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"Boots and Saddles"; Or, Life in Dakota with General Custer

by Elizabeth Bacon Custer · English · Gutenberg #48972 · 521,706 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: "Boots and Saddles"; Or, Life in Dakota with General Custer

Author: Elizabeth Bacon Custer


        
Release date: May 16, 2015 [eBook #48972]
                Most recently updated: October 24, 2024

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK "BOOTS AND SADDLES"; OR, LIFE IN DAKOTA WITH GENERAL CUSTER ***

[Illustration: _G. A. Custer._]




    “BOOTS AND SADDLES”

    OR LIFE IN DAKOTA WITH GENERAL CUSTER

    BY
    ELIZABETH B. CUSTER

    WITH PORTRAIT AND MAP

    NEW YORK
    HARPER & BROTHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE




    Copyright, 1885, by HARPER & BROTHERS.

    _All rights reserved._




                               Dedicated
                                   TO
                               MY HUSBAND
            THE ECHO OF WHOSE VOICE HAS BEEN MY INSPIRATION




PREFACE.


One of the motives that have actuated me in recalling these simple
annals of our daily life, has been to give a glimpse to civilians of
garrison and camp life--about which they seem to have such a very
imperfect knowledge.

This ignorance exists especially with reference to anything pertaining
to the cavalry, which is almost invariably stationed on the extreme
frontier.

The isolation of the cavalry posts makes them quite inaccessible to
travellers, and the exposure incident to meeting warlike Indians does
not tempt the visits of friends or even of the venturesome tourist. Our
life, therefore, was often as separate from the rest of the world as if
we had been living on an island in the ocean.

Very little has been written regarding the domestic life of an army
family, and yet I cannot believe that it is without interest; for
the innumerable questions that are asked about our occupations,
amusements, and mode of house-keeping, lead me to hope that the actual
answers to these queries contained in this little story will be
acceptable. This must also be my apology for entering in some instances
so minutely into trifling perplexities and events, which went to fill
up the sum of our existence.

                        E. B. C.

    _148 East 18th Street,
                New York City._




CONTENTS.


    CHAPTER                                                         PAGE

         I. CHANGE OF STATION                                          9

        II. A BLIZZARD                                                17

       III. WESTERN HOSPITALITY                                       30

        IV. CAVALRY ON THE MARCH                                      37

         V. CAMPING AMONG THE SIOUX                                   49

        VI. A VISIT TO THE VILLAGE OF “TWO BEARS”                     60

       VII. ADVENTURES DURING THE LAST DAYS OF THE MARCH              73

      VIII. SEPARATION AND REUNION                                    86

        IX. OUR NEW HOME AT FORT LINCOLN                              94

         X. INCIDENTS OF EVERY-DAY LIFE                              104

        XI. THE BURNING OF OUR QUARTERS.--CARRYING THE MAIL          115

       XII. PERPLEXITIES AND PLEASURES OF DOMESTIC LIFE              124

      XIII. A “STRONG HEART” DANCE!                                  131

       XIV. GARRISON LIFE                                            138

        XV. GENERAL CUSTER’S LITERARY WORK                           140

       XVI. INDIAN DEPREDATIONS                                      154

      XVII. A DAY OF ANXIETY AND TERROR                              159

     XVIII. IMPROVEMENTS AT THE POST, AND GARDENING                  167

       XIX. GENERAL CUSTER’S LIBRARY                                 174

        XX. THE SUMMER OF THE BLACK HILLS EXPEDITION                 181

       XXI. DOMESTIC TRIALS                                          194

      XXII. CAPTURE AND ESCAPE OF RAIN-IN-THE-FACE                   203

     XXIII. GARRISON AMUSEMENTS                                      216

      XXIV. AN INDIAN COUNCIL                                        225

       XXV. BREAKING UP OF THE MISSOURI                              229

      XXVI. CURIOUS CHARACTERS AND EXCURSIONISTS AMONG US            240

     XXVII. RELIGIOUS SERVICES.--LEAVE OF ABSENCE                    247

    XXVIII. A WINTER’S JOURNEY ACROSS THE PLAINS                     253

      XXIX. OUR LIFE’S LAST CHAPTER                                  261


            APPENDIX: WITH EXTRACTS OF GENERAL CUSTER’S LETTERS      271

[Illustration:

    OUTLINE MAP
  _of portions of_
  MONTANA & DAKOTA

                        Copyright, 1885, by HARPER & BROTHERS
]




BOOTS AND SADDLES.




CHAPTER I.

CHANGE OF STATION.


General Custer graduated at West Point just in time to take part in the
battle of Bull Run. He served with his regiment--the 5th Cavalry--for a
time, but eventually was appointed aide-de-camp to General McClellan.
He came to his sister’s home in my native town, Monroe, Michigan,
during the winter of 1863, and there I first met him. In the spring
he returned to the army in Virginia, and was promoted that summer, at
the age of twenty-three, from captain to brigadier-general. During
the following autumn he came to Monroe to recover from a flesh-wound,
which, though not serious, disabled him somewhat. At that time we
became engaged. When his twenty days’ leave of absence had expired
he went back to duty, and did not return until a few days before our
marriage, in February, 1864.

We had no sooner reached Washington on our wedding-journey than
telegrams came, following one another in quick succession, asking him
to give up the rest of his leave of absence, and hasten without an
hour’s delay to the front. I begged so hard not to be left behind that
I finally prevailed. The result was that I found myself in a few hours
on the extreme wing of the Army of the Potomac, in an isolated Virginia
farm-house, finishing my honeymoon alone. I had so besought him to
allow me to come that I did not dare own to myself the desolation
and fright I felt. In the preparation for the hurried raid which my
husband had been ordered to make he had sent to cavalry head-quarters
to provide for my safety, and troops were in reality near, although I
could not see them.

The general’s old colored servant, Eliza, comforted me, and the
Southern family in the house took pity upon my anxiety. It was a sudden
plunge into a life of vicissitude and danger, and I hardly remember the
time during the twelve years that followed when I was not in fear of
some immediate peril, or in dread of some danger that threatened. After
the raid was ended, we spent some delightful weeks together, and when
the regular spring campaign began I returned to Washington, where I
remained until the surrender and the close of the war.

After that we went to Texas for a year, my husband still acting
as major-general in command of Volunteers. In 1866 we returned to
Michigan, and the autumn of the same year found us in Kansas, where the
general assumed charge of the 7th (Regular) Cavalry, to which he had
been assigned, with the rank of lieutenant-colonel in the Regular Army.
We remained in Kansas five years, during which time I was the only
officer’s wife who always followed the regiment. We were then ordered,
with the regiment, to Kentucky. After being stationed in Elizabethtown
for two years, we went to Dakota in the spring of 1873.

When orders came for the 7th Cavalry to go into the field again,
General Custer was delighted. The regiment was stationed in various
parts of the South, on the very disagreeable duty of breaking up
illicit distilleries and suppressing the Ku-klux. Fortunately for us,
being in Kentucky, we knew very little of this service. It seemed
an unsoldierly life, and it was certainly uncongenial; for a true
cavalryman feels that a life in the saddle on the free open plain is
his legitimate existence.

Not an hour elapsed after the official document announcing our change
of station had arrived before our house was torn up. In the confusion I
managed to retire to a corner with an atlas, and surreptitiously look
up the territory to which we were going. I hardly liked to own that
I had forgotten its location. When my finger traced our route from
Kentucky almost up to the border of the British Possessions, it seemed
as if we were going to Lapland.

From the first days of our marriage, General Custer celebrated every
order to move with wild demonstrations of joy. His exuberance of
spirits always found expression in some boyish pranks, before he could
set to work seriously to prepare for duty. As soon as the officer
announcing the order to move had disappeared, all sorts of wild
hilarity began. I had learned to take up a safe position on top of the
table; that is, if I had not already been forcibly placed there as a
spectator. The most disastrous result of the proceedings was possibly a
broken chair, which the master of ceremonies would crash, and, perhaps,
throw into the kitchen by way of informing the cook that good news had
come. We had so few household effects that it was something of a loss
when we chanced to be in a country where they could not be replaced.
I can see Eliza’s woolly head now, as she thrust it through the door
to reprimand her master, and say, “Chairs don’t grow on trees in these
yere parts, gen’l.” As for me, I was tossed about the room, and all
sorts of jokes were played upon me before the frolic was ended. After
such participation in the celebration, I was almost too tired with the
laughter and fun to begin packing.

I know that it would surprise a well-regulated mover to see what short
work it was for us to prepare for our journeys. We began by having a
supply of gunny-sacks and hay brought in from the stables. The saddler
appeared, and all our old traps that had been taken around with us so
many years were once more tied and sewed up. The kitchen utensils were
plunged into barrels, generally left uncovered in the hurry; rolls of
bedding encased in waterproof cloth or canvas were strapped and roped,
and the few pictures and books were crowded into chests and boxes.
When these possessions were loaded upon the wagon, at the last moment
there always appeared the cook’s bedding to surmount the motley pile.
Her property was invariably tied up in a flaming quilt representing
souvenirs of her friends’ dresses. She followed that last instalment
with anxious eyes, and, true to her early training, grasped her red
bandanna, containing a few last things, while the satchel she scorned
to use hung empty on her arm.

In all this confusion no one was cross. We rushed and gasped through
the one day given us for preparation, and I had only time to be glad
with my husband that he was going back to the life of activity that
he so loved. His enforced idleness made it seem to him that he was
cumbering the earth, and he rejoiced to feel that he was again to have
the chance to live up to his idea of a soldier. Had I dared to stop
in that hurried day and think of myself all the courage would have
gone out of me. This removal to Dakota meant to my husband a reunion
with his regiment and summer campaigns against Indians; to me it meant
months of loneliness, anxiety, and terror. Fortunately there was too
much to do to leave leisure for thought.

Steamers were ready for us at Memphis, and we went thither by rail to
embark. When the regiment was gathered together, after a separation of
two years, there were hearty greetings, and exchanges of troublous or
droll experiences; and thankful once more to be reunited, we entered
again, heart and soul, into the minutest detail of one another’s
lives. We went into camp for a few days on the outskirts of Memphis,
and exchanged hospitalities with the citizens. The bachelors found an
elysium in the society of many very pretty girls, and love-making went
on either in luxurious parlors or in the open air as they rode in the
warm spring weather to and from our camp. Three steamers were at last
loaded and we went on to Cairo, where we found the trains prepared to
take us into Dakota.

The regiment was never up to its maximum of twelve hundred men, but
there may have been eight or nine hundred soldiers and as many horses.
The property of the companies--saddles, equipments, arms, ammunition,
and forage--together with the personal luggage of the officers, made
the trains very heavy, and we travelled slowly. We were a week or more
on the route. Our days were varied by the long stops necessary to
water the horses, and occasionally to take them out of the cars for
exercise. My husband and I always went on these occasions to loose the
dogs and have a frolic and a little visit with our own horses. The
youth and gamins of the village gathered about us as if we had been
some travelling show. While on the journey one of our family had a
birthday. This was always a day of frolic and fun, and even when we
were on the extreme frontier, presents were sent for into the States,
and we had a little dinner and a birthday cake. This birthday that
came during the journey, though so inopportune, did not leave utterly
without resources the minds of those whose ingenuity was quickened by
affection. The train was delayed that day for an unusually long time;
our colored cook, Mary, in despair because we ate so little in the
“twenty-minutes-for-refreshments” places, determined on an impromptu
feast. She slyly took a basket and filled it at the shops in the
village street. She had already made friends with a woman who had a
little cabin tucked in between the rails and the embankment, and there
the never absent “eureka” coffee-pot was produced and most delicious
coffee dripped. Returning to the car stove, which she had discovered
was filled with a deep bed of coals, she broiled us a steak and baked
some potatoes. The general and I were made to sit down opposite each
other in one of the compartments. A board was brought, covered with a
clean towel, and we did table-legs to this impromptu table. We did not
dare move, and scarcely ventured to giggle, for fear we should overturn
the laden board in our laps. For dessert, a large plate of macaroons,
which were an especial weakness of mine, was brought out as a surprise.
Mary told me, with great glee, how she had seen the general prowling in
the bakers’ shops to buy them, and described the train of small boys
who followed him when he came back with his brown paper parcel. “Miss
Libbie,” she said, “they thought a sure enough gen’l always went on
horseback and carried his sword in his hand.”

We were so hungry we scarcely realized that we were anything but
the embodiment of picturesque grace. No one could be otherwise than
awkward in trying to cut food on such an uncertain base, while Mary
had taken the last scrap of dignity away from the general’s appearance
by enveloping him in a kitchen towel as a substitute for a napkin.
With their usual independence and indifference to ceremony, troops of
curious citizens stalked through the car to stare at my husband. We
went on eating calmly, unconscious that they thought the picture hardly
in keeping with their preconceived ideas of a commanding officer.
When we thanked Mary for our feast, her face beamed and shone with a
combination of joy at our delight and heat from the stove. When she
lifted up our frugal board and set us free, we had a long stroll,
talking over other birthdays and those yet to come, until the train was
ready to start.




CHAPTER II.

A BLIZZARD.


After so many days in the car, we were glad to stop on an open plain
about a mile from the town of Yankton, where the road ended.

The three chief considerations for a camp are wood, water, and good
ground. The latter we had, but we were at some distance from the water,
and neither trees nor brushwood were in sight.

The long trains were unloaded of their freight, and the plains about
us seemed to swarm with men and horses. I was helped down from the
Pullman car, where inlaid woods, mirrors, and plush surrounded us, to
the ground, perfectly bare of every earthly comfort. The other ladies
of the regiment went on to the hotel in the town. The general suggested
that I should go with them, but I had been in camp so many summers it
was not a formidable matter for me to remain, and fortunately for what
followed I did so. The household belongings were gathered together.
A family of little new puppies, some half-grown dogs, the cages of
mocking-birds and canaries, were all corralled safely in a little
stockade made of chests and trunks, and we set ourselves about making
a temporary home. The general and a number of soldiers, composing the
head-quarters detail, were obliged to go at once to lay out the main
camp and assign the companies to their places. Later on, when the
most important work was done, our tents were to be pitched. While I
sat on a chest waiting, the air grew suddenly chilly, the bright sun
of the morning disappeared, and the rain began to fall. Had we been
accustomed to the climate we would have known that these changes were
the precursors of a snow-storm.

When we left Memphis, not a fortnight before, we wore muslin gowns and
were then uncomfortably warm; it seemed impossible that even so far
north there could be a returned winter in the middle of April. We were
yet to realize what had been told us of the climate--that there were
“eight months of winter and four of very late in the fall.” On the
bluffs beyond us was a signal-station, but they sent us no warning.
Many years of campaigning in the Indian Territory, Kansas, Colorado,
and Nebraska, give one an idea of what the weather can do; but each
new country has its peculiarities, and it seemed we had reached one
where all the others were outdone. As the afternoon of that first day
advanced the wind blew colder, and I found myself eying with envy a
little half-finished cabin without an enclosure, standing by itself.
Years of encountering the winds of Kansas, when our tents were torn and
blown down so often, had taught me to appreciate any kind of a house,
even though it were built upon the sand as this one was. A dug-out,
which the tornado swept over, but could not harm, was even more of a
treasure. The change of climate from the extreme south to the far north
had made a number of the men ill, and even the superb health of the
general had suffered. He continued to superintend the camp, however,
though I begged him from time to time as I saw him to give up. I felt
sure he needed a shelter and some comfort at once, so I took courage
to plan for myself. Before this I had always waited, as the general
preferred to prepare everything for me. After he had consented that
we should try for the little house, some of the kind-hearted soldiers
found the owner in a distant cabin, and he rented it to us for a few
days. The place was equal to a palace to me. There was no plastering,
and the house seemed hardly weatherproof. It had a floor, however, and
an upper story divided off by beams; over these Mary and I stretched
blankets and shawls and so made two rooms. It did not take long to
settle our few things, and when wood and water were brought from a
distance we were quite ready for house-keeping, except that we lacked
a stove and some supplies. Mary walked into the town to hire or buy a
small cooking-stove, but she could not induce the merchant to bring it
out that night. She was thoughtful enough to take along a basket and
brought with her a little marketing. Before she had come within sight
of our cabin on her return, the snow was falling so fast it was with
difficulty that she found her way.

Meanwhile the general had returned completely exhausted and very
ill. Without his knowledge I sent for the surgeon, who, like all of
his profession in the army, came promptly. He gave me some powerful
medicine to administer every hour, and forbade the general to leave
his bed. It was growing dark, and we were in the midst of a Dakota
blizzard. The snow was so fine that it penetrated the smallest cracks,
and soon we found white lines appearing all around us, where the
roof joined the walls, on the windows and under the doors. Outside
the air was so thick with the whirling, tiny particles that it was
almost impossible to see one’s hand held out before one. The snow was
fluffy and thick, like wool, and fell so rapidly, and seemingly from
all directions, that it gave me a feeling of suffocation as I stood
outside. Mary was not easily discouraged, and piling a few light fagots
outside the door, she tried to light a fire. The wind and the muffling
snow put out every little blaze that started, however, and so, giving
it up, she went into the house and found the luncheon-basket we had
brought from the car, in which remained some sandwiches, and these
composed our supper.

The night had almost settled down upon us when the adjutant came for
orders. Knowing the scarcity of fuel and the danger to the horses from
exposure to the rigor of such weather after their removal from a warm
climate, the general ordered the breaking of camp. All the soldiers
were directed to take their horses and go into Yankton, and ask the
citizens to give them shelter in their homes, cow-sheds, and stables.
In a short time the camp was nearly deserted, only the laundresses,
two or three officers, and a few dismounted soldiers remaining.
The towns-people, true to the unvarying western hospitality, gave
everything they could to the use of the regiment; the officers found
places in the hotels. The sounds of the hoofs of the hurrying horses
flying by our cabin on their way to the town had hardly died out before
the black night closed in and left us alone on that wide, deserted
plain. The servants, Mary and Ham, did what they could to make the room
below-stairs comfortable by stopping the cracks and barricading the
frail door. The thirty-six hours of our imprisonment there seems now
a frightful nightmare. The wind grew higher and higher, and shrieked
about the little house dismally. It was built without a foundation,
and was so rickety it seemed as it rocked in a great gust of wind that
it surely would be unroofed or overturned. The general was too ill for
me to venture to find my usual comfort from his re-assuring voice. I
dressed in my heaviest gown and jacket, and remained under the blankets
as much as I could to keep warm. Occasionally I crept out to shake
off the snow from the counterpane, for it sifted in between the roof
and clapboards very rapidly. I hardly dared take the little phial in
my benumbed fingers to drop the precious medicine for fear it would
fall. I realized, as the night advanced, that we were as isolated from
the town, and even the camp, not a mile distant, as if we had been on
an island in the river. The doctor had intended to return to us, but
his serious face and impressive injunctions made me certain that he
considered the life of the general dependent on the medicine being
regularly given.

