CHAPTER TEN.
THE RED-SKINS ATTEMPT TO ALARM US--SINGULARLY UNSUCCESSFUL--THE ENEMY ATLENGTH COMMENCE THE ASSAULT--WE BRAVELY DEFEND OUR CAMP--SAM DISCOVERSTHAT THEY ARE PAWNEES AND DACOTAHS--HIS DEVICE TO SEPARATE THEIRFORCES--DISCOVERS NOGGIN AMONG THEM DRESSED AS A CHIEF--THE ENEMYRETIRE--SAM'S EXPEDITION TO RESCUE NOGGIN, WHICH I ACCOMPANY--OURSUCCESS--MR. AND MRS. NOGGIN--HIS MAGNIFICENT APPEARANCE AS AN INDIANCHIEF--WE PUSH ONWARDS AND AT LENGTH REACH THE CAMP OF OUR FRIENDS THERAGGETS.
The red-skins knew that we were on the watch for them, and as they werenot likely to take us by surprise, they thought that they could terrifyus by their shrieks and hullabaloos. They did not know what we weremade of, or they would not have wasted their breath in that way. Two ofour scouts came hurrying in, the other two had, we feared, beensurprised and scalped by our enemies. We all stood to our arms in deadsilence, waiting the expected attack. Our Indian allies wanted to replyto the war-whoops of our foes, but we judged that as they outnumberedus, we should be much more likely to awe them if we remained in perfectsilence. Again and again, several times, those unearthly shrieks brokethe silence of the night. I own that they were terror-inspiring, and Iwas very glad each time when they ceased. It was nearly dawn when oncemore that hideous war-whoop was heard, and instantaneously the snow-cladground before us was covered with the dark forms of our foes, streamingout from the forest and climbing up the height towards us. The Raggets,Sam Short, Pipestick, and I took the lead in directing the defence, andwe were soon joined by old Waggum-winne-beg, who got up, in spite of hiswounds and weakness, to give us his assistance.
It was evident that our enemies had been reinforced, though it was stilltoo dark to count them with anything like accuracy. Indeed I don't,exaggerate when I say that our sight was not a little disturbed by theshowers of arrows which they sent among us. In spite of their numbers,we rather astonished them with the warm reception provided for theirentertainment. Old Short was in his element; calling some ten of theKioways round him, he was here and there and on every side of the campat the same moment, firing very rapidly and never throwing a shot away.He must have killed a dozen of our enemies in as many minutes. In abouttwenty minutes they seemed to have had enough of it, and rushed backunder shelter as rapidly as they had come out of it. The dawn appeared.The rising sun spread a ruddy glow over the field of snow alreadystained with the blood of the slain. We thought that our enemies wouldretire, but no. Without a moment's warning, on they rushed once more upthe height. This time our rifles told with more certain effect thaneven before; not a shot was thrown away, and the redskins fell thicklyaround us on every side.
"What are they about now? They seem to have some scheme in reserve," Iobserved to Obed. Scarcely had I spoken when some who had retired againcame forth, accompanied by a stout, sturdy-looking warrior, who,however, did not seem very anxious to advance. He held a rifle in hishand, which he fired every now and then as he advanced; but he was verylong in loading it, and each time his bullet whistled above our heads.His companions were too intent on the attack to observe this. Just thenwe were joined by old Sam Short. I pointed out the warrior to him.
"Why!" he exclaimed, "those fellows are Pawnees, the very villains fromwhom I escaped, and that seeming chief is no other than poor Noggin.Tell your fellows not to hurt him, and I will have a talk with himbefore long. If I can get him to draw off the Pawnees, we may easilysettle with the remainder of the Dacotahs, whom you have, I see, handledpretty severely already." Saying this, the old hunter disappeared amongthe tents, but speedily came back rigged out in the most fantasticfashion, holding a long staff in his hand literally covered with ragsand tatters, which as he held it aloft streamed in the wind. We,meantime, had been effectually keeping the enemy at bay. "I think thiswill do for the nonce," he exclaimed; "give them one volley more, andthen let me see what I can do."
We followed his advice, and the moment we ceased firing, while the enemywere still skipping about to avoid our shots, he rushed from among us,crying out, "Noggin, old friend, tell your fellows that the mightymedicine-man of all the Indians has come to get them out of a greatscrape, and that the sooner they take themselves away from this thebetter."
