South from Hudson Bay: An Adventure and Mystery Story for Boys

by Ethel C. Brill

  XXXII TO THE SHEYENNE RIVER

  When Neil went in pursuit of the frightened pony, he found it feeding onthe prairie grass on the other side of the ridge. Hindered by the cart,it had not run far. He had righted the badly wrecked vehicle, and wasexamining the breaks, when the rest of his party, with the other cart andthe lame pony, came up. Mr. Perier was appalled when he heard of hischildren's peril, and Mrs. Brabant was warm in her praise of the courageand coolness of Elise and Walter.

  The hunt had swept away towards the Red River, leaving the trampledprairie dotted with the dark bodies of the fallen buffalo. Here and therea wounded beast struggled to its feet and made off painfully. The sightof the injured and slain was not a pleasant one for the tender-heartedElise, and she turned her back upon it.

  "I wish," she confided to Mrs. Brabant, "people didn't have to killthings for food. I hate buffalo. They are ugly beasts. But I don't liketo see them killed, except the one that would have killed Max. Of courseWalter had to shoot that one."

  The Canadian woman put an arm around her and comforted her. "It isnecessary, my dear, for people to have meat to live, especially in thiswild country where we raise so little from the ground. I have always toldmy boys not to be wasteful in their hunting, not to kill for the sake ofkilling. If no one killed more than could be eaten or kept for food,there would always be plenty of animals in the world."

  As the carts descended the slope to the hunting ground, the hunters beganto straggle back from the chase. By the place where the animal lay, thespot where the bullet had entered, and sometimes by the bullet itself,they identified the game they had slain. Many of the hunters had markedtheir bullets so they would know them.

  Neil had killed two buffalo and Louis four. Their party was well suppliedwith meat. The bull Walter had shot was too old and tough for food. Atthat season of the year the skin was not fit for a robe. The summer coatof hair was short, and in many places ragged and rubbed off. But Louissaid that the tough hide was just the thing for new harness. WithWalter's permission the Canadian boy set to work. With sure and skilfulstrokes of his sharp knife, he marked out the harness on the body of thebuffalo, and stripped off the pieces. When dry,--with a thong or two inplace of buckles,--the harness would be ready for use.

  One by one the carts returned to camp loaded with meat and hides. Thoughof no use for robes, the short haired summer skins were in the very bestcondition for tanning. Buffalo leather was used by the _bois brules_ fortents, cart covers, and other purposes.

  The choicest cuts were soon broiling over the coals. At the same time therest of the meat was being prepared for pemmican making. It was cut intolarge lumps, then into thin slices, which were hung on lines in the hotsun or placed on scaffolds over slow fires. For the meat drying andpemmican making, the hunters prepared to remain in camp three days. Itwas a very busy time, yet a rest from traveling.

  The Brabant family and Neil knew just how to go about the work, but thePeriers and Walter, though willing and ready to help, had to be taught.After the buffalo strips were well dried, they were placed on hides andpounded with wooden flails or stones until the meat was a thick, flakypulp. In the meantime the fat and suet were melting to liquid in hugekettles. Hide bags were half filled with the flaked meat, the melted fatpoured in, the whole stirred with a long stick until thoroughly mixed,and the bags sewed up tight while still hot. So prepared, the pemmicanwould keep for months, even years, if not subjected to dampness or toohigh a temperature.

  The skins selected for tanning were stretched and staked down, and theflesh scraped off with an iron scraper or a piece of sharp-edged bone.When the hides had been well cleaned and partially cured by the sun, theywere folded and packed away in the carts to receive a final dressinglater.

  On the second day in camp a small body of Indians passed about a mileaway in pursuit of a herd of buffalo. A half dozen of the hunters, whowere out scouting, encountered some of the band. They reported that theIndians were Sioux, Yankton Dakota from farther west. They appearedfriendly enough. The hunting party felt no concern about them, except aspossible horse thieves. The men were especially careful that night to seethat every pony was safe within the circle of carts. The camp guards wereeven more alert than usual.

  There was feasting and jollity, as well as busy work, in the huntingcamp. The _bois brules_ always had time to fiddle and dance, to playgames and race their ponies over the prairie. Their capacity for freshmeat was enormous. Walter marveled at the quantity of buffalo tongues,humps, and ribs consumed. From dawn to dark, it seemed to him, there wasnever a moment when cooking and eating were not going on somewhere in thecamp. Even the lean dogs grew fat on what was thrown away and what theymanaged to steal. The wild creatures profited, too. The scene of the huntbeyond the low ridge was frequented, night and day, by birds of prey andwolves.