During the night I was startled by hearing a dull sound, as of
something falling heavily. Flying down the stairs I found the servants
prying open the frozen and snow-packed door, to admit a half dozen
soldiers who, becoming bewildered by the snow, had been saved by the
faint light we had placed in the window. After that several came,
and two were badly frozen. We were in despair of finding any way of
warming them, as there was no bedding, and, of course, no fire, until I
remembered the carpets which were sewed up in bundles and heaped in one
corner, where the boxes were, and which we were not to use until the
garrison was reached. Spreading them out, we had enough to roll up each
wanderer as he came. The frozen men were in so exhausted a condition
that they required immediate attention. Their sufferings were intense,
and I could not forgive myself for not having something with which to
revive them. The general never tasted liquor, and we were both so well
always we did not even keep it for use in case of sickness.

I saw symptoms of that deadly stupor which is the sure precursor of
freezing, when I fortunately remembered a bottle of alcohol which had
been brought for the spirit-lamps. Mary objected to using the only
means by which we could make coffee for ourselves, but the groans and
exhausted and haggard faces of the men won her over, and we saw them
revive under the influence of the fiery liquid. Poor fellows! They
afterwards lost their feet, and some of their fingers had also to
be amputated. The first soldier who had reached us unharmed, except
from exhaustion, explained that they had all attempted to find their
way to town, and the storm had completely overcome them. Fortunately
one had clung to a bag of hard-tack, which was all they had had to
eat. At last the day came, but so darkened by the snow it seemed
rather a twilight. The drifts were on three sides of us like a wall.
The long hours dragged themselves away, leaving the general too weak
to rise, and in great need of hot, nourishing food. I grew more and
more terrified at our utterly desolate condition and his continued
illness, though fortunately he did not suffer. He was too ill, and I
too anxious, to eat the fragments that remained in the luncheon-basket.
The snow continued to come down in great swirling sheets, while the
wind shook the loose window-casings and sometimes broke in the door.
When night came again and the cold increased, I believed that our
hours were numbered. I missed the voice of the courageous Mary, for
she had sunk down in a corner exhausted for want of sleep, while Ham
had been completely demoralized from the first. Occasionally I melted
a little place on the frozen window-pane, and saw that the drifts
were almost level with the upper windows on either side, but that the
wind had swept a clear space before the door. During the night the
sound of the tramping of many feet rose above the roar of the storm.
A great drove of mules rushed up to the sheltered side of the house.
Their brays had a sound of terror as they pushed, kicked, and crowded
themselves against our little cabin. For a time they huddled together,
hoping for warmth, and then despairing, they made a mad rush away, and
were soon lost in the white wall of snow beyond. All night long the
neigh of a distressed horse, almost human in its appeal, came to us
at intervals. The door was pried open once, thinking it might be some
suffering fellow-creature in distress. The strange, wild eyes of the
horse peering in for help, haunted me long afterwards. Occasionally a
lost dog lifted up a howl of distress under our window, but before the
door could be opened to admit him he had disappeared in the darkness.
When the night was nearly spent I sprang again to the window with a new
horror, for no one, until he hears it for himself, can realize what
varied sounds animals make in the excitement of peril. A drove of hogs,
squealing and grunting, were pushing against the house, and the door
which had withstood so much had to be held to keep it from being broken
in.

It was almost unbearable to hear the groans of the soldiers over their
swollen and painful feet, and know that we could do nothing to ease
them. To be in the midst of such suffering, and yet have no way of
ameliorating it; to have shelter, and yet to be surrounded by dumb
beasts appealing to us for help, was simply terrible. Every minute
seemed a day; every hour a year. When daylight came I dropped into an
exhausted slumber, and was awakened by Mary standing over our bed with
a tray of hot breakfast. I asked if help had come, and finding it had
not, of course, I could not understand the smoking food. She told me
that feeling the necessity of the general’s eating, it had come to her
in the night-watches that she would cut up the large candles she had
pilfered from the cars, and try if she could cook over the many short
pieces placed close together, so as to make a large flame. The result
was hot coffee and some bits of the steak she had brought from town,
fried with a few slices of potatoes. She could not resist telling me
how much better she could have done had I not given away the alcohol to
the frozen men!

The breakfast revived the general so much that he began to make light
of danger in order to quiet me. The snow had ceased to fall, but for
all that it still seemed that we were castaways and forgotten, hidden
under the drifts that nearly surrounded us. Help was really near at
hand, however, at even this darkest hour. A knock at the door, and the
cheery voices of men came up to our ears. Some citizens of Yankton
had at last found their way to our relief, and the officers, who
neither knew the way nor how to travel over such a country, had gladly
followed. They told us that they had made several attempts to get out
to us, but the snow was so soft and light that they could make no
headway. They floundered and sank down almost out of sight, even in the
streets of the town. Of course no horse could travel, but they told me
of their intense anxiety, and said that fearing I might be in need of
immediate help they had dragged a cutter over the drifts, which now had
a crust of ice formed from the sleet and the moisture of the damp night
air. Of course I declined to go without the general, but I was more
touched than I could express by their thought of me. I made some excuse
to go up-stairs, where, with my head buried in the shawl partition, I
tried to smother the sobs that had been suppressed during the terrors
of our desolation. Here the general found me, and though comforting me
by tender words, he still reminded me that he would not like any one to
know that I had lost my pluck when all the danger I had passed through
was really ended.

The officers made their way over to camp, for they were anxious and
uncertain as to what might have happened to the few persons remaining
there. I had been extremely troubled, for each of the soldiers for whom
we had been caring had, with a trooper’s usual love of the sensational,
told us of frozen men and of the birth of babies to the laundresses.
These stories had reached town through stragglers, until we imagined
from the exaggeration that enough newly-born children might be found to
start a small orphan asylum. The officers soon returned with the story
reduced to one little stranger who had come safely into this world
in the stormy night, sheltered by a tent only. No men were frozen,
fortunately, though all had suffered. The soldier detailed to take care
of the general’s horses found his way back with them, and in his solemn
voice told us that in spite of every effort, sharing his blankets and
holding the little things through the storm, the thorough-bred puppies
had frozen one by one. There was one little box-stove in camp which the
officers brought back, accompanied by its owner, an old and somewhat
infirm officer.

In the midst of all this excitement, and the reaction from the danger,
I could not suppress my sense of the ludicrous when I saw the daintiest
and most exquisite officer of “ours,” whom last I remembered careering
on his perfectly equipped and prancing steed before the admiring eyes
of the Memphis belles, now wound up with scarfs and impromptu leggings
of flannel; his hat tied down with a woollen comforter; buffalo gloves
on his hands; and clasping a stove-pipe, necessary for the precious
stove.

Some of the officers had brought out parcels containing food, while
our brother, Colonel Tom Custer, had struggled with a large basket of
supplies. In a short time another officer appeared at our door with
a face full of anxiety about our welfare. He did not tell us what we
afterwards learned from others, that, fearing the citizens would give
up going to us, and knowing that he could not find the way alone over
a country from which the snow had obliterated every landmark, he had
started to go the whole distance on the railroad. Coming to a long
bridge he found the track so covered with ice that it was a dangerous
footing; the wind blew the sleet and snow in his face, almost blinding
him, but nothing daunted, he crawled over on his hands and knees, and
continuing to use the track as his guide, stopped when he thought he
might be opposite our cabin, and ploughed his way with difficulty
through the drifts.

When the officers had returned to town, we made a fire in the little
stove which had been put up-stairs, as the pipe was so short. We
ensconced our visitor, to whom the stove belonged, near by. He was
a capital fireman; we divided our bedding with him, and put it on
the floor, as close as possible to the fire. The shawl and blanket
partition separated our rooms, but did not seem to deaden sound, and
at night I only lost consciousness of the audible sleeping of our
guest after I had dropped the point of a finger in my ear. He was the
one among us who, being the oldest of our circle, and having had a
varied experience, was an authority on many subjects. He had peculiar
and extreme ideas on some questions. We listened out of respect, but
we all drew the line at following some of his advice, and over one
topic there was general revolt. He disbelieved entirely in the external
or internal use of water, and living as we did in countries where
the rivers were flowing mud, and the smaller streams dried up under
the blazing sun, his would have been a convenient system, to say the
least. Unfortunately, our prejudices in favor of cleanliness increased
with the scarcity of water. Bathing became one of the luxuries as
well as one of the absolute necessities of life. From being compelled
to do with very little water, we had learned almost to take a bath
in a thimble, and to this day I find myself pouring the water out
of a pitcher in a most gingerly manner, so strong is the power of
habit--even now with the generous rush of the unstinted Croton at my
disposal. The theory of our venerable friend on the danger of bathing
was fortified with many an earnest argument, and the advantages of
his improved system of dry rubbing set out elaborately in his best
rhetoric. Nevertheless, taking a bath with the palm of the hand was
combated to the last by his hearers. When I had heard him arguing
previously I had rather believed it to be the vagary of the hour. I
had proof to the contrary the next morning after the storm, for I was
awakened by a noise of vigorous friction and violent breathing, as of
some one laboring diligently. I suddenly remembered the doctrine of
our guest, and realized that he was putting theory into practice. As
softly as I awakened my husband, and tried to whisper to him, he was
on nettles instantly, hearing the quiver of laughter in my voice. He
feared I might be heard, and that the feelings of the man for whom he
had such regard might be wounded. He promptly requested me to smother
my laughter in the blankets, and there I shook with merriment, perhaps
even greater because of the relief I experienced in finding something
to counteract the gloom of the preceding hours. And if I owned to
telling afterwards that the old officer’s theory and practice were one,
it could not be called a great breach of hospitality, for he gloried in
what he called advanced ideas, and strove to wear the martyr’s crown
that all pioneers in new and extreme beliefs crowd on their heads.

Our friend remained with us until the camp was inhabitable and the
regular order of military duties was resumed. Paths and roads were made
through the snow, and it was a great relief to be again in the scenes
of busy life. We did not soon forget our introduction to Dakota. After
that we understood why the frontiersman builds his stable near the
house; we also comprehended then when they told us that they did not
dare to cross in a blizzard from the house to the stable-door without
keeping hold of a rope tied fast to the latch as a guide for their safe
return when the stock was fed. Afterwards, when even our cool-headed
soldiers lost their way and wandered aimlessly near their quarters, and
when found were dazed in speech and look, the remembrance of that first
storm, with the density of the down-coming snow, was a solution to us
of their bewilderment.




CHAPTER III.

WESTERN HOSPITALITY.


The citizens of Yankton, endeavoring to make up for the inhospitable
reception the weather had given us, vied with one another in trying
to make the regiment welcome. The hotel was filled with the families
of the officers, and after the duties of the day were over in camp,
the married men went into town. We were called upon, asked to dine,
and finally tendered a ball. It was given in the public hall of the
town, which, being decorated with flags and ornamented with all the
military paraphernalia that could be used effectively, was really very
attractive. We had left gas far behind us, and we had not the mellow,
becoming light of wax-candles, but those Western people were generous
about lamps, as they are about everything else, and the hall was very
bright.

The ladies had many trials in endeavoring to make themselves
presentable. We burrowed in the depths of trunks for those bits of
finery that we had supposed would not be needed again for years. We
knew the officers would do us credit. Through all the sudden changes of
fashion, which leave an army lady when she goes into the territories
quite an antediluvian in toilet after a few months, the officer can
be entirely serene. He can be conscious that he looks his best in a
perfectly fitting uniform, and that he is never out of date.

The general and I went into the hotel and took a room for the night of
the ball. Such good-humor, confusion, and jolly preparations as we had,
for the young officers came to borrow the corner of our glass to put on
the finishing touches, carrying their neckties, studs, sleeve-buttons,
and gloves in their hands. The aigret had been taken from the helmet
and placed across their broad chests, brightening still more their
shining new uniforms. I remember with what pride the “plebs” called our
attention to the double row of buttons which the change in the uniform
now gave to all, without regard to rank. The lieutenants had heretofore
only been allowed one row of buttons, and they declared that an Apollo
even could not do justice to his figure with a coat fastened in so
monotonous and straight up-and-down a manner.

Yankton, like all new towns, was chiefly settled with newly-married
people, who ornamented their bits of front yards with shining new
perambulators. The mothers had little afternoon parades, proud enough
to trundle their own babies. If any one’s father ever came from the
States to a Western town, we all felt at liberty to welcome his gray
hairs. There were but few young girls, but that night must have been a
memorable one for them. All the town, and even the country people, came
to the ball. The mayor and common council received us, and the governor
opened the festivities. We crossed to the hotel to our supper. We were
asked to sit down to the table, and the abundance of substantials
proved that our hosts did not expect us to nibble. The general was, of
course, taken possession of by the city fathers and mothers. Finding
among them a woman he knew I would appreciate, he placed me beside her
at supper. I had but little time to eat, for she was not only clever
and brave, but very interesting in her description of the dangers and
hardships she had endured during the ten years of her pioneering. The
railroad had been completed but a short time, and before that the life
was wild enough. She sat quietly among these people in her simple
stuff gown, honored and looked up to. Though not even elderly, she was
still almost the oldest citizen and an authority in the history of the
country. All classes and conditions came to the ball, for Yankton was
not yet large enough to be divided into cliques; besides, the rough and
hazardous life these people had shared endeared them to one another.

The days after this passed very rapidly. The officers were already
getting the command into condition to begin the long march of five
hundred miles that lay before us. Before we left, the general, desiring
to return some of the civilities of the citizens, gave the governor
and his staff a review. The wide plain on which our camp was located
was admirably adapted to the display of troops. My heart swelled with
pride to see our grand regiment all together once more and in such fine
condition. When the review was closing, and that part came where the
officers leave their companies and, joining, ride abreast to salute the
commanding officer, the general could hardly maintain the stereotyped,
motionless quiet of the soldier--the approach of this fine body of men
made him so proud of his command.

All were well mounted; the two years’ station in the South had given
them rare opportunities to purchase horses. The general, being
considered an excellent judge, had, at the request of the officers,
bought several from the stables of his Kentucky friends. He told me
that if a colt failed a quarter of a second in making certain time
expected, the owner was disappointed and willing to sell him at a
merely nominal sum. So it came about that even the lieutenants, with
their meagre pay, owned horses whose pedigree was unending. There were
three officers belonging to each of the twelve companies; some were
detailed on duty elsewhere, but those remaining, with the adjutant,
surgeon, quartermaster, and commissary, made a long line of brilliantly
caparisoned and magnificently formed men mounted on blood-horses. No
wonder that the moment they saluted the general, he jumped from the
saddle to congratulate them, and show them his pride in their soldierly
appearance.

The governor and his staff were not chary in their expressions of
admiration. It was a great event in the lives of the citizens, and the
whole town was present. Every sort of vehicle used on the frontier
came out, filled to overflowing, and many persons walked. The music
of the band, the sun lighting up the polished steel of the arms and
equipments, the hundreds of spirited horses going through the variety
of evolutions which belong to a mounted regiment, made a memorable
scene for these isolated people. Besides, they felt the sensation
of possession when they knew that these troops had come to open the
country and protect those more adventurous spirits who were already
finding that a place into which the railroad ran was too far East for
them.

One day we were all invited to take luncheon on board the steamer
that had been chartered to take the regimental property up the river
to Bismarck. The owner of the boat was very hospitable, and champagne
flowed freely as he proposed old-fashioned toasts. The officers and
ladies of the regiment received with pleasure all this politeness, and
since these occasions were rare in the lives of those of us who lived
always on the outskirts of civilization, we were reluctant to go home.
My horse had been sent away by some mistake, and the general accepted
the offer of the host to drive me out to camp, he riding for a time
beside the carriage, and then, with his usual restlessness, giving rein
to his horse for a brisk gallop. It was not long before I discovered
that the uncertain swaying of the vehicle from side to side, and the
hazardous manner in which we skirted the deep gullies, was due to the
fact that our friend was overcome with hospitality.

Trying to talk intelligently, and to appear not to notice the vagaries
of the driver, and at the same time to control my wandering eyes
as they espied from afar a dangerous bit of road, I spent a very
uncomfortable hour. Fortunately the “dear Polly” was most demure in
harness, and possibly having been left before that to find her own
way under similar circumstances, she did not attempt to leap with the
carriage over ditches, as her gay owner invited her to do. When we
came up within shouting distance of the general, I cried out, in what I
meant to seem like playful menace; but he had taken in the situation,
and seeing that Polly was to be trusted, he mischievously laughed back
at me and flew over the country. Finally we neared our little cabin,
and my last fear came upon me. Mary had spread the clothes-line far and
wide; it was at the rear of the house, but my escort saw no door, and
Polly soon wound us hopelessly up in the line and two weeks’ washing,
while she quietly tried to kick her way through the packing-boxes and
wood-piles! Mary and Ham extricated me, and started the old nag on
the road homeward, and I waved a relieved good-bye to the retreating
carriage.

Only such impossible wives as one reads of in Sunday-school books
would have lost the opportunity for a few wrathful words. I was not
dangerous, though, and the peals of laughter from my husband, as he
described my wild eyes peering out from the side of the carriage, soon
put me into a good-humor. Next day I was called to the steps, and
found that Polly’s owner had discovered that we had a door. He said
an off-hand “How d’ye?” and presented a peace-offering, adding, “My
wife tells me that I was hardly in a condition to deliver a temperance
lecture yesterday. As what she says is always true, I bring my
apologies.” Ham carried in the hamper, and though I urged our guest to
remain, he did not seem quite at ease and drove away.

