves of the forest?" · " Hold, my son ! I had nothing to do in the matter. !rf y he~rt was sorrowful when I heard of the crime. It was High Lance who committed it." "Then I will go and kill him, or be killed my- • JAMES P. BECKWOUR'l'H. 249 self," said I; and away I sped to the lodge of High Lance. "Go with him-go with him!" exclaimed my father to all my brothers and relatives around. "He is mad; go and protect him." I advanced to High Lance, who was standing at his lodge, who, on seeing me .approach, stepped in and shut his door. I dismounted, and tore his door down in an instant, and demanded of him what he had been doing. I remarked that his lodge was extremely well supplied with goods. "High Lance," said I, in an authoritative tone, "restore to these men their horses without one moment's delay." "I have taken no horses," said. he, sullenly. " Send for them in an instant," said I . By this time my Dog Soldiers, the bravest men in the nation, were surrounding me. "What does our chief want?'' demanded they. I told them that I wanted all the goods taken out of the lodge of High Lance, for that he had assisted to steal them from a white man, who was my friend. _ Instantly the lodge was hoisted, and torn into a thou-sand pieces, and High Lance, the mulatto, and eleven white men, were exposed to plain view. .I then accosted the mulatto: "What are you doing here, you black velvet-headed scoundrel? You come here in my absence to put the devil into the heads of the Indians, who are bad enough already? I will have your scalp torn off, you consummate villain ! " The poor fellow was frightened almost to death, and trembled in every joint. He replied, " The Crows gave me liberty to stay here and tr~p in their country, and-" L2 • |