Prairie Smoke, a Collection of Lore of the Prairies. Gilmore Melvin Randolph

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СКАЧАТЬ the men might let themselves down the face of the cliff by a rope. When night came again, after he had posted the sentries to guard the place of ascent from the enemy, he returned to the point of rock and with his knife he cut away soft weathered rock at its base to make a secure place of fastening for a rope. Then he gathered secretly all the lariats which the company had. These he tied together and then, tying one end securely to the rock which he had prepared, he carefully paid out the rope and found to his joy that it reached the ground below. He made a loop in the rope for his foot and then he let himself slowly down to the ground, then he climbed back again. When night came again he posted his sentries so that the enemy might see them at their posts on the side of the butte above the path, but when darkness had fully come they were all gradually withdrawn. Quietly calling his men about him he explained his plan and told them how they might all save themselves. He sent his men down by the rope, one after another, beginning with the youngest and least important of the company, and so on up to the men of most importance. Last of all the captain of the company himself came down. He and all his men crept quietly in the darkness through the Dakota lines and escaped safely. The Dakotas directed their vigilance mainly toward the other side of the butte where lay the only path, and that a very rugged one, between the base and the summit.

      The Pawnees never knew how long the Dakotas kept watch about the rock.

      A MANDAN MONUMENT IN COMMEMORATION OF AN ACT OF HEROISM

      It is a common instinct among all nations of the human race to preserve relics and record memorials of notable persons and events. Such monuments vary with the different means and materials at hand. Sometimes mounds of earth, sometimes boulders, sometimes cairns of stones, sometimes hewn stones, and various other devices have been used according to circumstances.

      There exists a monument to the memory of a Mandan hero which has never before been described and published. The following account is from information given by several persons of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara tribes. The location of the monument is near the site of “Fish-hook Village” on the north side of the Missouri River some twelve or fifteen miles east of Elbowoods, North Dakota.

      During the middle part of the 19th century the three tribes, Arikara, Hidatsa and Mandan, lived together in alliance against their common enemies. Their chief enemies were the Dakota. So these three tribes built their three villages adjoining, making one compound village of three wards. The village lay upon a well-drained terrace of the Missouri River, while their farms were laid out in the fertile alluvial “bottom” along the river both above and below the village. To the north of the village site lies a range of hills.

      The enemy many times made raids upon the village. They would approach under cover of the hills to the north and then steal close upon the village through the course of a ravine which skirted the northeast and north sides of the village.

      About sixty-six years ago such an attack was made by a war party of Dakota. Of the defenders of the village, two young Mandans, brothers, named Lefthand and Redleaf, had been dismounted and their retreat cut off by the enemy. A brother of these two, Whitecrow by name, saw the danger of Lefthand and Redleaf and rode out to their assistance. Lefthand was killed and Redleaf was defending the body from a Dakota who was trying to take the scalp. Redleaf shot at the Dakota and missed him, the bullet going over the enemy’s head and striking into the ground beyond him, the enemy being crouched low at the time of the shot. Whitecrow rode in a circuit beyond these combatants and held off the attacking party of the enemy. He killed the Dakota who was engaged in combat with his brother Redleaf. Then Whitecrow picked up Redleaf upon the horse with himself and carried him safely back to the village.

      After the enemy had been driven away the Mandans went out and marked the course in which Whitecrow had ridden to his brother’s rescue, the spot where Lefthand had been killed, the spot where Redleaf had made his stand, the spot where the Dakota was killed, and the spot where Redleaf’s bullet fired at the Dakota, had struck the ground. The method used for marking these places was by removal of the sod leaving holes in the ground. To mark the course of Whitecrow’s horse the sod was removed in horse-track shaped sections consecutively from the point of advance from the village round the place of combat and returning to the village. The horse-track marks were made about two feet in diameter. All these marks commemorating the entire action, which took place about the year 1853 are still plainly evident, being renewed whenever they tend to become obliterated by weathering and by advancing vegetation.

      THE LEGEND OF STANDING ROCK

      This story of Standing Rock is a legend of the Arikara who once had their villages along the Missouri River between the Grand River and the Cannonball River. Afterwards, being harrassed by hostile incursions of the Dakotas they abandoned this country to their enemies and moved farther up the Missouri River, joining themselves in alliance with the Mandans.

      One time there was a young girl in this tribe who was beautiful and amiable but not given to heedless, chattering, idle amusement. She was thoughtful and earnest and conversant with the ways of all the living creatures, the birds and the small mammals, and the trees and shrubs and flowers of the woodlands and of the prairies. She was in the habit of going to walk by herself to visit and commune with all these living creatures. She understood them better than most other people did, and they all were her friends.

      When she became of marriageable age she had many suitors, for she was beautiful and lovely in disposition. But to the young men who wooed her she answered, “I do not find it in my heart to marry any one. I am at home with the bird people, the four-footed people of the woods and prairies, with the people of the flower nations and the trees. I love to work in the cornfields in summer, and the sacred squash blossoms are my dear companions.”

      Finally her grandmother reasoned with her and told her that it was her duty to marry and to rear children to maintain the strength of the tribe. Because of filial duty she finally said, when her grandmother continued to urge her to marry a certain young man of estimable worth who desired her for his wife, “Well grandmother, I will obey you, but I tell you that good will not come of it. I am not as others are, and Mother Nature did not intend me for marriage.”

      So she was married and went to the house already prepared for her by her husband. But three days later she came back to her mother’s, house, appearing sad and downcast. She sat down without speaking. Finally her grandmother said, “What is it, my child? Is he not kind to you?” The girl answered, “Oh, no, he is not unkind. He treated me well.” And with that she sped away into the forest. Her grandmother followed her after a little while, thinking that out among her beloved trees and plants she might open her heart and tell her what was the trouble. And this she did, explaining all the trouble to her grandmother. And she concluded her talk with her grandmother with these words, saying: “And so you see, grandmother, it is as I said when you urged me to marry. I was not intended for marriage. And now my heart is so sad. I should not have married. My spirit is not suited to the bounds of ordinary human living, and my husband is not to be blamed. He is honorable and kind. But I must go away and be with the children of nature.” So her grandmother left her there where she was sitting by a clump of choke-cherries, having her sewing kit with her and her little dog by her side.

      She did not return home that night, so the next morning young men were sent to search for her. At last she was found sitting upon a hill out upon the prairie, and she was turned to stone from her feet to her waist. The young men hastened back to the village and reported to the officers who had sent them out.

      Then the people were summoned by the herald and they all went out to the place where the young woman was. Now they found she had become stone as far up as her breasts.

      Then the priests opened the sacred bundle and took the sacred pipe which they filled and lighted and presented it to her lips so that thus she and they in turn smoking from the same pipe might be put in communion and accord with the spirit. But she refused the pipe, and said, “Though I refuse the pipe it is not from disloyalty or because of unwillingness СКАЧАТЬ