While we were at Yankton, something happened that filled us with
wonder. The Indians from the reservation near brought in reports that
came through other tribes of the Modoc disasters. It was a marvel to
the general to find that at that distance north news could come to us
through Indian runners in advance of that we received by the telegraph.




CHAPTER IV.

CAVALRY ON THE MARCH.


When the day came for us to begin our march, the sun shone and the
towns-people wished us good-luck with their good-bye.

The length of each day’s march varied according to the streams on which
we relied for water, or the arrival of the boat. The steamer that
carried the forage for the horses and the supplies for the command was
tied up to the river-bank every night, as near to us as was possible.
The laundresses and ladies of the regiment were on board, except the
general’s sister, Margaret, who made her first march with her husband,
riding all the way on horseback. As usual, I rode beside the general.
Our first few days were pleasant, and we began at once to enjoy the
plover. The land was so covered with them that the hunters shot them
with all sorts of arms. We counted eighty birds in the gunny-sack
that three of the soldiers brought in. Fortunately there were several
shot-guns in the possession of our family, and the little things,
therefore, were not torn to pieces, but could be broiled over the coals
of the camp-fire. They were so plump that their legs were like tiny
points coming from beneath the rounded outline that swept the grass
as they walked. No butter was needed in cooking them, for they were
very fat. Some of the officers had not left behind them all of their
epicurean tastes, and preferred to have the birds cooked when they were
decidedly “gamy.” In this way they secured the privilege of taking
their odoriferous luncheon quite apart from the others. The general had
invited two officers besides his brother Tom, and his brother-in-law,
Mr. Calhoun, to mess with him. We had a tableful, and very merry
we were, even in the early morning. To joke before daylight seems
impossible, but even at breakfast peals of laughter went up from the
dining-tent.

One of the officers was envied, and we declared he got more to eat than
the rest, because he insisted upon “carving the hash;” while to cut
meat for all our hungry circle, as the general did at the other end
of the table, took many precious moments. One of our number called us
the “Great Grab Mess,” and some one slyly printed the words in large
black letters on the canvas that covered the luncheon-hamper, which was
usually strapped at the back of our travelling-carriage. How gladly
we gathered about that hamper when the command halted at noon! How
good the plover and sandwiches tasted, while we quenched our thirst
with cold coffee or tea! Since we were named as we were, we all dared
to reach over and help ourselves, and the one most agile and with the
longest arms was the best fed.

No great ceremony is to be expected when one rises before four, and
takes a hurried breakfast by the light of a tallow-candle; the soldiers
waiting outside to take down the tent, the servants hastily and
suggestively rattling the kettles and gridiron as they packed them,
made it an irresistible temptation for one hungry to “grab.”

We had a very satisfactory little cook-stove. It began its career
with legs, but the wind used to lift it up from the ground with such
violence it was finally dismembered, and afterwards placed flat on the
ground. Being of sheet-iron it cooled quickly, was very light, and
could be put in the wagon in a few moments after the morning meal was
cooked. When we came out from breakfast the wagon stood near, partly
packed, and bristling with kitchen utensils; buckets and baskets tied
outside the cover, axe and spade lashed to the side, while the little
stove looked out from the end. The mess-chest stood open on the ground
to receive the dishes we had used. At a given signal the dining-tent
went down with all those along the line, and they were stowed away in
the wagons in an incredibly short time. The wagon-train then drew out
and formed in order at the rear of the column.

At the bugle-call, “boots and saddles,” each soldier mounted and took
his place in line, all riding two abreast. First came the general and
his staff, with whom sister Margaret and I were permitted to ride; the
private orderlies and head-quarters detail rode in our rear; and then
came the companies according to the places assigned them for the day;
finally the wagon-train, with the rear-guard. We made a long drawn-out
cavalcade that stretched over a great distance. When we reached some
high bluff, we never tired of watching the command advancing, with the
long line of supply wagons, with their white covers, winding around
bends in the road and climbing over the hills. Every day the breaking
of camp went more smoothly and quickly, until, as the days advanced,
the general used to call me to his side to notice by his watch how few
moments it took after the tents were ordered down to set the whole
machinery for the march in motion; and I remember the regiment grew so
skilful in preparation that in one campaign the hour for starting never
varied five minutes during the whole summer.

The column was always halted once during the day’s march to water the
horses, then the luncheons were brought forth. They varied decidedly;
sometimes an officer took from his pocket a hard biscuit wrapped in
his handkerchief; the faithful orderly of another took his chief’s
sandwiches from his own haversack and brought them to him, wherever
he was. Often a provident officer, as he seated himself to his little
“spread” on the grass, was instantly surrounded by interested visitors,
who, heedless ever of any future, believed that the world owed them a
living and they were resolved to have it.

When the stream was narrow, and the hundreds of horses had to be
ranged along its banks to be watered, there was time for a nap. I
soon acquired the general’s habit of sleeping readily. He would throw
himself down anywhere and fall asleep instantly, even with the sun
beating on his head. It only takes a little training to learn to sleep
without a pillow on uneven ground and without shade. I learned, the
moment I was helped out of the saddle, to drop upon the grass and lose
myself in a twinkling. No one knows what a privilege it is to be
stretched out after being cramped over the horn of a lady’s saddle for
hours, until she has experienced it. I think I never got quite over
wishing for the shade of a tree; but there was often a little strip of
shadow on one side of the travelling wagon, which was always near us on
the journey. I was not above selfishly appropriating the space under
the wagon, if it had not been taken by somebody else. Even then I had
to dislodge a whole collection of dogs, who soon find the best places
for their comfort.

We had a citizen-guide with us, who, having been long in the country,
knew the streams, and the general and I, following his instructions,
often rode in advance as we neared the night’s camp. It was always a
mild excitement and new pleasure to select camp. The men who carried
the guidons for each company were sent for, and places assigned them.
The general delighted to unsaddle his favorite horse, Dandy, and turn
him loose, for his attachment was so strong he never grazed far from
us. He was not even tethered, and after giving himself the luxury of
a roll in the grass, he ate his dinner of oats, and browsed about the
tent, as tame as a kitten. He whinnied when my husband patted his sleek
neck, and looked jealously at the dogs when they all followed us into
the tent afterwards.

After tramping down the grass, to prevent the fire from spreading, my
husband would carry dry sticks and underbrush, and place them against
a fallen tree. That made an admirable back-log, and in a little while
we had a glorious fire, the general having a peculiar gift of starting
a flame on the wildest day. The next thing was to throw himself down
on the sod, cover his eyes with his white felt hat, and be sound asleep
in no time. No matter if the sun beat down in a perfect blaze, it never
disturbed him. The dogs came at once to lie beside him. I have seen
them stretched at his back and curled around his head, while the nose
and paws of one rested on his breast. And yet he was quite unconscious
of their crowding. They growled and scrambled for the best place, but
he slept placidly through it all.

When the command arrived, the guidons pointed out the location for
each company; the horses were unsaddled and picketed out; the wagons
unloaded and the tents pitched. The hewing of wood and the hauling of
water came next, and after the cook-fires were lighted, the air was
full of savory odors of the soldiers’ dinner. Sometimes the ground
admitted of pitching the tents of the whole regiment in two long lines
facing each other; the wagons were drawn up at either end, and also
at the rear of the two rows of tents; they were placed diagonally,
one end overlapping the other, so as to form a barricade against the
attack of Indians. Down the centre of the company street large ropes
were stretched, to which the horses were tied at night; our tents were
usually a little apart from the rest, at one end of the company street,
and it never grew to be an old story to watch the camp before us. After
I had changed my riding-habit for my one other gown, I came out to
join the general under the tent-fly, where he lay alternately watching
the scene and reading one of the well-thumbed books that he was never
without. I always had sewing--either a bit of needle-work that was
destined to make our garrison quarters more attractive, or more often
some necessary stitches to take in our hard-worn clothes. As we sat
there it would have been difficult for a stranger seeing us to believe
that it was merely the home of a day.

Our camps along the river were much alike, and each day when we
entered the tent our few things were placed exactly as they were the
day before. The only articles of furniture we had with us were two
folding-chairs, a bed, a wash-bowl, with bucket and tin dipper, and
a little mirror. This last, fastened to the tent-pole, swayed to and
fro with the never-ceasing wind, and made it a superfluous luxury, for
we learned to dress without it. The camp-chairs were a great comfort:
they were made by a soldier out of oak, with leather back, seat and
arms, the latter so arranged with straps and buckles that one could
recline or sit upright at will. I once made a long march and only took
a camp-stool for a seat; I knew therefore what an untold blessing it
was to have a chair in which to lean, after having been sitting in the
saddle for hours.

We had tried many inventions for cot-beds that folded, but nothing
stood the wear and tear of travel like the simple contrivance of two
carpenter’s horses placed at the right distance apart, with three
boards laid upon them. Such a bed was most easily transported, for the
supports could be tied to the outside of the wagon, while the boards
slipped inside before the rest of the camp equipage was packed.

An ineffaceable picture remains with me even now of those lovely camps,
as we dreamily watched them by the fading light of the afternoon. The
general and I used to think there was no bit of color equal to the
delicate blue line of smoke which rose from the camp-fire, where the
soldiers’ suppers were being cooked. The effect of light and shade,
and the varying tints of that perfect sky, were a great delight to
him. The mellow air brought us sounds that had become dear by long
and happy association--the low notes of the bugle in the hands of
the musician practising the calls; the click of the currycomb as
the soldiers groomed their horses; the whistle or song of a happy
trooper. And even the irrepressible accordeon at that distance made a
melody. It used to amuse us to find with what persistent ingenuity the
soldiers smuggled that melancholy instrument. No matter how limited the
transportation, after a few days’ march it was brought out from a roll
of blankets, or the teamster who had been bribed to keep it under the
seat, produced the prized possession. The bay of the hounds was always
music to the general. The bray of the mules could not be included under
that head but it was one of those “sounds from home” to which we had
become attached. Mingling with the melodies of the negro servants, as
they swung the blacking-brushes at the rear of the tents, were the
buoyant voices of the officers lying under the tent-flies, smoking the
consoling pipe.

The twilight almost always found many of us gathered together, some
idling on the grass in front of the camp-fire, or lounging on the
buffalo robes. The one with the best voice sang, while all joined in
the chorus.

We all had much patience in listening to what must necessarily be
“twice-told tales,” for it would have taken the author of “The Arabian
Nights” to supply fresh anecdotes for people who had been so many years
together. These stories usually varied somewhat from time to time,
and the more Munchausen-like they became the more attentive was the
audience.

The territories are settled by people who live an intense, exaggerated
sort of existence, and nothing tame attracts them. In order to compel
a listener, I myself fell into the habit of adding a cipher or two to
stories that had been first told in the States with moderate numbers.
If the family overheard me, their unquenchable spirit of mischief
invariably put a quietus on my eloquence. In fact I was soon cured
of temptation to amplify, by the repeated asides of my deriding
family, “Oh, I say, old lady, won’t you come down a hundred or two?”
Sometimes, when we were all gathered together at evening, we improved
the privilege which belongs to long-established friendships of keeping
silent. The men yielded to the soporific influence of tobacco, in quiet
content, knowing that nothing was expected of them if they chose not to
talk. My husband and I sometimes strolled through the camp at twilight,
and even went among the citizen teamsters that are employed for the
march, when they were preparing their evening meal.

These teamsters mess together on the march as the officers do, with
rarely more than four or five in the circle. One of the number buys
the supplies, takes charge of the rations, and keeps the accounts. The
sum of expenses is divided at the end of the month, and each pays his
portion. They take turns in doing the cooking, which, being necessarily
simple, each can bear a share of the labor. Sometimes we found a more
ambitious member of the mess endeavoring to rise superior to the
tiresome hard-tack; he had bared his brawny arms and was mixing biscuit
on the tail-board of the wagon, let down for the purpose. He whistled
away as he moulded the dough with his horny hands, and it would have
seemed that he had a Delmonico supper to anticipate.

We had not left Yankton far behind us before we were surprised to see
one of its most hospitable citizens drive up; he acknowledged that he
had missed us, and described the tameness of life after the departure
of the cavalry as something quite past endurance. We were so stupid as
not to discover, until after he had said the second good-bye, that he
really wanted to join us on the march; still, had he kept on, I am sure
his endurance would have been tested, for while I do not remember ever
to have been discouraged before in all our campaigning, I was so during
the storm that followed. The weather suddenly changed, and we began our
march with a dull, gray morning and stinging cold. The general wound
me up in all the outside wraps I had until I was a shapeless mass of
fur and wool as I sat in the saddle. We could talk but little to each
other, for the wind cut our faces and stiffened the flesh until it
ached. My hands became too numb to hold my horse, so I gave him his own
way. As we rode along like automatons, I was keeping my spirits up with
the thought of the camp we would make in the underbrush of a sheltered
valley by some stream, and the coming camp-fire rose brightly in my
imagination. We went slowly as the usual time a cavalry command makes
is barely four miles an hour. It was a discouraging spot where we
finally halted; it was on a stream, but the ice was thick along the
edges, and all we could see was the opposite bank, about thirty feet
high, so frozen over that it looked like a wall of solid ice. It was
difficult to pitch the tent, for the wind twisted and tore the canvas;
the ground was already so frozen that it took a long time to drive in
the iron pins by which the ropes holding the tents are secured. All
the tying and pinning of the opening was of little avail, for the wind
twisted off the tapes and flung the great brass pins I had brought on
purpose for canvas far and wide.

No camp-fire would burn, of course, in such a gale, but I remembered
thankfully the Sibley stove that we always carried. The saddler had cut
a hole in the roof of the tent for the pipe, and fastened zinc around
it to make it safe from fire. I shall never think about a Sibley stove
without gratitude, nor cease to wonder how so simple an invention can
be the means of such comfort. It is only a cone of sheet-iron, open at
the top and bottom; the broader part rests on the ground, while the
little pipe fits on the top. The wood is put through a door cut in the
side; only billets can be used, for the aperture is of course small. It
requires almost constant attention to keep the insatiable little thing
filled, but it never occurs to one, where half a dozen are huddled
together, to ask who shall be the fireman, and there is equal division
of labor. The stove is so light that, in marching, the pipe is removed
and a rope run through the openings, which enables it to be tied
underneath the wagon, beside the bucket which is always suspended there
to be used to water the horses.

The general was busy in the adjutant’s tent, so I sent for the
sergeant, who was our factotum, and asked him to hunt up the Sibley
stove. I felt disheartened when he told me it had been forgotten.[A] I
could have gone to the next tent where a provident officer had put his
up, but I felt in too disagreeable a humor to inflict myself on any
one, and so crept into bed to keep warm. It was an unmistakable fit
of sulks, and I was in the valley of humiliation next morning, for I
knew well how difficult it is to have ladies on the march, and how many
obstacles the general had surmounted to arrange for my coming. My part
consisted in drilling myself to be as little trouble as I could. I had
really learned, by many a self-inflicted lesson, never to be too cold
or too hot, and rarely allowed a thought of hunger if we were where no
supplies could be had. It was a long struggle, but I finally learned
never to drink between meals, as it is always difficult to get water on
a march. I can remember being even mortified at dropping my whip, for
I wished to be so little trouble that every one would be unconscious
of my presence, so far as being an inconvenience was concerned. The
cold of Dakota overcame me on that one day, but it was the last time I
succumbed to it.

    [A] It was afterwards recovered.




CHAPTER V.

CAMPING AMONG THE SIOUX.


Our march took us through the grounds set apart by the Government for
the use of the Sioux Indians at peace with our country. We had not made
much progress before we began to see their graves. They do not bury
their dead, but place them on boards lashed to the limbs of trees, or
on high platforms raised from the ground by four poles perhaps twenty
feet. The body is wound round and round with clothing or blankets,
like a mummy, and inside the layers are placed fire-arms, tobacco,
and jerked beef, to supply them on the imaginary journey to the happy
hunting-grounds. In the early morning, when it was not quite light,
as we filed by these solitary sepulchres, it was uncanny and weird,
and the sun, when it came, was doubly welcome. Our first visitor from
Agency Indians was Fool-dog, a Sioux chief. He was tall, commanding,
and had really a fine face. When he was ready to go home he invited us
to come to his village before we left on our next march. At twilight
my husband and I walked over. The village was a collection of tepees
of all sizes, the largest being what is called the Medicine Lodge,
where the councils are held. It was formed of tanned buffalo-hides,
sewed together with buckskin thongs, and stretched over a collection
of thirty-six poles. These poles are of great value to the Indians,
for in a sparsely timbered country like Dakota it is difficult to find
suitable trees. It is necessary to go a great distance to procure the
kind of sapling that is light and pliable and yet sufficiently strong
for the purpose. The poles are lashed together at the tops and radiate
in a circle below. The smoke was pouring out of the opening above, and
the only entrance to the tepee was a round aperture near the ground,
sufficiently large to allow a person to crawl in. Around the lodge
were poles from which were suspended rags; in these were tied their
medicines of roots and herbs, supposed to be a charm to keep off evil
spirits. The sound of music came from within; I crept tremblingly in
after the general, not entirely quieted by his keeping my hand in his,
and whispering something to calm my fears as I sat on the buffalo robe
beside him. In the first place, I knew how resolute the Indians were in
never admitting one of their own women to council, and their curious
eyes and forbidding expressions towards me did not add to my comfort.
The dust, smoke, and noise in the fading light were not re-assuring.
Fool-dog arose from the circle of what composed their nobility, and
solemnly shook hands with the general; those next in rank followed his
example. The pipe was then smoked, and the general had to take a whiff
when it came his turn. Fortunately we escaped the speeches, for we had
not brought an interpreter.

Coming out of the light into this semi-darkness, with the grotesque
figures of the plebeians, as they danced around their chiefs and
contorted their bodies to the sound of the Indian drum and minor
notes of the singers, made it something unearthly in appearance; their
painted faces, grunts and grins of serious mirth as they wheeled around
the tepee, made me shiver. How relieved I felt when the final pipe was
smoked and the good-bye said! The curious eyes of the squaws, who stood
in the vicinity of the lodge, followed us, as they watched me clinging
to the general’s arm while we disappeared, in the direction of camp,
through the thickening gloom.