  With high expectations of further sport, the hunters resumed their marchto the south. They were not disappointed, for they were in true buffalocountry. The first time Walter joined in the chase, he was so excited andconfused by the wild ride across the prairie and the charge into the bandof stampeding beasts, that he could do nothing but cling to his horse andtry to avoid being thrown or trampled. It was not until the herd hadscattered and the worst of the wild confusion was over, that he managedto get a shot at one of the animals, and missed it. Mortified by hisfailure, he tried a different plan next time. He kept to the outskirts ofthe herd, singled out a young bull, pursued it, and brought it down.

  Though some of the hunters, like Louis, killed only what they could useand saved as much of the meat as possible, the majority of the _boisbrules_ were wasteful and improvident. They ran buffalo for the mereexcitement of the chase, killed for sport, and frequently took nothingbut the tongue, leaving the rest for the wolves and crows. Like whitehunters of a later period, they believed the herds of buffaloinexhaustible. Yet it did not take many years of unwise slaughter almostto exterminate the animals that, during the first half of the nineteenthcentury, roamed the prairies in hundreds of thousands.

  Sometimes the hunters had accidents. Men thrown from their horsessuffered severe sprains and broken bones. Occasionally too heavy a chargeof powder burst a gun. Raoul's old musket was ruined in this manner. Hecarried his left hand bandaged for weeks, and was lucky to lose no morethan the tip of his forefinger. There were many maimed hands among thehunters. Fortunately none of the injuries was fatal, though one man wasso badly hurt when he was thrown and trampled that he would never huntagain. The _bois brules_ were skilled in the rough and ready treatment ofwounds, sprains, and broken bones, but not over particular aboutcleanliness. Their open air life, however, helped most of the hurts toheal rapidly.

  Day after day the caravan made its slow and creaking way to the south.Now and then bands of Sioux, out on the summer hunt, were seen. SometimesIndians visited the camp, with no apparent unfriendly intentions. Thesavage blood in the Pembina half-breeds was mostly Cree and Ojibwa. Butthe hunting party was too large and well armed to fear hostility fromsmall, wandering bands of Sioux.

  Nevertheless the Pembina men had no intention of penetrating too far intoSioux country. They did not wish to provoke the tribes to unite againstthem. When camp was made one night on the bank of the Sheyenne River, thechief of the hunt announced that they would go south no farther. July hadcome. They had been out nearly four weeks. The carts were well loadedwith fresh and dried meat, fat, pemmican, and hides. On the morrow theywould turn, circling to the west a little, and, hunting as they went,make their way back to Pembina. They should reach the settlement early inAugust.

  This decision meant that if the Brabants and Periers were to go on to theSt. Peter and Mississippi rivers, they must part company with thehunters. That night Mr. Perier and the boys consulted with Lajimoniere,St. Antoine, and others who knew something of the country to the southand east. Lake Traverse, they were told, was only three or four days'march away. At the lake were traders who would doubtless help them ontheir
journey.

  Some of the hunters shook their heads at the idea of such a small partytraveling alone sixty or seventy miles across Dakota country. There wouldbe grave danger in the attempt, they said, and advised against it. ButMr. Perier, Walter, and Louis had not come so far merely to turn back toPembina. They were bound for the Mississippi and intended to reach itsomehow. They might have hesitated to travel alone farther to thesouthwest, but everyone said that the route to the southeast was lessdangerous. The Indians who visited Lake Traverse were in the habit ofdealing with traders.

  In truth the hunters had neither seen nor heard sign of trouble anywhere.The Indians they had encountered had seemed inoffensive enough. The boyshad rather lost their awe of the dread Sioux. They were beginning tobelieve that the tales of the fierceness and cruelty of those savageswere greatly exaggerated. As Neil expressed it, "Most of that sort oftalk is just an excuse for Saulteur and half-breed cowardice. They havemade bogies of the Sioux. I can't see that they are different from anyother Indians. I don't believe they dare molest white men."

  The always hopeful Mr. Perier was quite sure there would be no difficultyin reaching Traverse. "We are not enemy Indians raiding the Siouxcountry," he argued. "We are peaceable white settlers going about our ownaffairs. Probably we shall meet no Indians at all. If we do, we willtreat them in a polite and friendly manner. They are reasonable humanbeings just like ourselves. They have no reason to harm us and I don'tbelieve they will try to."

  "We will take care to avoid them anyway," added Louis, not quite so sureof Sioux reasonableness, but eager to go on.

  Louis had hoped to persuade some of the hunters to go to Lake Traversewith the little party. In fact St. Antoine and another man had halfpromised. But both suddenly changed their minds. The boys could find noone else willing to leave the hunt for the trip to the trading post.There was nothing to do but go on alone. Before they rolled themselves intheir blankets, they had decided to part with the hunters on thefollowing day.