quand on a besoin du diable on lui dit, "Monsieur." One can not expect, however, the diable to be equally civil: when we asked him to tidy our vehicle a little, he simply replied that he'd be darned if he did. Long may be the darning-needle and sharp to him! But tempers seriously soured must blow up or burst, and a very pretty little quarrel was the result: it was settled bloodlessly, because one gentleman, who, to do him justice, showed every disposition to convert himself into a target, displayed such perfect unacquaintance with the weapons—revolvers—usually used on similar occasions, that it would have been mere murder to have taken pistol in hand against him.
As we sat very disconsolate in the open veranda, five Indians stalked in, and the biggest and burliest of the party, a middle-aged man, with the long, straight Indian hair, high, harsh features, and face bald of eyebrows and beard, after offering his paw to Mrs. Dana and the rest of the party, sat down with a manner of natural dignity somewhat trenching upon the impertinent. Presently, diving his hand into his breast, the old rat pulled out a thick fold of leather, and, after much manipulation, disclosed a dirty brown, ragged-edged sheet of paper, certifying him to be "Little Thunder," and signed by "General Harney." This, then, was the chief who showed the white feather at Ash Hollow, and of whom some military poet sang:
"We didn't make a blunder,
We rubbed out Little Thunder,
And we sent him to the other side of Jordan."
Little Thunder did not look quite rubbed out; but for poesy fiction is, of course, an element far more appropriate than fact. I remember a similar effusion of the Anglo-Indian muse, which consigned "Akbar Khan the Yaghi" to the tune and fate of the King of the Cannibal Isles, with a contempt of actualities quite as refreshing. The Western Indians are as fond of these testimonials as the East Indians: they preserve them with care as guarantees of their good conduct, and sometimes, as may be expected, carry about certificates in the style of Bellerophons' letters. Little Thunder was en route to Fort Laramie, where he intended to lay a complaint against the Indian agent, who embezzled, he said, half the rations and presents intended for his tribe. Even the whites owned that the "Maje's" bear got more sugar than all the Indians put together.
Nothing can be worse, if the vox populi occidentalis be taken as the vox Dei, than the modern management of the Indian Bureau at Washington. In former times the agencies were in the hands of the military authorities, and the officer commanding the department was responsible for malversation of office. This was found to work well; the papers signed were signed on honor. But in the United States, the federal army, though well paid, is never allowed to keep any appointment that can safely be taken away