As we went farther north the twilights became longer, and I was greatly
deceived by having so much daylight. Every morning, when the reveille
sounded, in attempting to obey its summons I found myself actually
mystified from excessive drowsiness, and I announced my resolve to go
to bed at dark--as was often my custom on previous marches--when I was
informed that we had marched into a land where daylight continues into
the night hours. The general, who was always looking at the curious
effects in the heavens, delighted in the clearness of the atmosphere
and the myriads of stars that seemed to far outnumber all we had ever
seen in other skies. All the strange phenomena of northern climes
revealed themselves to us day by day. The sun and moon dogs, the lunar
rainbows, and sometimes three perfect arcs of brilliant color formed
directly above us in the heavens as we made our day’s march through
spring showers. The storms came down in great belts of rain sometimes,
and if the country were level enough we could look ahead on the plain
and see where the storm was crossing. This enabled us to halt in time
to escape a perfect sheet of pouring rain which fell like a wall of
water directly before us. Once we found ourselves in the midst of it,
and not knowing then the peculiarities of such storms, we took our
drenching philosophically, and believed that it was like too many
others that had kept us soaked to the skin for hours. Seeing the sun
shining in advance on the plain, the general and I put spurs to our
horses and rode out of the storm to perfectly dry ground. The sun came
down on us so hotly that we were soon enveloped in a halo of steam from
our drying clothes.

The history of one day’s march was that of many; they were varied by
small misfortunes over which we amused ourselves, but which were very
serious affairs to the melancholy Ham. He had cooked by fireplaces
in Kentucky, but never having lived out-doors before, he gained his
experience by hard trials. The little sheet-iron cooking-stove which we
considered such a treasure, was placed in the kitchen-tent on stormy
nights, and the bit of pipe, put through a hole in the canvas, had an
elbow so that it could be turned according to the direction of the wind.

One day, after camp was re-established, the general saw the smoke
pouring out of the opening of the kitchen-tent, and hurried to see what
was the matter. It was one of those days when the Dakota winds, like
those of Kansas, blow in all directions; poor Ham was barely visible
in the dense smoke inside the tent. “Why don’t you turn the pipe?” the
general called, above the tempest; and Ham shouted back, “Giniril,
I did; see whar she’s p’intin’ now?” His master’s sides shook with
laughter, for sure enough the pipe would have been right if there had
been any uniformity in the course of the wind. The general was hungry,
but he did not stop to complain; he found a place somewhat sheltered,
and digging a hole in the ground, taught the discouraged darkey how to
build a fire outside. At last we sat down to a burned, smoky meal, and
had to go to bed hungry.

Another day, when there was a small tornado, we began to wonder why
dinner was delayed; we looked out, to find the cook-tent blown flat to
the ground. The general ran to the rescue, and found Ham interred, as
the old-time child stories buried their heroes, “in a pot of grease.”
He had been thrown among skillets and kettles, and the half-cooked
dinner was scattered over him. The general helped him out, and was too
much exhausted with laughter over the old fellow’s exasperated remarks
about “such a low-down country,” to mind the delay of the dinner.
Indeed, he soothed him by telling him to wait and begin again when the
wind went down, as it usually does when the sun sets.

One day we caught sight of our American flag on the other side of the
river, floating over a little group of buildings inside a stockade.
When they told me that it was a military post, I could hardly believe
it possible; it seemed that no spot could be more utterly desolate.
Then I remembered having met an officer at Yankton who had told me that
was his station. As I looked at his fine face and figure, I could not
help thinking how thoroughly some woman would appreciate him. Thinking
aloud, I said that I hoped he had “improved each shining hour” of his
leave of absence, and was already engaged. He replied that I would see
his post as we went up the river, and then might comprehend why he did
not dare ask any woman to be his wife. I argued that if some girl grew
fond of him, it would little matter to her where she went, if it were
only by her husband’s side. I confess, however, that when I saw that
lonely place, I thought that it would require extraordinary devotion
to follow him there. It was an infantry station, and the soldiers’
barracks, officers’ quarters, and storehouses were huddled together
inside a wall made of logs placed perpendicularly and about fifteen
feet high. The sand was so deep about this spot that nothing could be
made to grow. Constant gusts of wind over the unprotected plain kept
little clouds of fine alkaline dust whirling in the air and filling
the eyes and mouth; not a tree was near, as the Missouri--that most
uncertain of rivers--kept constantly changing its channel, and the
advancing water washed away great hollows in the banks. The post would
then have to be moved farther back for safety. The soldiers would be
obliged to take up the stockade, and bury the logs as deep as they
could to keep them from blowing over. The frail buildings, “built upon
the sand,” rocked and swayed in the wind.

Beside the forlorn situation of this garrison, no one could go outside
to ride or hunt without peril. The warlike Indians considered that
side of the river theirs, and roamed up and down it at will. They came
incessantly to the small sliding panel in the gates of the stockade,
and made demands, which, if not consented to, were followed by howls
of rage and threatening gestures. All that the handful of men could do
was to conciliate them as best they could. The company was not full,
and possibly, all told, there were but fifty white men against hundreds
of Indians. The only variety in their lives was the passing of an
occasional steamer in the brief summer. Then settled down the pitiless
winter, burying them in snow which never left the ground until late in
the spring. The mail only reached them at irregular intervals. They
were compelled to live almost entirely on commissary stores, for though
living in the midst of game it was too hazardous to attempt to hunt.
When we found that one regiment had been seven years on the river, and
some of the officers had never taken leave of absence, it seems strange
that any one stationed at such a post had not gone stark mad. It makes
me proud of women when I recall the fact that the wife of an officer
did live in that wretched little post afterwards, and did not complain.
The cavalry, turning to look their last at that garrison, thanked the
good-fortune that had placed them in a branch of the service where
there was the active duty of campaigns to vary a life otherwise so
monotonous.

The dogs had almost as hard a time to become accustomed to the
vagaries of a Dakota climate as we did. We had to be their nurses
and surgeons. In our large pack of hounds there were many that had
marked individuality of character. Not many days could be passed in
their company before we were noticing new peculiarities not previously
observed. The general had a droll fashion, as we rode along, of putting
words into their mouths when they got into trouble, fought among
themselves, or tried to lord it over one another. One of them had been
given us, and had been called by her former owner “Lucy Stone.” In vain
did we try, out of respect for the life of the useful woman for whom
she was named, to rechristen the dog. She would neither listen nor
obey if called anything else. I can see her now, sitting deliberately
down in the road directly in front of us, and holding up a paw full
of cactus thorns. The general would say, “There sits Lucy Stone, and
she is saying, ‘If you please, sir, since you chose to bring me into a
land of bristling earth like this, will you please get down immediately
and attend to my foot?’” Her howls and upturned eyes meant an appeal,
certainly, and her master would leap to the ground, sit down in the
road, and taking the old creature in his arms, begin the surgery.
He carried one of those knives that had many adjuncts, and with the
tweezers he worked tenderly and long to extract the tormenting cactus
needles. Lucy was a complaining old dame, and when the general saw her
sit down, like some fat old woman, he used to say that the old madam
was telling him that she “would like to drive a bit, if you please.”
So it often happened that my travelling-wagon was the hospital for an
ill or foot-sore dog. The general had to stop very often to attend to
the wounded paws, but experience taught the dogs to make their way very
skilfully where the cactus grew. A dancing-master, tripping the steps
of instruction, could not have moved more lightly than did they. If
there were no one near to whom they could appeal in the human way those
dumb things have, they learned to draw out the offending thorns with
their teeth.

While we were all getting accustomed to the new climate, it was of no
use to try to keep the dogs out of my tent. They stood around, and eyed
me with such reproachful looks if I attempted to tie up the entrance
to the tent and leave them out. If it were very cold when I returned
from the dining-tent, I found dogs under and on the camp-bed, and so
thickly scattered over the floor that I had to step carefully over
them to avoid hurting feet or tails. If I secured a place in the bed
I was fortunate. Sometimes, when it had rained, and all of them were
wet, I rebelled. The steam from their shaggy coats was stifling; but
the general begged so hard for them that I taught myself to endure the
air at last. I never questioned the right of the half-grown puppies to
everything. Our struggles to raise them, and to avoid the distemper
which goes so much harder with blooded than with cur dogs, endeared
them to us. When I let the little ones in, it was really comical to
hear my husband’s arguments and cunningly-devised reasons why the older
dogs should follow. A plea was put up for “the hound that had fits;”
there was always another that “had been hurt in hunting;” and so on
until the tent would hold no more. Fortunately, in pleasant weather, I
was let off with only the ill or injured ones for perpetual companions.
We were so surrounded with dogs when they were resting after the march,
and they slept so soundly from fatigue, that it was difficult to walk
about without stepping on them.

My favorite, a great cream-colored stag-hound, was named “Cardigan.”
He never gave up trying to be my lap-dog. He was enormous, and yet
seemingly unconscious of his size. He kept up a perpetual struggle and
scramble on his hind-legs to get his whole body up on my lap. If I
pieced myself out with a camp-stool to support him, he closed his eyes
in a beatific state and sighed in content while I held him, until my
foot went to sleep and I was cramped with his weight. One thing that
made me so fond of him was that on one occasion, when he was put in
the kennel after an absence, he was almost torn to pieces by the other
dogs. He was a brave hound, but he was at fearful odds against so many.
Great slices of flesh were torn from his sides, and gaping wounds made
by the fang-like teeth showed through his shaggy coat. It was many
months before they healed.

Though the stag-hound is gentle with human beings he is a terrible
fighter. They stand on their hind-legs and, facing each other, claw and
tear like demons. It was always necessary to watch them closely when a
new dog, or one that they had not seen for some time, was put in their
midst.

I will anticipate a moment and speak of the final fate of Cardigan.
When I left Fort Lincoln I asked some one to look out for his welfare,
and send him, as soon as possible, to a clergyman who had been my
husband’s friend. My request was complied with, and afterwards, when
the poor old dog died, his new master honored him by having his body
set up by the taxidermist, and a place was given him in one of the
public buildings in Minneapolis. I cannot help thinking that he was
worthy of the tribute, not only because of the testimony thus given
to the friendship of the people for his master, but because he was the
bravest and most faithful of animals.

Most of the country passed over in our route belonged to the Indian
Reservations, and the Government was endeavoring to teach the tribes
settled there to cultivate the soil. They had hunted off most of the
game; an occasional jack-rabbit, the plover, and a few wild ducks were
all that were left. I must not forget the maddening curlew. It was not
good eating, but it was always exciting to see one. There never was
a more exasperating bird to shoot. Time and again a successful shot
was prophesied, and I was called to be a witness, only to see finally
the surprise of the general when the wily bird soared calmly away. I
believe no person was able to bring one down during the entire trip.

As we approached an Indian village, the chiefs came out to receive
us. There were many high-sounding words of welcome, translated by our
guide, who, having lived among them many years, knew the different
dialects. The Government had built some comfortable log-houses
for them, in many of which I would have lived gladly. The Indians
did not care for them, complaining that they had coughs if they
occupied a house. A tepee was put up alongside, in which one or two
families lived, while little low lodges, looking like the soldiers’
shelter-tents, were used for the young men of the circle to sleep in.
The tools and stores given by the Government were packed away in the
otherwise empty houses.




CHAPTER VI.

A VISIT TO THE VILLAGE OF “TWO BEARS.”


A Sioux chief, called Two Bears, had the most picturesque village that
we saw. The lodges were placed in a circle, as this was judged the
most defensive position; the ponies were herded inside the enclosure
at night. This precaution was necessary, for the neighboring tribes
swept down on them after dark and ran off the stock if they were not
secured. As we dismounted, we saw an old man standing alone in the
circle, apparently unconscious of everything, as he recounted some war
tale in loud, monotonous tones. He had no listeners--all were intently
watching the approaching regiment; still the venerable Sioux went on
as persistently as if he were looking “upon a sea of upturned faces.”
He was the “medicine-man,” or oracle, of the tribe, or possibly the
“poet-laureate” of the village, for the guide told us he sang of the
deeds of valor of his people far back in history.

Just outside of the village, the chiefs sat in a circle awaiting us.
Two Bears arose to welcome the general, and asked him to go with him to
his lodge. I was asked to go also and be presented to Miss Two Bears;
for she was too royal in birth to be permitted outside, and it was not
in keeping with the dignity of her rank to mingle with the others, the
guide afterwards explained to us.

The honor of going alone into the tepee was one that I could have
foregone, for my courage was much greater if I did my Indian
sight-seeing surrounded by the regiment. The general, fearing their
_amour propre_ might be offended if I declined the invitation,
whispered an encouraging word, and we dipped our heads and crept
into the tepee. The chief was a dignified old man, wrapped in his
blanket, without the usual addition of some portion of citizen’s dress
which the Indians believe adds to their grandeur. His daughter also
was in complete squaw’s costume; her feet were moccasined, her legs
and ankles wound round with beaded leggings, and she had on the one
buckskin garment which never varies in cut through all the tribes.
A blanket drawn over her head was belted at her waist. To crown all
this, however, she had an open parasol, brought to her, doubtless, as a
present by some Indian returning from a council at Washington. She held
it with dignity, as if it might be to her as much an insignia of state
as the mace of the lord-mayor.

Fortunately they did not ask us to sit down and partake of jerked
beef, or to smoke the never-ending pipe, so we soon got through our
compliments and returned to the outer entrance of the village.

Here the tribe were assembled, and evidently attired in gala-dress
in our honor. We were most interested in the village belle, and the
placid manner in which she permitted us to walk around her, gazing and
talking her good points over, showed that she expected homage. She
sat on a scarlet blanket spread on the ground, and over her, stretched
from poles, was another for an awning. She was loaded with ornaments,
row after row of beads about her neck, broad armlets and anklets of
brass, pinchbeck rings, and a soft buckskin dress and leggings, heavily
embroidered. Her ears were pierced twice--on the side as well as in the
lobe--and from these holes were suspended circles of gilt. Her bright
eyes, the satin smoothness of her hair, and the clear brown of the skin
made a pretty picture. There was no attempt to blend into the brown the
bright patch of carmine on each cheek.

Only extreme youth and its ever attractive charms can make one forget
the heavy square shape of Indian faces and their coarse features.
It was surprising to see all the other squaws giving up the field
to this one so completely. They crouched near, with a sort of
“every-dog-must-have-its-day” look, and did not even dispute her sway
by making coy eyes as we spoke to them.

There were but few young men. Their absence was always excused by the
same reason--they were out hunting. We knew how little game there was,
and surmised--what we afterwards found to be true--that they had joined
the hostile tribes, and only came in to the distribution of supplies
and presents in the fall. A few rods from the village a tripod of poles
was set in the ground, and lashed to it the Indian’s shield, made of
the hide of the buffalo where it is thickest about the neck. There were
rude paintings and Indian hieroglyphics covering it. The shield is an
heirloom with the Indian, and the one selected to hang out in this
manner has always the greatest war record. One of their superstitions
is that it keeps away enemies. These nomads had some idea of luxury,
for I recollect seeing some of them reclining on a kind of rest made
of a framework of pliable rods, over which was stretched buckskin.
Afterwards I found how comfortable such contrivances were, for one was
given me. The slope is so gradual that you half recline and can read
with great ease.

When we had reached camp and were taking our afternoon siesta the same
day, with the tent walls raised for air, we were roused by the sound
of music. Looking off over the bluffs we saw a large body of Indians
approaching on ponies, while squaws and children ran beside them.
It was the prompt response of Two Bears to the general’s invitation
to return his call. The warriors stopped near camp, and dismounting
advanced towards us. The squaws unbridled and picketed the ponies, and
made themselves comfortable by arranging impromptu shades of the bright
blankets. They staked down two corners closely to the ground, and
propped up the others with poles stuck in the sod.

When the Indians came up to us, the council was, as usual, begun. The
pipe being smoked, Two Bears gave us a eulogy of himself. He then
demanded, in behalf of the tribe, payment for the use of the ground on
which we were encamped, and also for the grass consumed, though it was
too short to get more than an occasional tuft. He ended, as they all
do, with a request for food. The general in reply vaguely referred them
to the Great Father in payment for the use of their land, but presented
them with a beef in return for their hospitality. Only half satisfied,
they stalked away one by one. We watched them at a distance kill and
divide the beef. It surprised us to see how they despatched it, and
that hardly a vestige of it was left.

Many of the Indians coming from reservations carried papers which they
valued and carefully guarded. After burrowing under robe and shirt,
something was produced wrapped in layers of soiled cotton cloth. It was
a recommendation of them obtained from some officer or Indian agent.
This was presented on entering, as their letter of introduction. Most
of these papers read very much the same way. Giving the Indian’s name,
it stated that he had been living on the reservation for a certain
length of time, that he was friendly to the whites, etc.

One of our guests that day carried something a little different. He
was called “Medicine Jo.” Lingering behind the rest, he presented
his letter with perfect good faith and great pomposity. Some wag had
composed it, and it read something like this:

  “Medicine Jo says he is a good Indian, that you can trust him. If
  he is, he is the first I have ever seen, and in my opinion he, like
  all the rest, will bear watching.”

It was all the general could do to keep his face straight as he handed
back to the unconscious owner this little libel on himself.

The interpreter kept constantly before us the fine post that we were
approaching, and the last day before we reached there it was visible
for a long distance. The atmosphere of Dakota was so deceptive that
we imagined ourselves within a few miles of the garrison, when, in
reality, there was a march of twenty-nine long miles before us.

Our road led up from the river valley on the high bluffs, and
sometimes followed along the backbone of hills from which on either
side we looked down a great distance. There was barely room for the
travelling-wagon. Occasionally I had been obliged to take refuge
from the cold for a little while and drive. Our lead-mules were
tiny, quick-moving little dots, and I soon discovered that they were
completely demoralized at the sight of an Indian. They could see one
in advance long before the driver could. A sudden shying and quick
turning of these agile little brutes, a general tangle of themselves in
the harness and legs of the wheelers, loud shouts of the driver, and a
quick downfall of his foot on the brake, to keep us from overturning,
made an exciting _mêlée_.