The Indians, astonished at his sudden appearance, hung back, and no oneattempted to attack him, as I fully expected they would have done.Noggin, on hearing the voice of his old friend, instantly called hiscompanions around him, we meantime taking care to reserve our fire forour old enemies the Dacotahs. Presently we saw the Pawnees drawing off,while the old hunter, indulging in all sorts of fantastic gestures, camehurrying back to the camp, no one attempting to stop him. I asked himwhy he had not brought his friend Noggin with him.
"Ah, he is an honest fellow," he answered. "He refused to come withoutMrs Noggin. The poor girl had trusted to him, had saved his life, andhe would not desert her. I honour him for it, but I do not despair ofseeing him and her yet. If he can induce her to come, he will bring heras soon as he can make his escape from her tribe. He has no wish tolive the life of a red-skin for the remainder of his days. It is mydesire, and I think it will be his, to join my fortunes to yours. Fromwhat I hear you are bound for California, and I should like to go andtry my luck in that country too. I may be of use to you, and you willafford me that companionship which I begin to feel the want of in my oldage. I have no fancy again to run the risk of being scalped or roasted,or having to lie down and die by myself like a worn-out old wolf, orother wild beast in the desert."
The Raggets and I expressed our satisfaction at the thoughts of havingso experienced a hunter as our companion, and that matter was settledoff-hand. The Dacotahs had retired when they saw the Pawnees drawingoff. They probably tried to ascertain the cause of this desertion.They made but one more very faint attack, and finding, as we supposed,that their chance of success was less than ever, finally retired out ofsight into the wood. We could not restrain our Indian allies fromrushing out to scalp the slain, though we warned them against surprise,and charged them not to touch the wounded; but I suspect they did notmuch heed our words. They came back with fully thirty scalps, sayingthat our bullets had made such sure work, that every one was killedoutright. As the day drew on, we were more and more convinced that ourenemies had had enough of it. We sent out our scouts, who felt theirway cautiously, following their trails. The chief body of the Dacotahshad gone off to the north and east, while the Pawnees had taken thedirection of the north-west. The latter had retired with deliberationand order, while the former had made a hurried retreat. A little laterin the day a scout came in, saving that the Pawnees had halted aboutfive miles off.
"Then I know the reason why," observed Short. "Noggin has persuadedthem to halt, and, depend on it, he will try to escape with his wife.If some of you would aid me, I should like to go and meet him, to helphim along."
Obed and I and John Pipestick agreed to accompany him, with four of ourIndian allies. As soon as it was dusk we set off on our expedition. Wecrept cautiously along from the very fist in Indian file, the scout whohad discovered the trail leading, and Short going next. Indeed, the manwho wishes to keep the scalp on his head cannot be too cautious when inthe Indian country, and with enemies in the neighbourhood. Not a wordwas spoken, scarcely a sound was heard, while we kept our riflestrailing by our sides, ready for use at a moment's notice. We could nottell, of course, whether the Dacotahs or Pawnees might not have taken itinto their heads to come back and attack us, or, at all events, mightnot have left some scouts to watch our proceedings. We went on thus,till the sounds of drums beating, bones rattling, keeping time to thevoices of human beings, creating a most unpleasant sort of music, warnedus that we were in the neighbourhood of the Pawnee camp. It wasdifficult to say when Noggin might take the opportunity of slippingaway. It might be at once, while all the noise was going forward, or itmight not be till the inhabitants of the camp were asleep. So we allsat down and watched in silence.
It was agreed that Short should go forward and meet hi
s friend, so asnot to alarm him. I must own that I had fallen asleep, and was dreamingof old England and my comfortable arm-chair, when I was awoke by findingmy companions rising and beginning to move on at a rapid rate--I was sosleepy that I could not tell where. On we went, no one speaking,following each other as before, so I judged that it would be wise not tospeak either.
It was still very dark, all I could do was to see the person immediatelypreceding me. On, on, we went: at last we began to go up hill, and Ifound that we were approaching our own camp. The light of our fires wasshining brightly from it. Obed answered with a cheerful voice to thechallenge of our sentinels, and as we entered our stockade I found, forthe first time, that our party was increased by two persons. One washabited in the full costume of a red-skin chief, and a bigcommanding-looking fellow he was; the other was an Indian squaw; she wasa fine but modest girl, and she seemed to shrink back with true femininetimidity from the gaze of so many strangers. To my surprise I foundthat the handsome chief, who decidedly would have created a greatsensation in any London drawing-room, and, perhaps, have won the heartsof half a dozen young ladies, and persuaded them to settle down as themistress of his faithful retainers in his extensive territories in theFar West, was no other than Tom Noggin, whose adventures I had just beenhearing. I do not know what sort of an orator Tom might have made as anIndian, his English vernacular was not of the choicest.