Nothing would get them righted and started again. They would have to
be unharnessed, and the rebellious pair tied to the rear of the wagon
until we had gone far beyond the object of terror. Part of the day that
we were following the wanderings of the road alongside hills and over
the narrow, smooth level of the hill-tops, I was compelled to drive,
and I watched anxiously the ears of these wretched little beasts to
see if they expressed any sentiment of fright. We came to such steep
descents, the brake holding the wheels seemed of no use. Looking down
from the wagon on to the mules below us, we appeared to be in the
position of flies on a wall.

As we came to one descent more awful than the rest, the general, who
was always near, rode up to the carriage and told me not to be afraid,
for he would order the wheels manned. The head-quarters escort of over
a hundred men, dismounting, attached ropes to the wheels, and held on
with all their strength while I went down the steepest declivity I had
ever descended. After that I begged to get out, and the general carried
me to a bank and set me down where I could watch the repairing of the
road.

He took off his coat and joined the soldiers in carrying logs and
shovelling earth, for they were obliged to fill up the soft bed of the
stream before the command could cross. It took a long time and much
patience; but the general enjoyed it all, and often helped when the
crossings needed to be prepared. When the logs were all laid, I had
to laugh at the energy he showed in cracking a whip he borrowed from
a teamster, and shouting to the mules to urge them to pull through
where there was danger of their stalling. When the road was completed,
I was ready to mount my horse, for it seemed to me preferable to die
from accident, surrounded with friends, than to expire alone in the
mule-wagon. The ascent was rendered so wet and slippery, the general
feared my saddle would turn, and I was once more shut in by myself. The
soldiers again manned the wheels to prevent the carriage sliding back,
the mules scrambled, and with the aid of language prepared expressly
for them, we reached the summit.

The driver had named the lead-mules Bettie and Jane, and when they
were over their tempers he petted and caressed them. Their repeated
rebellion at last wore out even his patience. One morning I noticed
new leaders, but the imperturbable face of the driver gave no hint of
his successful plotting. Mary told me, however, that he was worn out
with his struggles, and had gone after dark into the herd of mules with
Bettie and Jane, and, as he expressed it, “lost them.” He selected
two more from among those belonging to the wagon-train, and returned
triumphant over his premeditated exchange. He carefully reclipped their
manes and tails, and disguised them still further with blotches of
black paint, to give them a mottled appearance. When the other teamster
prepared to harness in the morning, of course he discovered the fraud
perpetrated on him. There was no redress then, and he had to take out
his wrath in language more forcible than elegant, which the teamsters
have adapted expressly for extreme occasions. Our driver told Mary,
with a chuckle, that with a command of many hundred men waiting for a
teamster to harness, he found “no time for swapping horses.”

Burkman, the soldier who took care of our horses, was a middle-aged
man, so deliberate in speech and slow in his movements, he seemed as
incongruous among the spirited cavalrymen as would be an old-time
farmer. Early in the march I had heard him coughing as he groomed
the horses. When I asked if he had done anything for his cold, he
replied, “Bottle after bottle of stuff, mum, but it don’t do no good,”
so I begged the surgeon to look more carefully into his case. He made
an examination, and told me, as the result, that the man must have
only light work and nourishing food. After that I asked Mary to save
everything for Burkman and make his recovery her especial care. The
officers made fun of me, as they were rather incredulous, and thought
a bit of shamming was being practised on me, but I knew better. They
never failed to comment and smile when they saw the old defender of his
country coming out of the kitchen-tent, his jaws working and his mouth
full, while he carried all the food his hands would hold. To tell the
truth, he kept up this prescription of nourishing food long after he
had quite recovered.

It became the delight of my husband and the officers to chaff me
about “Old Nutriment,” for such was the sobriquet they gave him. At
last, even Mary began to narrate how he swept everything before him
with voracious, convalescing appetite. “Why, Miss Libbie,” she said
to me one day, “I thought I’d try him with a can of raw tomatoes,
and set them before him, asking if he was fond of them. And he just
drawled out, ‘_Always was_,’ and the tomatoes were gone in no time.”
His laconic answer passed into a proverb with us all, when invited to
partake of anything we liked.

Such a tender heart as that old soldier had! I had noticed this first
in Kentucky. My horse, which I prized above all that I have ever
ridden, died during my temporary absence from home. I was too greatly
grieved to ask many questions about him, but one day, some time
afterwards, when we were riding through a charming bit of country,
Burkman approached me from the place where he usually rode behind us,
and said, “I’d like to tell Mrs. Custer there’s whar poor Phil lies
I picked the purtiest place I could find for him.” And he had indeed,
for the green valley under wide-spreading trees would have gone far to
reconcile many a weary human heart to be placed under the sod.

We thought we had made the first step towards savage life when Burkman
brought the mother of the one baby of our regiment the dried vertebra
of a rattlesnake that he killed, because he had heard that it was the
best of anything on which the infant could cut its teeth!

I had made some scarlet flannel shirts for my husband’s use on the
summer campaign, and he was as much pleased as possible, beginning at
once to wear them. Not many days’ march proved to me what an error I
had made. The bright red color could be seen for miles, when the form
itself was almost lost on the horizon. I had to coax to get them away
again and replace them with the dark blue that he usually wore. Though
I triumphed, I was met with a perfect fusillade of teasing when I
presented the red shirts to Burkman. The officers, of course, hearing
all the discussion over the subject--as no trifle was too small to
interest us in one another’s affairs--attacked me at once. If I had
been so anxious to protect the general from wearing anything that
would attract the far-seeing eye of the vigilant Indian on the coming
campaign, why should I be so willing to sacrifice the life of “Old
Nutriment?” They made no impression on me, however, for they knew as
well as I did that the soldier, though so faithful, was not made of
that stuff that seeks to lead a Balaklava charge.

My husband and I were so attached to him, and appreciated so deeply his
fidelity, we could not thank the good-fortune enough that gave us one
so loyal to our interests.

Before we reached the post we were approaching, the commandant sent
out ice for our use, and the despatches of the Associated Press. The
general was greatly delighted to get news of events that had occurred
all over the world, in this far distant land. We found afterwards that
the officers joined in paying for the despatches. The Indians had such
a superstition about molesting the wires, that the lines ran through
even the most dangerous country. I can hardly say how good it seemed to
us to see a telegraph-pole again.

We were not surprised, after seeing the other posts below on the river,
that the guide had praised Fort Sully. It was the head-quarters of
one of the infantry regiments, and the commanding officer had been at
the post long enough to put it in excellent order. It was situated on
an open plateau, from which there was an extensive view. Below in the
valley the companies had gardens, and they also kept cows, pigs, and
chickens. We looked upon all this as an El Dorado, and the thought of
remaining long enough at one fort to get any good out of a garden was
simply unknown in our vagrant existence.

Our camp was very near the post, on the same open plain, without trees
or shelter. We were received with genuine hospitality, and finally all
of us invited to luncheon. The ladies came up from the steamer, and the
large house was filled with happy people. The post band played outside
on the parade-ground while we lunched. We had nine kinds of game on the
table. Some of it was new to us--the beaver tail, for instance--but it
was so like pork and so fat I could only taste it. We had, in addition,
antelope, elk, buffalo tongue, wild turkey, black-tailed deer, wild
goose, plover, and duck. The goose was a sort of “fatted calf” for us.
The soldiers had caught it while young, and by constantly clipping
its wings, had kept it from joining the flocks which its cries often
brought circling around the post. At last it began to make the life
of the chickens a burden to them, and we arrived in time to enjoy the
delicious bird served with jelly made from the tart, wild “bullberries”
that grew near the river. The home-made bread, delightful cake, tender
ham of the garrison’s own curing, and the sweets made with cream, fresh
butter, and eggs--three unheard-of luxuries with us--proved that it is
possible for army people to live in comfort if they do not belong to
a mounted regiment. Still, though they had a band and a good library
belonging to the regiment, the thought of being walled in with snow,
and completely isolated for eight months of the year, made me shudder.
The post was midway between Yankton and Bismarck, each the termination
of a railroad, and each two hundred and fifty miles away.

The wife of the commanding officer was known throughout the department
for her lovely Christian character, and the contented life she led
under all circumstances. I was much amused at her account of her
repeated trials in trying to secure a permanent governess. She said
all the posts along the river seemed to know intuitively when a new one
arrived from the East. The young officers found more imperative duties
calling them to Fort Sully than they had dreamed of in a year. Before
long the governess began to be abstracted, and watch longingly for the
mails. A ring would next appear on the significant first finger, and
be the forerunner of a request to allow her to resign her place. This
had happened four times when I met our hostess, and though she was glad
to furnish the officers with wives, she rather sighed for a woman who,
though possessing every accomplishment, might still be so antiquated
and ugly that she could be sure to keep her for a time at least.

The commandant had some fine greyhounds, and joining the general
with his packs of stag and fox hounds, they had several hunts in the
few days that remained. Of course, after so bright a visit and such
a feast, it was hard to begin again on the march with baking-powder
biscuit and tough beef. The cattle that supplied us with meat were
driven along on the march, and killed every other day, and could not
be expected to be in very good condition. The interest of our journey,
however, made us soon forget all deprivations. Grateful sentiments
towards those who had been so kind to us as strangers remained as a
memory.




CHAPTER VII.

ADVENTURES DURING THE LAST DAYS OF THE MARCH.


My husband and I kept up our little _détours_ by ourselves as we neared
the hour for camping each day. One day one of the officers accompanied
us. We left the higher ground to go down by the water and have the
luxury of wandering through the cottonwood-trees that sometimes fringed
the river for several miles. As usual, we had a number of dogs leaping
and racing around us. Two of them started a deer, and the general
bounded after them, encouraging the others with his voice to follow.
He had left his friend with me, and we rode leisurely along to see
that the younger dogs did not get lost. Without the least warning,
in the dead stillness of that desolate spot, we suddenly came upon a
group of young Indian warriors seated in their motionless way in the
underbrush. I became perfectly cold and numb with terror. My danger in
connection with the Indians was twofold. I was in peril from death or
capture by the savages, and liable to be killed by my own friends to
prevent my capture. During the five years I had been with the regiment
in Kansas I had marched many hundred miles. Sometimes I had to join
my husband going across a dangerous country, and the exposure from
Indians all those years had been constant. I had been a subject of
conversation among the officers, being the only woman who, as a rule,
followed the regiment, and, without discussing it much in my presence,
the universal understanding was that any one having me in charge in an
emergency where there was imminent danger of my capture should shoot me
instantly. While I knew that I was defended by strong hands and brave
hearts, the thought of the double danger always flashed into my mind
when we were in jeopardy.

If time could have been measured by sensations, a cycle seemed to
have passed in those few seconds. The Indians snatched up their guns,
leaped upon their ponies, and prepared for attack. The officer with me
was perfectly calm, spoke to them coolly without a change of voice,
and rode quickly beside me, telling me to advance. My horse reared
violently at first sight of the Indians, and started to run. Gladly
would I have put him to his mettle then, except for the instinct of
obedience, which any one following a regiment acquires in all that
pertains to military directions. The general was just visible ascending
a bluff beyond. To avoid showing fear when every nerve is strung to its
utmost, and your heart leaps into your throat, requires super-human
effort. I managed to check my horse and did not scream. No amount of
telling over to myself what I had been told, that all the tribes on
this side were peaceable and that only those on the other side of the
river were warlike, could quell the throbbing of my pulses. Indians
were Indians to me, and I knew well that it was a matter of no time to
cross and recross on their little tub-like boats that shoot madly down
the tide.

What made me sure that these warriors whom we had just met were from
the fighting bands was the recollection of some significant signs we
had come upon in the road a few days previous. Stakes had been set
in the ground, with bits of red flannel fastened on them peculiarly.
This, the guide explained, meant warnings from the tribes at war to
frighten us from any further advance into their country. Whether
because of the coolness of the officer, or because the warriors knew of
the size of the advancing column, we were allowed to proceed unharmed.
How interminable the distance seemed to where the general awaited us,
unconscious of what we had encountered! I was lifted out of the saddle
a very limp and unconscious thing.

Encouraged by references to other dangers I had lived through without
flinching, I mounted again and followed the leader closely. He took us
through some rough country, where the ambitious horses, finding that by
bending their heads they could squeeze through, forgot to seek openings
high enough to admit those sitting in the saddle. We crashed through
underbrush, and I, with habit torn and hands scratched, was sometimes
almost lifted up, Absalom-like, by the resisting branches. Often we had
no path, and the general’s horse, “Vic,” would start straight up steep
banks after we had forded streams. It never occurred to his rider,
until after the ascent was made, and a faint voice arose from the
valley, that all horses would not do willingly what his thorough-bred
did. He finally turned to look back and tell me how to manage my
horse. I abandoned the bridle when we came to those ascents, and wound
my hands in the horse’s mane to keep from sliding entirely off, while
the animal took his own way. All this was such variety and excitement I
was delighted, and forgot my terror of the morning.

We found a bit of lovely road, which only those who go hundreds of
miles under a blazing sun can appreciate fully. The sunshine came
flickering down through the branches of the trees and covered the
short grass with checkered light and shade. Here we dawdled, and
enjoyed looking up at the patches of blue sky through great grown-up
tree-tops. It was like a bit of woods at home, where I never thought
to be grateful for foliage, but took it as a matter of course. My
husband remembered my having put some biscuit in the leather pocket on
my saddle, and invited himself to luncheon at once. We dismounted, and
threw ourselves on the ground to eat the very frugal fare.

After resting, we gave ourselves the privilege of a swift gallop over
the stretch of smooth ground before us. We were laughing and talking so
busily I never noticed the surroundings until I found we were almost
in the midst of an Indian village, quite hidden under a bluff. My
heart literally stood still. I watched the general furtively. He was
as usual perfectly unmoved, and yet he well knew that this was the
country where it was hardly considered that the Indian was overburdened
with hospitality. Oh, how I wished ourselves safely with the column,
now so far away! There were but few occupants of the village, but they
glowered and growled, and I could see the venomous glances they cast
on us as I meekly followed. I trembled so I could barely keep my seat
as we slowly advanced, for the general even slackened his speed, to
demonstrate to them, I suppose, that we felt ourselves perfectly at
home. He said “How,” of course, which was his usual salutation to them.
An echoing “how” beside him proved that I still had power of utterance.
When we came to one Indian, who looked menacingly at us and doggedly
stood in our road, the officer with us declared that I accompanied my
“how” with a salaam so deep that it bent my head down to the pommel of
my saddle! At all events, I meant, if politeness would propitiate, not
to be deficient in that quality at such a critical moment.

In a few moments, which seemed however a lifetime, we saw the reason
why the village appeared so empty. Men, women, and children had gone
nearly to the top of the bluff, and there, with their bodies hidden,
were looking off at a faint cloud of dust in the distance.

My husband, appreciating my terror, quickly assured me it was the 7th
Cavalry. Even then, what a stretch of country it seemed between us and
that blessed veil of sand, through which we perceived dimly that succor
was at hand.

My horse was rather given to snuggling, and pressed so against the
general that he made his leg very uncomfortable sometimes. But then, in
my terror, it seemed to me an ocean of space was dividing us. I longed
for the old Puritan days, when a wife rode on a pillion behind her
liege as a matter of course.

I found courage to look back at last. The bluff was crowned with little
irregularities, so still they seemed like tufts of grass or stones.
They represented many pairs of bead-like eyes, that peered over the
country at the advancing troops.

The next day the general thought I might rather not go with him than
run the risk of such frights; but I well knew there was something far
worse than fears for my own personal safety. It is infinitely worse
to be left behind, a prey to all the horrors of imagining what may be
happening to one we love. You eat your heart slowly out with anxiety,
and to endure such suspense is simply the hardest of all trials that
come to the soldier’s wife.

I gladly consented to be taken along every day, but there never seemed
a time when it was not necessary to get accustomed to some new terror.
However, it is only the getting used to it that is so bad. It is the
unexpected things that require fresh relays of courage. When a woman
has come out of danger, she is too utterly a coward by nature not
to dread enduring the same thing again; but it is something to know
that she is equal to it. Though she may tremble and grow faint in
anticipation, having once been through it, she can count on rising to
the situation when the hour actually comes.

The rattlesnakes were so numerous on this march that all Texas and
Kansas experience seemed to dwarf in contrast. My horse was over
sixteen hands high, but I would gladly have exchanged him for a
camelopard when I rode suddenly almost upon a snake coiled in the
grass, and looked down into the eyes of the upraised head. We counted
those we encountered in one day’s journey until we were tired. The
men became very expert and systematic in clearing the camp of these
reptiles. If we halted at night in the underbrush, they cut and tore
away the reeds and grass, and began at once to beat the ground and kill
the snakes. When I say that as many as forty were killed in one night,
some literal person may ask if I actually saw the bodies of all those
“lately slain!” It is not an exaggerated story, however, and one only
needs to see hundreds of men pounding and clearing such a place to
realize that many snakes could be disposed of in a short time. After
that, when the ground was selected for our camp in the low part of
the valley, I was loath to lie down and sleep until the soldiers had
come up to prepare the ground. My husband used to indulge this little
prejudice of mine against making my head a reproduction of Medusa’s,
and we often sought the high ground for a rest until the command came
up.

The guide rode often at the head of the column, and we found him full
of information about the country. We began also to listen for a new
domestic disclosure every time we approached an Indian village. He was
the most married of any man I ever saw, for in every tribe he had a
wife. Still this superfluity did not burden him, for the ceremony of
tying a marital knot in the far West is simple, and the wives support
themselves. Sometimes he gave us new points about making ourselves
comfortable in camp. One day I was very grateful to him. We were far in
advance of the wagon-train containing the tents; the sun was scorching;
not a tree, nor even a clump of bushes was near. In a brief time,
however, the guide had returned from the stream, where he had cut some
willow saplings, and sticking them in the ground made what he called
“wik-a-up.” He wove the ends loosely together on top, and over this
oval cover he threw the saddle blankets. There was just room enough to
crawl into this oven-like place, but it was an escape from the heat of
the sun, and I was soon asleep. After I emerged the general took my
place. When he had taken his nap the dogs crept in; so a very grateful
family thanked the guide for teaching us that new device.

The bends in the Missouri River are sometimes so long that the steamer
with supplies would have to make a journey of sixty miles while we had
perhaps only five to march across the peninsula. All the soldiers,
officers’ servants, teamsters, and other citizen employés took that
time to wash their clothes, for we were two days in camp. The creek
on which we halted was lined with bending figures, their arms moving
vigorously back and forth as they wrung out each article. Later on the
camp looked like an animated laundry. From every tent-rope and bush
floated the apparel. I had only a small valise for my summer’s outfit,
but Mary had soon taken out our few things, and around the kitchen-tent
was suspended the family linen. As soon as this was dry she folded and
pressed it as best she could, and laid it between the mattresses as a
substitute for ironing.

All the way up the river the guide was constantly interviewed as to the
chances for fishing. He held out promises that were to be realized upon
reaching Choteau Creek. We arrived there on one of the resting-days,
and camp was no sooner made, and food and water brought, than a great
exodus took place.

The general called me to the tent-door to see the deserted camp, and
wondered how the soldiers could all have disappeared so quickly.
Another problem was, where the fishing-tackle came from! Some had
brought rods, even in the restricted space allotted them, but many
cut them from the bushes along the river, attaching hooks and lines,
while some bent pins and tied them to strings. The soldiers shared so
generously with one another that one pole was loaned about while the
idle ones watched. I never cared for fishing, but my husband begged me
to go with him always, and carried my book and work. I sat under a bush
near him, which he covered with a shawl to protect me from the sun,
and there we stayed for hours. Officers and men competed alike for the
best places by the quiet pools. The general could hardly pay attention
to his line, he was so interested watching the men and enjoying their
pleasure. His keen sense of the ludicrous took in the comical figures
as far as we could see. In cramped and uncomfortable positions, with
earnest eyes fixed steadily in one place for hours, they nearly fell
into the water with excitement if they chanced to draw out a tiny fish.
The other men came from all along the bank to observe if any one was
successful.

One of the men near us was a member of the band. He was a perfect
reproduction of the old prints of Izaak Walton. The fixedness of his
gaze--his whole soul in his eyes--while he was utterly unconscious of
any one being near, was too much for the general’s equanimity. He put
his head under the canopy made by my shawl, not daring to laugh aloud,
for fear he might be heard by the man, and said it was more fun to see
that soldier fish than to hear him play on the violin. No wonder the
men enjoyed the sport, for even these little bull-fish, fairly gritty
from the muddy water in which they lived, were a great addition to
their pork and hard-tack fare.

For once the sun overcame me, and I knew the ignominy of being
compelled to own that I was dizzy and faint. I had not been long in
military life before I was as much ashamed of being ill as if I had
been a real soldier. The troops pride themselves on being invulnerable
to bodily ailments. I was obliged to submit to being helped back to
camp, and in the cool of the evening watched the return of the fishers,
who were as proud of the strings of ugly little things they carried as
if they had been pickerel or bass. Then the blue flame and soft smoke
began to ascend from the evening fires, and the odor from the frying
supper rose on the air.

In my indolent, weak condition I never knew how I was able to perform
such agile pirouettes as I did; but hearing a peculiar sound, I looked
down and saw a huge rattlesnake gliding towards me. I had long ago
learned to suppress shrieks, but I forgot all such self-control then.
How I wished myself the Indian baby we had seen the day before--the
veritable “baby in the tree-top,” for it was tied by buckskin thongs
to a limb! There I thought I could rest in peace. The snake was soon
despatched. The men had left camp so hurriedly in the morning that the
usual beating of the ground was omitted, and so I had this unwelcome
visitor.

When we camped near a village, the Indians soon appeared. Groups of
half a dozen on ponies, with children running after, would come. The
ponies were, most of them, dull and sway-backed. It was no wonder, for
I have seen four persons on one pony--an Indian and three half-grown
boys. No horse could keep its shape loaded down, as those of the
Indians usually are, with game and property. These visitors grew to be
great trials, for they were inveterate beggars. One day an old Indian,
called “The-Man-with-the-Broken-Ear,” came riding in, elaborately
decorated and on a shapely pony. He demanded to see the chief. The
general appeared, assisted him to dismount, and seated him in my
camp-chair. The savage leaned back in a grand sort of manner and calmly
surveyed us all. I was soon in agonies of anxiety, for Colonel Tom and
the young officers lounging near entered the tent. They bowed low,
took the hand of the old fellow with profound deference, and, smiling
benignly, addressed him. In just as suave a voice as if their words
had been genuine flattery, they said, “You confounded old galoot, why
are you here begging and thieving, when your wretched old hands are
hardly dry from some murder, and your miserable mouth still red from
eating the heart of your enemy?” Each one saluted him, and each vied
with the other in pouring forth a tirade of forcible expletives, to
which he bowed in acknowledgment and shook hands. My terror was that he
might understand, for we often found these people as cunning as foxes,
sitting stolid and stupid, pretending not to know a word, while they
understood the gist of much that was said.

The officers gave this chief tobacco--Perique I think it is called--and
so strong that, though I was accustomed to all kinds, I rather avoided
the odor of it. We had no whiskey, but if we had kept it, the general
obeyed the law of the reservation too strictly to allow it to be given
away. He was called to the office-tent a few moments, and in a trice
one of the others had emptied the alcohol from the spirit-lamp and
offered the cup to the distinguished guest. Putting the great square of
Perique into his mouth, with a biscuit beside, he washed it all down
with gulps of the burning fluid. His eyes, heretofore dull, sparkled at
the sight of the fire-water. The officers said, “How,” and he replied,
“How.” This did not surprise me, for that one word is the Indian toast,
and all tribes know it. But my breath almost went out of my body when
they asked him if he would have more, and he replied, “You bet.” I was
sure then that he had understood all the railing speeches and that he
would plan a revenge. Loud cries of laughter greeted his reply; but
matching their cunning against his, they eventually found that he knew
no more English. He had learned these words, without understanding
their meaning, at the trader’s store on the reservation. He waited
around in the tent, hoping for more alcohol, until I was weary of the
sight of him; but I was too much afraid of him, limp as he then was, to
look bored.

Finally he was lifted out, a tumbled up, disorganized heap of drooping
feathers, trailing blanket, and demoralized legs. When once, however,
one drunken old foot was lifted over the pony for him, he swung himself
into the saddle, and though swaying uncertainly, he managed to ride
away.

During the last days of our march we came upon another premonitory
warning from the Indians. A pole was found stuck in the trail before
us, with a red flag, to which were fastened locks of hair. It was
a challenge, and when interpreted meant, that if we persisted in
advancing, the hostiles were ready to meet the soldiers and fight them.
The officers paid little attention to this, but my heart was like lead
for days afterwards.

We encamped that night near what the Indians call “Medicine Rock;”
my husband and I walked out to see it. It was a large stone, showing
on the flat surface the impress of hands and feet made ages ago,
before the clay was petrified. The Indians had tied bags of their herb
medicine on poles about the rock, believing that virtue would enter
into articles left in the vicinity of this proof of the marvels or
miracles of the Great Spirit. Tin cans, spoons, and forks, that they
had bought at the Agency, on account of the brightness of the metal,
were left there as offerings to an unseen God.

Everything pertaining to the Indians was new and interesting to me.
While we were in Kansas the tribes were at war, and we had not the
opportunity to see their daily life as we did while passing through the
Sioux reservations on the march.

I regretted each day that brought us nearer to the conclusion of our
journey, for though I had been frightened by Indians, and though we had
encountered cold, storms, and rough life, the pleasures of the trip
over-balanced the discomforts.




CHAPTER VIII.

SEPARATION AND REUNION.


The day at last came for our march of five hundred miles to terminate.
A rickety old ferryboat that took us over the river made a halt near
Fort Rice, and there we established ourselves. Strange to say, the
river was no narrower there than it was so many hundred miles below,
where we started. Muddy and full of sand-bars as it was, we began
bravely to drink the water, when the glass had been filled long enough
for the sediment partially to settle, and to take our bath in what at
first seemed liquid mud. We learned after a time to settle the water
with alum, and we finally became accustomed to the taste.

The commandant at Fort Rice was most hospitable, and his wife charming.
The quarters were very ordinary frame buildings, with no modern
improvements. They were painted a funereal tint, but one warranted to
last. The interior showed the presence of a tasteful woman. She met
us as cheerfully as if she were in the luxurious home from which we
knew she had gone as a girl to follow a soldier’s life. Contrast often
helps us to endure, and Dakota was not so bad as their last station
in Arizona. The dinner was excellent, and our entertainers were the
happy possessors of a good cook. Rarely do army people have two good
servants at the same time on the frontier. Our host and hostess made
no apologies, but quietly waited on the table themselves, and a merry
time we had over the blunders of the head of the house, who was a
distinguished general, in his endeavors to find necessary dishes in the
china closet.

A steamer that arrived a day or two after we had reached Fort Rice
brought the regimental property, consisting of everything that was not
used on the march. Our household effects and trunks were delivered to
us in a very sorry condition. They had been carelessly stored on the
wharf at Yankton, near the government warehouse, without any covering,
during all the storms that drenched us coming up the river. Almost
everything was mildewed and ruined. We tried to dry our clothing in the
sun. Many a little bit of silken finery that we had cherished since
our marriage days, feeling sure that we should never attain to such
grandeur again, was suspended from the tent-ropes, stained and dull.
Our sister’s husband helped her to unpack her clothes and his own
soaked uniform. He was dignified and reserved by nature, but on that
occasion the barriers were broken. I heard him ask Margaret to excuse
him while he went outside the tent to make some remarks to himself that
he felt the occasion demanded. There were furious people on all sides,
and savage speeches about the thoughtlessness of those who had left our
property exposed to snow and rain, when we were no longer there to care
for it. I endured everything until my pretty wedding-dress was taken
out, crushed and spotted with mildew. My husband had great control
over himself in the small annoyances of life, and was able to repeat
again the proverb he had adopted in his boyhood, “Never cry for spilled
milk.” How he could submit so quietly, when he took out his prized
books and the few pictures I knew that he valued, was a mystery.

All thought began now to centre on the coming events of the summer.
It was decided that the regiment was to go out to guard the engineers
of the Northern Pacific Railroad while they surveyed the route from
Bismarck to the Yellowstone River. The ladies necessarily were to be
left behind. Now began the summer of my discontent. I longed to remain
in Dakota, for I knew it would take much longer for our letters to
reach us if we went East. Besides, it was far more comforting to stay
at a military post, where every one was interested in the expedition,
and talked about it as the chief topic of concern. I remembered when I
had gone East before, during a summer when our regiment was fighting
Indians, and my idea was that the whole country would be almost as
absorbed as we were, how shocked I was to be asked, when I spoke of the
regiment, “Ah, is there a campaign, and for what purpose has it gone
out?”

I was willing to live in a tent alone at the post, but there were not
even tents to be had. Then we all looked with envious eyes at the
quarters at Fort Rice. The post was small, and there were no vacant
rooms except in the bachelor quarters. These are so called when the
unmarried men take rooms in the same house and mess together. No
opportunity was given us to wheedle them into offering us a place. Our
officers hinted to them, but they seemed to be completely intimidated
regarding women. They received an honest and emphatic “no” when they
asked if the ladies of the 7th Cavalry quarrelled. Even then these wary
men said “they did not dare to offer to take in any women.” They added
that there were but three in the post, and no two of them spoke to each
other. They thought if we were asked to remain it might be the history
of the Kilkenny cats repeated, and they were obdurate.

There was nothing left for us, then, but to go home. It was a sore
disappointment. We were put on the steamer that was to take us to
Bismarck, a heart-broken little group. I hated Dakota, the ugly river,
and even my native land. We were nearly devoured with mosquitoes
at once. Only the strongest ammonia on our faces and hands served
to alleviate the torment. The journey was wretchedness itself. I
had thrown myself on the berth in one of the little suffocating
state-rooms, exhausted with weeping, and too utterly overcome with
the anguish of parting to know much of the surroundings. I was roused
by the gentle hand of a woman, who had forgotten her own troubles to
come to me. Ah, even now, when the tears rain down my face at the
remembrance of those agonizing good-byes, which were like death each
time, and which grew harder with each separation, I think of the
sympathy shown me. The sweet, tender eyes of the wives of officers come
to me now, and I feel the soft touch of their hands as they came to
comfort me, even when their own hearts were wrung. Grief is so selfish,
I wonder now that they could have been such ministering angels.

At last the slow, wearisome journey was over, and we went into the
little town of Bismarck to take the cars. The Department Commander,
returning to his head-quarters, had offered to take charge of us to St.
Paul, and was kind enough to share with us the car of the President of
the Northern Pacific Railroad, which had been placed at his disposal.
There were seven of us and his own personal staff. Another five hundred
miles were before us, but in such luxury it hardly seemed that my
sister and I were the same two who had been “roughing it” on the march
a few days before.

The journey was very quiet and over an uninteresting country, but
we ladies had something to occupy our time, as we began to prepare
some of our meals, for the untidy eating-houses on the road were
almost unendurable. The staff of the Commanding General went out at
the stations and foraged for what food they could find to add to our
bill of fare. At St. Paul we bade them all good-bye, and soon found
ourselves welcomed by dear father and mother Custer, at Monroe. Their
hearts were ever with the absent ones.

For several slow, irksome months I did little else than wait for
the tardy mails, and count each day that passed a gain. I had very
interesting letters from my husband, sometimes thirty and forty pages
in length. He wrote of his delight at having again his whole regiment
with him, his interest in the country, his hunting exploits, and the
renewal of his friendship with General Rosser. The 7th Cavalry were
sent out to guard the engineers of the Northern Pacific, while they
surveyed the route to the Yellowstone. This party of citizens joined
the command a few days out from Fort Rice. The general wrote me that
he was lying on the buffalo-robe in his tent, resting after the march,
when he heard a voice outside asking the sentinel which was General
Custer’s tent. The general called out, “Halloo, old fellow! I haven’t
heard that voice in thirteen years, but I know it. Come in and welcome!”

General Rosser walked in, and such a reunion as they had! These two had
been classmates and warm friends at West Point, and parted with sorrow
when General Rosser went into the Southern army. Afterwards they had
fought each other in the Shenandoah Valley time and time again. Both of
them lay on the robe for hours talking over the campaigns in Virginia.
In the varying fortunes of war, sometimes one had got possession of the
wagon-train belonging to the other. I knew of several occasions when
they had captured each other’s head-quarters wagons with the private
luggage. If one drove the other back in retreat, before he went into
camp he wrote a note addressing the other as “dear friend,” and saying,
“you may have made me take a few steps this way to-day, but I’ll be
even with you to-morrow. Please accept my good-wishes and this little
gift.” These notes and presents were left at the house of some Southern
woman, as they retreated out of the village.

Once General Custer took all of his friend’s luggage, and found in it
a new uniform coat of Confederate gray. He wrote a humorous letter
that night thanking General Rosser for setting him up in so many new
things, but audaciously asking if he “would direct his tailor to make
the coat-tails of his next uniform a little shorter” as there was a
difference in the height of the two men. General Custer captured his
herd of cattle at one time, but he was so hotly pursued by General
Rosser that he had to dismount, cut a whip, and drive them himself
until they were secured.

To return to the Yellowstone expedition. The hour for starting never
varied more than a few moments during the summer, and it was so early
the civilians connected with the engineering party could not become
reconciled to it. In the afternoon my husband sometimes walked out on
the outskirts of camp, and threw himself down in the grass to rest with
his dogs beside him.

It was a source of amusement to him if he accidentally overheard the
grumbling. His campaigning dress was so like that of an enlisted
man, and his insignia of rank so unnoticeable, that the tongues ran
on, indifferent to his presence. Sometimes, in their growling, the
civilians accused him of having something on his conscience, and
declared that, not being able to sleep himself, he woke every one else
to an unearthly reveille. At this he choked with laughter, and to their
dismay they discovered who he was.

I remember his telling me of another occasion, when he unavoidably
heard a soldier exclaim, “There goes taps, and before we get a mouthful
to eat, reveille will sound, and ‘Old Curley’ will hike us out for the
march.” The soldier was slightly discomfited to find the subject of his
remarks was within hearing.

The enlisted men were constantly finding new names for the general,
which I would never have known--thereby losing some amusement--if
Mary had not occasionally told me of them. A favorite was “Jack,” the
letters G. A. C. on his valise having served as a suggestion.

When the expedition returned from the Yellowstone, a despatch came to
me in Michigan, saying the regiment had reached Fort Lincoln in safety.
Another soon followed, informing me that my husband was on his way
home. The relief from constant anxiety and suspense, together with all
the excitement into which I was thrown, made me almost unfit to make
preparation to meet him. There was to be an army reunion in the city
nearest us, and in my impatience I took the first train, thinking to
reach there in advance of General Custer. As I walked along the street,
looking into shop-windows, I felt, rather than saw, a sudden rush from
a door, and I was taken off my feet and set dancing in air. Before I
could resent what I thought was an indignity, I discovered that it
was my husband, who seemed utterly regardless of the passers-by. He
was sunburnt and mottled, for the flesh was quite fair where he had
cut his beard, the growth of the summer. He told me the officers with
whom he had travelled in the Pullman car had teased him, and declared
that no man would shave in a car going at forty miles an hour, except
to prepare to meet his sweetheart. I was deeply grateful, though,
for I knew the fiery tint of the beard, and infinitely preferred the
variegated flesh tints of his sunburnt face.




CHAPTER IX.

OUR NEW HOME AT FORT LINCOLN.


In a few days we were ready to return to Dakota, and very glad to go,
except for leaving the old parents.

The hardest trial of my husband’s life was parting with his mother.
Such partings were the only occasions when I ever saw him lose entire
control of himself, and I always looked forward to the hour of their
separation with dread.

For hours before we started, I have seen him follow his mother about,
whispering some comforting word to her; or, opening the closed door
of her own room, where, womanlike, she fought out her grief alone,
sit beside her as long as he could endure it. She had been an invalid
for so many years that each parting seemed to her the final one. Her
groans and sobs were heart-rending. She clung to him every step when he
started to go, and exhausted at last, was led back, half fainting, to
her lounge.

The general would rush out of the house, sobbing like a child, and
then throw himself into the carriage beside me completely unnerved. I
could only give silent comfort. My heart bled for him, and in the long
silence that followed as we journeyed on, I knew that his thoughts
were with his mother. At our first stop he was out of the cars in an
instant, buying fruit to send back to her. Before we were even unpacked
in the hotel, where we made our first stay of any length, he had dashed
off a letter. I have since seen those missives. No matter how hurriedly
he wrote, they were proofs of the tenderest, most filial love, and full
of the prophecies he never failed to make, of the reunion that he felt
would soon come.