"I wish some-on you chaps would get this young woman of mine stowed awaywith some of her own kind among the Indians, they'll know her, andcomfort her a bit, poor thing," quoth Tom. The words and tone werereally kind and kindly meant, but they sounded odd as coming from thelips of a full-fledged red-skin warrior. Noggin at once fell into oldShort's plan, and having all laid down to take some rest, we packed upour traps and were once more on the move. We accompanied thekind-hearted Ottoes three days further on their road till theyconsidered themselves out of the reach of their enemies. Had I pressedJohn Pipestick I believe he would have brought his wives and joined ourparty, but I did not altogether admire the young gentleman's notions onthings in general, so I kept silent on the matter. I had anaffectionate parting from old Waggum-winne-beg, who once more pressedhis beautiful Firefly on me; but my heart was proof against even herbrilliant attractions. The young lady pouted a little when I wished hergood-bye, and, I have no doubt, thought me a man of very bad taste.Once more our course was turned towards the West. With a good supply ofammunition, little baggage, and forming as we did a band of practisedhunters and backwoodsmen, together with a body of faithful allies, wehad no fear as to the result of an attack which any Indians mightventure to make on us, provided we exercised all necessary precaution inour advance.
More than once we were aware that Indians were on our trail, or hoveringround our camp; but when they ascertained the state of preparation wewere in, being assured that they would have to buy victory, if they gotit at all, at a very dear rate, they thought it wiser not to attack us.We expected to have been pursued by the Pawnees, but for some reason orother they did not seem to wish to get back Noggin or his wife. Theyfollowed us, however, and ten days afterwards two of them made theirappearance in our camp. We watched them narrowly, for they are thievishfellows, and would have stolen anything they could have laid hands on.They came, they said, to bring a message from their chief to hisdaughter, which, as far as we could make out, was equivalent to hisblessing; telling her at the same time that as she had chosen to marry awhite man, she must follow his fortunes for the future, and not look tothe red men for support. The young lady replied that she was perfectlycontented with her choice, and had no intention of going home again.Short all the time kept out of sight of the Pawnees, for he thought hisappearance would not fail to enrage them he advised us, however, tofollow theirs trail as they went away, to ascertain in what directionthey were going, and to assure ourselves that they were not plottingsome piece of treachery. We found, however, that they went right awayto the north-east, and were not likely to trouble us any more. Wetravelled steadily on, making good twenty miles a day at least.
The instant we arrived at a wood or other fit place for camping, somecollected wood and lighted fires, others tore down strips of bark andbranches of trees to form wigwams, while the sportsmen ranged round tolook out for game, and the scouts explored the neighbourhood toascertain that no enemies were lurking near. Mrs Noggin made herselfvery useful in cooking our provisions, and her husband and Short helpedher. The latter had not yet recovered from his long run and theexertions he had made to free himself, and it seemed wonderful that heshould be able to support the fatigue of travelling as well as he did.Altogether, we led a very pleasant life; but I was not sorry, I own, tosee in the distance the stockade in which my old friends the Raggets,and two or three other families who had associated themselves with them,had passed the winter. We arrived just in time before the frost brokeup. After that, till the warm dry weather began, travelling would havebeen very difficult. Our friends were very glad to see us all backagain safe, and gave a hearty welcome to old Short and to Noggin and hiswife. They were not people to turn up their noses at a red-skin. Withall due respect to my white friends, Mrs Noggin appeared to greatadvantage alongside them. She was a very well-mannered, amiable, kind,sweet young woman, and though some of her ways were not just quite whata refined Englishman would admire, I do not think friend Noggin objectedto them, and they seemed as happy as possible.
We had altogether not an unpleasant time in the stockade, and we hadplenty of work in repairing the wagons and tents, and in making otherpreparations for our further progress through the wild passes of theSnowy Mountains. The travelling, barring the attacks from thered-skins, had hitherto been easy; we were now to enter on a region wildand rugged in the extreme, where we should have to encounter dangersinnumerable from grizzly bears, avalanches, mountain torrents, and steepprecipices, added to those we had already gone through. However, theircontemplation in no way daunted any of our party. From old Mr Ragget'sforethought and judgment, he had amply supplied his camp with provisionsbefore the winter set in, and the same qualities he was now exerting inmaking preparations for our journey. We thus avoided many of thedisasters and miseries from which so many parties of emigrants sufferedproceeding over the same route in following years.
Dick Onslow Among the Redskins Page 10