After long debates with her parents, we had captured a young lady who
was to return with us. She was a “joy forever,” and submitted without
a word to the rough part of our journey. After we left St. Paul, the
usual struggle for decent food began. Some of the officers returning
from leave of absence had joined us, and we made as merry over our
hardships as we could. When we entered the eating-houses, one young
member of our party, whom we called the “butter fiend,” was made the
experimenter. If he found the butter too rancid to eat undisguised,
he gave us a hint by saying, under his breath, “this is a double-over
place.” That meant that we must put a layer of bread on top of the
butter to smother the taste.

The general was so sensitive when living in civilization that the
heartiest appetite would desert him if an allusion to anything
unpleasant or a reference to suffering was made at the table. But he
never seemed to be conscious of surroundings when “roughing it.” Of
course I had learned to harden myself to almost anything by this time,
but I can see the wide-open eyes of our girl friend when she saw us eat
all around any foreign ingredients we found in our food. She nearly
starved on a diet consisting of the interior of badly-baked potatoes
and the inside of soggy rolls.

One of the eating-places on the road was kept in a narrow little house,
built on a flat car. Two men presided, one cooking and the other
waiting on the table. We were laboriously spearing our food with two
tined forks, and sipping the muddy coffee with a pewter spoon, when
I heard with surprise the general asking for a napkin. It seemed as
foreign to the place as a finger-bowl. The waiter knew him, however,
and liked him too well to refuse him anything; so he said, “I have
nothing but a towel, general.” “Just the thing, just the thing,”
repeated my husband, in his quick, jolly way. So the man tied a long
crash towel under his chin, and the general ate on, too indifferent to
appearances to care because the tableful of travellers smiled.

When we finally reached the termination of the road at Bismarck,
another train was about starting back to St. Paul. The street was full
of people, wildly expostulating and talking loudly and fiercely. It
appeared that this was the last train of the season, as the cars were
not to run during the winter. The passengers were mostly Bismarck
citizens, whose lawless life as gamblers and murderers had so outraged
the sentiments of the few law-abiding residents that they had forced
them to depart. We could see these outlaws crowding at the door,
hanging out of the windows, swearing and menacing, and finally firing
on the retreating crowd as the cars passed out of town. I was inclined
to remain a fixture in our car; to step down into such a _melée_ was
too much for my courage. The general made allowance for my fears, and
we were quietly slipped out on the other side of the depot, hurried
into the ambulance, and driven to the river.

The ice was already thick enough to bear our weight part way over; then
came a swift rushing torrent of water which had to be crossed in a
small boat. Some of the soldiers rowed, while one kept the huge cakes
of floating ice from our frail boat with a long, iron-pointed pole. As
I stepped into the little craft, I dropped upon the bottom and hid my
eyes, and no amount of reference to dangers I had encountered before
induced me to look up. The current of the Missouri is so swift it is
something dreadful to encounter. We were lifted out upon the ice again,
and walked to the bank. Once more on shore, I said to myself, here will
I live and die, and never go on that river again.

Our brother, Colonel Tom, met us, and drove us to our new home. In the
dim light I could see the great post of Fort Lincoln, where only a few
months before we had left a barren plain. Our quarters were lighted,
and as we approached, the regimental band played “Home, Sweet Home,”
followed by the general’s favorite, “Garryowen.”

The general had completely settled the house before he left for the
East, but he had kept this fact secret, as a surprise. Our friends
had lighted it all, and built fires in the fireplaces. The garrison
had gathered to welcome us, and Mary had a grand supper ready. How
we chattered and gloried over the regiment having a home at last. It
seemed too good to believe that the 7th Cavalry had a post of its own,
with room for the half of the regiment assigned to duty there. In
other garrisons, when we had come in late in the fall from campaigns,
the officers, in order to get places for themselves, had been obliged
to turn some one else out. There is a disagreeable, though probably
necessary law in the army regulations, which directs officers to take
their quarters according to rank.

Fort Lincoln was built with quarters for six companies. The barracks
for the soldiers were on the side of the parade-ground nearest the
river, while seven detached houses for officers faced the river
opposite. On the left of the parade-ground was the long granary and the
little military prison, called the “guard-house.” Opposite, completing
the square, were the quartermaster and commissary storehouses for
supplies and the adjutant’s office. Outside the garrison proper, near
the river, were the stables for six hundred horses. Still farther
beyond were the quarters for the laundresses, easily traced by the
swinging clothes-lines in front, and dubbed for this reason “Suds
Row.” Some distance on from there were the log-huts of the Indian
scouts and their families, while on the same side also was the level
plain used for parades and drill. On the left of the post was the
sutler’s store, with a billiard-room attached. Soon after the general
arrived he permitted a citizen to put up a barber-shop, and afterwards
another built a little cabin of cotton-wood, with canvas roof for a
photographer’s establishment.

The post was located in a valley, while just back of us stretched a
long chain of bluffs. On the summit of a hill, nearly a mile to the
left, was a small infantry garrison, which had been established some
time, and now belonged to our post. When we went to return the visits
of the infantry ladies, the mules dragged the ambulance up the steep
hill with difficulty. We found living in this bleak place--in small,
shabbily built quarters, such as a day-laborer would consider hardly
good enough for his family--delicate women and children, who, as usual,
made no complaint about their life. Afterwards we were much indebted to
one of the ladies, who, determined to conquer fate, varied our lives
and gave us something to look forward to, by organizing a reading-club
that met every week. She had sent to the East, before the trains ceased
running, for the new books.

This little post had been built before the railroad was completed, and
the houses were put together with as few materials as possible. There
was no plastering, but the ceilings and partitions were of thick paper
made for the purpose. When narrow mouldings of wood were tacked over
the joined places, and all of it painted, the effect was very pretty.
When it was torn and ragged it looked poverty-stricken enough. In one
set of quarters there chanced to be so many children and so little room
that the parents had invented a three-story bed, where the little ones
could be all stowed at night. While we were calling there one day, I
sat talking with the cheerful little mother, and wondering how she
could be so bright. Everything in garrison life was, of course, new to
my girl friend, and I discovered she was trying to smother a laugh. She
commanded a view of the inner door. One of the children, who had been
beating the wall and crying to enter, had finally made preliminary
preparations. She had thrust through a hole in the paper partition each
article of her little wardrobe, even to her shoes, and was putting the
first rosy foot through after them. When the mother discovered this she
laughed heartily, and gave us thus an opportunity to join her.

Our own post was somewhat sheltered by the bluffs behind; but though
our quarters were plastered, the unseasoned lumber warped, and it was
a struggle to keep warm. The wood with which we were provided was far
from dry, and much of it of that kind that burns quickly but sends out
little heat. It seemed to require the entire time of one man to keep up
the fires. It was thus a blessed thing for the poor fellow whose duty
it was, for he had never been able to remain long with his company at a
time. He had an uncontrollable habit of drinking. Most of the time he
belonged to the band of prisoners who are taken out of the guard-house
every day, under a sentinel, to police the garrison and cut the wood.
Mary gave them the coffee and whatever else was left from the table
every day. This seemingly worthless fellow told Mary that he believed
he could “keep straight” if Mrs. Custer would get the general to remit
his sentence and let him come to us to keep the fires. So he came, and
was occasionally sober for some time. He learned to go through the
house with his arms full of wood when he was quite drunk. He really had
too much heart to cause me trouble, and used to say, “Mary, I am pretty
full, but don’t let Mrs. Custer know it, for I told her I would not do
so again, and I don’t like to make her feel bad.” So Mary spied out the
land before him and opened his doors. After he had tried her patience
long, she finally lost her temper on finding that he had swallowed all
the Worcestershire sauce and her bottle of pain-killer. She held out
the can of kerosene oil to him, and asked if he would not add that to
his dram, and began such a berating that he hurried off to escape from
the violence of her tongue.

The soldiers asked the general’s permission to put up a place in which
they could have entertainments, and he gave them every assistance
he could. They prepared the lumber in the saw-mill that belonged to
the post. The building was an ungainly looking structure, but large
enough to hold them all. The unseasoned cotton-wood warped even while
the house was being built, but by patching and lining with old torn
tents, they managed to keep out the storm. The scenery was painted
on condemned canvas stretched on a frame-work, and was lifted on and
off as the plays required. The footlights in front of the rude stage
were tallow-candles that smoked and sputtered inside the clumsily
cobbled casing of tin. The seats were narrow benches, without backs.
The officers and ladies were always invited to take the front row at
every new performance, and after they entered, the house filled up with
soldiers. Some of the enlisted men played very well, and used great
ingenuity in getting up their costumes. The general accepted every
invitation, and enjoyed it all greatly. The clog-dancing and negro
character songs between the acts were excellent. Indeed, we sometimes
had professionals, who, having been stranded in the States, had
enlisted.

A regiment is recruited from all classes and conditions of men.
Occasionally accident revealed the secret that there were fugitives
from justice in the ranks. If they changed their names, they found
no place where they were so hidden from every one they ever knew as
in a regiment that is always on duty in the territories. It came to
pass sometimes that a man of title, who had “left his country for
his country’s good,” wore the government blue as a disguise, and
served as a trooper for want of anything better to do. Among the men
who sent word they would be glad to help me about the house when we
were settling--either as a carpenter, a saddler to sew carpets, or a
blacksmith to put up stoves--there were several with histories. Though
they were strictly military with the general, observing the rule of
never speaking unless spoken to, they sought the first opportunity to
tell me their troubles. These were invariably domestic difficulties,
until I began to think our regiment was “a city of refuge” for outraged
husbands. It would eventually be found out that these men had run
away and enlisted under assumed names, when driven desperate by the
scoldings of a turbulent wife. Time, and the loneliness of a soldier’s
life, would soften their woes, and they began at last to sigh even
for the high-pitched voice of the deserted woman. The general felt as
badly as I did when I carried their stories to him, begging him to get
them discharged. He had a little fashion, however, of asking me to
remember that about this, as about every other subject that we ever
discussed, “there were always two sides to a question.” My sympathy for
the soldiers in trouble was of little avail, for the law compelling
them to serve the five years out was irrevocable. All I could do was
to write letters at their solicitation, revealing their identity and
asking for a reconciliation.

My husband’s duties extended over a wide range. If the laundresses
had a serious difficulty, he was asked to settle it. They had many
pugilists among them, and the least infringement of their rights
provoked a battle in which wood and other missiles filled the air.
Bandaged and bruised, they brought their wrongs to our house, where
both sides had a hearing. The general had occasionally to listen and
arbitrate between husband and wife, when the laundress and her soldier
husband could not agree. I was banished from the room, while he heard
their story and gave them counsel. In the same way he listened to
whatever complaints the soldiers made. Some of them came into our
quarters on one occasion with a tin cup of coffee for the general to
taste, and determine whether he agreed with them that it was too poor
to drink. From that time on, after every Sunday morning inspection,
the general went with all the officers to visit the kitchens, as well
as the barracks of each company, and every troop commander was called
upon to pass criticisms on the cleanliness of the quarters and the
wholesomeness of the food.




CHAPTER X.

INCIDENTS OF EVERY-DAY LIFE.


The companies each gave a ball in turn during the winter, and the
preparations were begun long in advance. There was no place to buy
anything, save the sutler’s store and the shops in the little town of
Bismarck, but they were well ransacked for materials for the supper.
The bunks where the soldiers slept were removed from the barracks,
and flags festooned around the room. Arms were stacked and guidons
arranged in groups. A few pictures of distinguished men were wreathed
in imitation laurel leaves cut out of green paper. Chandeliers and side
brackets carved out of cracker-box boards into fantastic shapes were
filled with candles, while at either end of the long room great logs in
the wide fireplaces threw out a cheerful light.

The ball opened, headed by the first-sergeant. After this the officers
and their wives were invited to form a set at one end of the room,
and we danced several times. One of the men whose voice was clear and
loud sang the calls. He was a comical genius, and improvised new ways
of calling off. When the place came in the quadrille to “Turn your
partners,” his voice rose above the music, in the notes of the old
song, “Oh swing those girls, those pretty little girls, those girls
you left behind you!” This was such an inspiration to the fun-lovers
that the swinging usually ended in our being whirled in the air by the
privileged members of our family.

The soldiers were a superb lot of men physically. The out-door life
had developed them into perfect specimens of vigorous manhood. After
the company tailor had cut over their uniforms, they were often the
perfection of good fitting. The older soldiers wore, on the sleeves of
their coats, the rows of braid that designate the number of years in
the service. Some had the army badges of the corps in which they fought
during the war, while an occasional foreign decoration showed that
they had been brave soldiers in the fatherland. We were escorted out
to the supper-room in the company-kitchen in advance of the enlisted
men. The general delighted the hearts of the sergeant and ball-managers
by sitting down to a great dish of potato-salad. It was always
well-flavored with the onion, as rare out there, and more appreciated
than pomegranates are in New York. We ladies took cake, of course, but
sparingly, for it was also a great luxury.

When we returned to watch the dancing, the general was on nettles for
fear we should be wanting in tact, and show our amusement by laughing
at the costumes of the women. There was but a sprinkling of them:
several from Bismarck and a few white servants of the officers. Each
company was allowed but three or four laundresses. The soldier was
obliged to ask permission to marry, and his engagement was a weary
waiting sometimes. In order to get a vacancy for his sweetheart, he had
to await the discharge of some other soldier from the company, whose
wife held the appointment of laundress. These women were at the ball in
full force, and each one brought her baby. When we removed our wraps
in the room of the first-sergeant we usually found his bed quite full
of curly-headed infants sleeping, while the laundress mothers danced.
The toilets of these women were something marvellous in construction.
In low neck and short sleeves, their round, red arms and well-developed
figures wheeled around the barracks all night long. Even the tall
Mexican laundress, hereafter specially mentioned, would deck herself
in pink tarletan and false curls, and notwithstanding her height and
colossal anatomy, she had constant partners.

The little Dutch woman, who loved her husband more devotedly after each
beating, and did not dance with any one else, was never absent from the
balls. Her tiny little figure was suspended between heaven and earth
while her tall soldier whirled her around the long hall in the endless
German waltz. Some officer would whisper slyly in my ear, as she bowed
and smiled in passing, “Do you see the get-up of ‘Old Trooble Agin?’”
She had long before earned this sobriquet, when coming to me for help
out of her misfortunes, beginning each story of woe with “Trooble
agin.” Wherever we were, when the orders were issued for a campaign,
she soon appeared claiming sympathy. No one could feel at such a time
more than I the truth of her preface, for if we were to be left behind,
it was, indeed, “Trouble again.”

The pack of hounds were an endless source of delight to the general.
We had about forty: the stag-hounds that run by sight, and are on
the whole the fleetest and most enduring dogs in the world, and the
fox-hounds that follow the trail with their noses close to the ground.
The first rarely bark, but the latter are very noisy. The general
and I used to listen with amusement to their attempts to strike the
key-note of the bugler when he sounded the calls summoning the men to
guard mount, stables, or retreat. It rather destroyed the military
effect to see, beside his soldierly figure, a hound sitting down
absorbed in imitation. With lifted head and rolling eyes there issued
from the broad mouth notes so doleful they would have answered for a
_misericordia_.

The fox-hounds were of the most use in the winter, for the hunting
was generally in the underbrush and timber along the river. I never
tired of watching the start for the hunt. The general was a figure
that would have fixed attention anywhere. He had marked individuality
of appearance, and a certain unstudied carelessness in the wearing of
his costume that gave a picturesque effect, not the least out of place
on the frontier. He wore troop-boots reaching to his knees, buckskin
breeches fringed on the sides, a dark navy blue shirt with a broad
collar, a red necktie, whose ends floated over his shoulder exactly
as they did when he and his entire division of cavalry had worn them
during the war. On the broad felt hat, that was almost a sombrero, was
fastened a slight mark of his rank.

He was at this time thirty-five years of age, weighed one hundred
and seventy pounds, and was nearly six feet in height. His eyes were
clear blue and deeply set, his hair short, wavy, and golden in tint.
His mustache was long and tawny in color; his complexion was florid,
except where his forehead was shaded by his hat, for the sun always
burned his skin ruthlessly.

He was the most agile, active man I ever knew, and so very strong and
in such perfect physical condition that he rarely knew even an hour’s
indisposition.

Horse and man seemed one when the general vaulted into the saddle. His
body was so lightly poised and so full of swinging, undulating motion,
it almost seemed that the wind moved him as it blew over the plain. Yet
every nerve was alert and like finely tempered steel, for the muscles
and sinews that seemed so pliable were equal to the curbing of the most
fiery animal. I do not think that he sat his horse with more grace than
the other officers, for they rode superbly, but it was accounted by
others almost an impossibility to dislodge the general from the saddle,
no matter how vicious the horse might prove. He threw his feet out of
the stirrups the moment the animal began to show his inclination for
war, and with his knees dug into the sides of the plunging brute, he
fought and always conquered. With his own horses he needed neither
spur nor whip. They were such friends of his, and his voice seemed so
attuned to their natures, they knew as well by its inflections as by
the slight pressure of the bridle on their necks what he wanted. By the
merest inclination on the general’s part, they either sped on the wings
of the wind or adapted their spirited steps to the slow movement of the
march. It was a delight to see them together, they were so in unison,
and when he talked to them, as though they had been human beings,
their intelligent eyes seemed to reply.

As an example of his horsemanship he had a way of escaping from the
stagnation of the dull march, when it was not dangerous to do so,
by riding a short distance in advance of the column over a divide,
throwing himself on one side of his horse so as to be entirely out
of sight from the other direction, giving a signal that the animal
understood, and tearing off at the best speed that could be made.
The horse entered into the frolic with all the zest of his master,
and after the race the animal’s beautiful, distended nostrils glowed
blood-red as he tossed his head and danced with delight.

In hunting, the general rode either Vic or Dandy. The dogs were
so fond of the latter, they seemed to have little talks with him.
The general’s favorite dog, Blücher, would leap up to him in the
saddle, and jump fairly over the horse in starting. The spirited
horses, mounted by officers who sat them so well, the sound of the
horn used for the purpose of calling the dogs, their answering bay,
the glad voices, and “whoop-la” to the hounds as the party galloped
down the valley, are impressions ineffaceable from my memory. They
often started a deer within sound of the bugle at the post. In a few
hours their shouts outside would call me to the window, and there,
drooping across the back of one of the orderlies’ horses, would be a
magnificent black-tailed deer. We had a saddle of venison hanging on
the wood-house almost constantly during the winter. The officers’, and
even the soldiers’, tables had this rarity to vary the monotony of the
inevitable beef.

After these hunts the dogs had often to be cared for. They would be
lame, or cut in the chase, through the tangle of vines and branches.
These were so dense it was a constant wonder to the general how the
deer could press through with its spreading antlers. The English
hounds, unacquainted with our game, used to begin with a porcupine
sometimes. It was pitiful, though for a moment at first sight amusing,
to see their noses and lips looking like animated pin-cushions. There
was nothing for us to do after such an encounter but to begin surgery
at once. The general would not take time to get off his hunting-clothes
nor go near the fire until he had called the dog into his room and
extracted the painful quills with the tweezers from his invaluable
knife. I sat on the dog and held his paws, but quivered even when I
kept my head averted. The quills being barbed cannot be withdrawn, but
must be pulled through in the same direction in which they entered. The
gums, lips, and roof of the mouth were full of little wounds, but the
dogs were extremely sagacious and held very still. When the painful
operation was over they were very grateful, licking the general’s hand
as he praised them for their pluck.

Sometimes, when the weather was moderate, and I rode after the
fox-hounds, one of them separated himself from the pack, and came
shaking his great, velvet ears and wagging his cumbrous tail beside my
horse. The general would call my attention to him, and tell me that
it was our latest surgical patient, paying us his bill in gratitude,
“which is the exchequer of the poor.”

Among the pack was an old hound that had occasional fits. When he
felt the symptoms of an attack he left the kennel at the rear of the
house, came round to the front-door, and barked or scratched to get
in. My husband knew at once that the dog was going to suffer, and that
instinct had taught him to come to us for help. Rover would lie down
beside the general until his hour of distress, and then solicit the
ever-ready sympathy with his mournful eyes. The general rubbed and
cared for him, while the dog writhed and foamed at the mouth. He was
always greatly touched to see the old hound, when he began to revive,
try to lift the tip of his tail in gratitude.

With the stag-hounds, hunting was so bred in the bone that they
sometimes went off by themselves, and even the half-grown puppies
followed. I have seen them returning from such a hunt, the one who led
the pack holding proudly in his mouth a jack-rabbit.

The wolves in their desperate hunger used to come up on the bluffs
almost within a stone’s-throw of our quarters. It was far from pleasant
to look out of the window and see them prowling about. Once when the
stag-hounds were let out of the kennel for exercise, they flew like the
winds over the hills after a coyote. The soldier who took care of them
could only follow on foot, as the crust on the snow would not bear the
weight of a horse. After a long, cold walk he found the dogs standing
over the wolf they had killed. When he had dragged it back to our
wood-shed he sent in to ask if the general would come and see what the
dogs had done unaided and alone, for he was very proud of them.

As the family all stood talking over the size of the coyote and its
fur, I said, triumphantly, “Now, I shall have a robe!” It was enough
for them, and they made no end of sport about my planning a robe out
of one small skin. After we had all gone into the house, the soldier,
who was not accustomed to hear such badgering, went in to Mary, and
indignantly exclaimed, “Be jabers, and they’ll not tease her about that
long!” After that, during the winter, he walked frequently over the
plain with the dogs, and when they had started a trail and run almost
out of sight, he patiently followed until he readied the spot where
they had brought down the game. Even in that bitter weather he brought
in enough foxes, swifts, and coyotes to make me a large robe. When it
was made up, I triumphantly placed myself on it, and reminded my family
of their teasing, and the time, so lately past, when I had been an
object of jest to them.

The weather seemed to grow colder and colder as the winter
advanced--from 20° to 30° below zero was ordinary weather. The officers
were energetic enough to get up sleighs, even with all the difficulties
they had to encounter. There was no lumber at the post except
unseasoned cotton-wood. The man who could get a packing-box for the
body of his sleigh was a Crœsus. The carpenter cut and sawed the edges
into scallops and curves; the rudest bobs were ironed by the company
blacksmith; and the huge tongue of an army wagon was attached to the
frail egg-shell. The wood-work was painted black, and really the color
and shape reminded one of a little baby hearse. Sister Margaret and I
disliked sleighing even under favorable circumstances, but that made
no sort of difference; we were expected to go twice a day, and try in
turn each new sleigh.

My husband found a sketch in some of the illustrated papers, which he
thought such a fitting representation of us that he added some lines
and drew some applicable features to the picture, and wrote underneath,
“Margaret and Libbie _enjoying_ a sleigh-ride!” (two wretched,
shivering beings, wrapped in furs, sit with their feet in a tub of
ice-water, while a servant rings a dinner-bell over their heads). When
we were thus taken out, as a sacrifice we were enveloped in so many
wraps we had literally to be carried and dropped into the sleigh, and
after hot bricks were adjusted to our feet, we assumed the martyr look
that women understand how to take on when persuaded against their will,
and off we flew. It made no impression if we were speechless--the
dearth of women made the men far from critical. Sometimes we went to
the Hart River, which empties into the Missouri, and which we were not
afraid to drive over, as it was frozen solid. And yet it should be
understood that we preferred to go and be frozen rather than stay at
home and be comfortable, for we were a band of friends sharing the same
isolation, and each took comfort in contributing to the enjoyment of
the rest.

One sort of sleighing we really did enjoy. One of the officers got up
a long sleigh, using the bed of an army wagon for the box. He was his
own coachman, and stood in front driving an excellent four-in-hand. We
all placed ourselves in the straw and robes, and nothing of the whole
party was visible except two rows of “tip tilted,” rosy-tinted noses
peeping out from under fur caps and gay mufflers. If any one rashly
left a seat to play some prank it was never regained. The space closed
up instantly, and it was a choice of standing for the rest of the
distance, or uncomfortably sitting on the spurs, arctics, or buffalo
over-shoes of the others. Another of our number tried driving tandem;
and as his horses were very fleet and his sleigh very frail, it was a
study from first to last how soon we should gather up the fragments of
our scattered selves from the white plain over which we flew at eagle
speed.

When the thermometer went down to 45° below zero, the utmost
vigilance was exercised to prevent the men from being frozen. The
general took off all the sentinels but two, and those were encased
in buffalo overcoats and shoes, and required to walk their beat but
fifteen minutes at a time. There were no wells or cisterns, and the
quartermaster had no means of supplying the post with water, except
with a water-wagon that required six mules to haul it around the
garrison. The hole in the river through which the water was drawn was
cut through five feet of ice. It was simply dreadful on those bitter
days to see the poor men whose duty it was to distribute the supply.
My husband used to turn away with a shudder from the window when they
came in sight, and beg me not to talk of a matter that he was powerless
to remedy. The two barrels at the kitchen-door were all that we could
have, and on some days the men and wagon could not go around at all. We
husbanded every drop, and borrowed from a neighbor, if any neighbor was
fortunate enough not to have used all his supply.




CHAPTER XI.

THE BURNING OF OUR QUARTERS.--CARRYING THE MAIL.


We had hardly finished arranging our quarters when, one freezing night,
I was awakened by a roaring sound in a chimney that had been defective
from the first. Women have such a rooted habit of smelling smoke and
sending men on needless investigating trips in the dead of night, that
I tried to keep still for a few moments. The sound grew too loud to
be mistaken, and I awakened my husband. He ran up-stairs and found
the room above us on fire. He called to me to bring him some water,
believing he could extinguish it himself. While I hurried after the
water, there came such a crash and explosion that my brain seemed to
reel from fright. I had no thought but that my husband was killed.
Nothing can describe the relief with which I heard his voice calling
back to my agonized question as to his safety. His escape was very
narrow; the chimney had burst, the whole side of the room was blown
out, and he was covered with plaster and surrounded with fallen bricks.
The gas from the petroleum paper put on between the plastering and the
outer walls to keep out the cold had exploded. The roof had ignited at
once, and was blown off with a noise like the report of artillery. The
sentinel at the guard-house fired his carbine as an alarm. The general
ran to one of the lower windows, and with his powerful voice that he
could throw so far called for the guard. Then we hurried to the room
occupied by our girl-friend. The plastering falling on her bed from the
burning roof was the first hint she had of the danger. It was unsafe
for her to stop to gather her clothes, and wrapping a blanket about her
we sent her to our sister next door.

In an incredibly short time the men were swarming about the house. The
general had buttoned his vest, containing his watch and purse, over
his long night-dress, and unconscious of his appearance, gave just as
cool orders to the soldiers as if it were at drill. They, also, were
perfectly cool, and worked like beavers to remove our things; for with
no engine and without water it was useless to try to save the house.
The general stood upon the upper landing and forbade them to join him,
as it was perilous, the floors being then on fire. He had insisted upon
my going out of the house, but I was determined not to do so until he
was safe. When I did leave I ran in my night-dress over the snow to our
sister’s. The house burned very quickly. Fortunately it was a still,
cold night, and there was no wind to spread the flames. Except for this
the whole garrison must have been burned.

When the morning came we went to inspect the heap of household
belongings that had been carried out on the parade-ground. It was
a sorry collection of torn, broken, and marred effects! Most of my
clothes were gone. Our poor girl-friend looked down into her trunk,
empty except for one tarlatan party gown. I had lost silver and linen,
and what laces and finery I had. The only loss I mourned, as it was
really irreparable, was a collection of newspaper clippings regarding
my husband that I had saved during and since the war. Besides these I
lost a little wig that I had worn at a fancy-dress ball, made from the
golden rings of curly hair cut from my husband’s head after the war,
when he had given up wearing long locks.

The fire served one purpose after all. Before it occurred I had always
been a trial to Mary because I cared so little for dress and really
owned so few ornaments. When the servants gathered together after
that to boast of the possessions of their several mistresses, as is
customary with the colored people, who so love display, Mary was armed
with an excuse for me. I used to hear of her saying, “You jist orter
seed what Miss Libbie had afo’ the fire;” and then she would describe
in detail elegant apparel that I had never even thought of having.
Long afterwards I heard of the comments of one of our number, who
loved the loaves and fishes of this life beyond everything. In vain
she accumulated and had the proud satisfaction of out-doing every one
in the number of her dresses. Mary managed to slip into her kitchen on
some feigned errand, and drawing upon her imagination related how much
richer Miss Libbie’s possessions were before the fire. I had a hearty
laugh by myself when I heard that the Miss Flora McFlimsey of our
circle, worn out with the boasting of the cook, was heard to exclaim,
“I wish I might have seen for myself all the gorgeousness described. I
am tired to death of hearing about ‘befo’ the fire.’”

The general selected another set of quarters next to his brother’s,
and thither removed the remnants of our household goods. He begged me
not to go near the house, or attempt to settle, until I had recovered
from the fright of the fire and of his imperilled life the night
before. We were all busy enough trying to fit our things upon our
little friend. Her purse, with abundance to buy a new outfit, was
burned, and it would be weeks before she could receive a remittance
from home by our slow mails. Next day, as she sat among us in
borrowed apparel, several sizes too large, she had a surprise. A huge
clothes-basket was handed in at the door, with a note addressed to
her, begging her to consider herself, what the garrison had long felt
that she was, “the daughter of the regiment.” The basket contained
everything that the generous hearts of friends could suggest. Not
content with this, another was sent on the next day, with a further
supply of things bought in the store at Bismarck. She objected to the
acceptance, and tears rose in her eyes at the thoughtfulness; but there
were no names signed to the note, so we would not heed remonstrances.
Every one came with needles and thimbles, and the scissors flew.

I was too much absorbed in this scheme to ask many questions about the
new quarters. When I did inquire, the general put me off by saying
that in a few days I should begin to settle. The second evening after
the fire he sent for me, and asked if I would come and consult with
him about some arrangement of the furniture, as he was too busy to
come after me. I started at once, but Mary, ever thoughtful of my
appearance, and deep in the mystery that followed, urged me to put on
my other gown. I was unwillingly put into it, and went to the new
house to find both sets of quarters lighted throughout, and the band
playing “Home, Sweet Home.” My husband, meeting me, led me in, and to
my utter surprise I found the whole place completely settled, a door
cut through into Colonel Tom’s quarters, and the garrison assembled at
the general’s invitation for the house-warming. The pantry was full of
good things to eat that Mary had prepared for the supper. Every one
tried, by merry frolic and dancing, to make me forget the catastrophe,
and the general, bubbling over with fun, inspired me to join. Then he
told me to what subterfuges he had resorted to get the house ready, and
repeated to me again that it was never worth while to “cry over spilled
milk.”

The life of the enlisted men was very dull during the cold weather.
In the summer they had mounted drill and parades, and an occasional
scout, to vary the life. They got very little good out of their horses
in the winter. An hour in the morning and another in the afternoon
were spent every day in grooming them. The general took me down to the
stables sometimes to watch the work. Each horse had the name given to
him by his rider printed in home-made letters over his stall. Some of
the men were so careful of their horses that they were able to keep
them for service during the five years of their enlistment. The daily
intercourse of horse and rider quickened the instinct of the brute,
so that he seemed half human. Indeed, I have seen an old troop-horse,
from whose back a raw recruit had tumbled, go through the rest of the
drill as correctly as if mounted by a well-trained soldier. Many of
the soldiers love and pet their dumb beasts, and if the supply of grain
gives out on a campaign they unhesitatingly steal for them, as a mother
would for a starving child.

Beside every stall hung the saddle and equipments of the trooper,
and the companies vied with one another in keeping them in perfect
condition. Some of the horses’ coats shone like satin under the
busy currycomb of an attached master. The captain of a company and
his first-sergeant soon discovered the faults of a horse. When the
preparations for a campaign began, it was really laughable to hear the
ingenious excuses why an apparently sound horse should be exchanged for
another from the fresh supply.

In the same way a soldier who was hopelessly worthless was often
transferred to another company. The officers who had been the recipient
of the undesirable soldier would come to the general to complain. I
could not always keep a straight countenance when the injured captain
narrated his wrongs. One told of what desperate need he had been in
for a tailor. He had been proffered this man with many eulogies by a
brother officer, and the final recommendation given which insured the
acceptance of this seemingly generous offer was, “He has made clothes
for _me_.” Not until the transfer was effected, and a suit of clothes
ruined for the captain, was he told by his would-be liberal friend the
whole story, which was, “Oh yes! he made clothes for me, but, _I forgot
to add_, I couldn’t wear them.”

The general sympathized with the impatience of the enlisted men in
their dull life, which drove the sergeants to solicit as a privilege
the transportation of the mail. For a man of my husband’s temperament
it was easy to understand that danger was more endurable than the dead
calm of barrack life. The telegraph lines were frequently down, and
except for the courage of the sergeants we should have been completely
isolated from the outside world. With four mules and the covered body
of a government wagon on bobs, they went over a trackless waste of snow
for two hundred and fifty miles. Occasionally there were huts that had
once been stage stations, where they could stop, but it was deadly
perilous for them to leave the telegraph line, no matter through what
drifts they were compelled to plunge.

The bewilderment of a snow-storm comes very soon. An officer lying
in the hospital, quite crazed from having been lost in attempting to
cross a parade-ground only large enough for the regiment in line, was
a fearful warning to these venturesome men. If the mail sergeant did
not appear when he was due--at the end of two weeks--the general could
scarcely restrain his anxiety. He was so concerned for the man’s safety
that he kept going to the window and door incessantly. He spoke to me
so often of his fears for him that I used to imagine he would, for
once, express some of his anxiety when the sergeant finally appeared to
report; but military usage was too deeply bred in the bone of both, and
the report was made and received with the customary repressed dignity
of manner. However, I have seen my husband follow the man to the door,
and tell him that he had felt great concern about him, and renew his
directions to take every precaution for his safety. How thankful I
used to be that I was not hedged in with a soldier’s discipline, but
that I could follow the faithful old trooper and tell him how the
general had worried about him, and how thankful we all were for his
safe return.

It did not take long for the garrison to discover the poor mules, with
their tired, drooping heads and wilted ears, dragging the mail-sleigh
into the post. Every officer rushed to the adjutant’s office for his
mail. It was a great event and the letters were hailed with joy. An
orphan, and having no brothers and sisters, I must have been the only
one who was contented not to get any. For my world was there. An
officer’s wife who could hardly wait for news from her lonely, delicate
mother in the East used to say pathetically, realizing the distance
that intervened, that no one knew what it was to be married to a
husband and a mother at the same time.

As soon as the mail was distributed, the general buried himself with
the newspapers. For several days after he agreed with me that an
old engraving, called “My Husband,” was a faithful likeness of him
at such a time (the picture represented a man sitting in a chair,
completely hidden, except his crossed legs and his hands, and clasping
an outspread paper). As soon as the contents were devoured, he cut
from the illustrated papers comic pictures, and adding to them some
doggerel, sent them in to our witty neighbor as illustrating some joke
that had transpired against her. With other papers, by a little drawing
he transposed the figures and likenesses of some of the officers
who had been placed previously in some ludicrous position. Adding
marginal comments, he left the pictures uppermost where they were
sure to be seen by the persons for whom they were intended, when they
came in as usual to look over the papers and magazines in his room. A
clever lady in a neighboring garrison, speaking of the arrival of the
mail, described how voraciously she seized the new reading matter and
closeted herself for hours to read up in advance of the others. She
felt that “having exhausted every other topic she must coach up on
something new.”

In spite of the great risks and dangers of the mail-carriers, their
journeys were accomplished without serious accident. I used to hear
occasionally that the sergeant had levied such a heavy tax upon the
citizens of Bismarck, when he brought small parcels through for them,
that he had quite a little sum of money for himself by spring.




CHAPTER XII.

PERPLEXITIES AND PLEASURES OF DOMESTIC LIFE.


The climate of Dakota was so fine that those who had been poisoned by
malaria in the South became perfectly well after a short residence
there. Sickness was of rare occurrence, and because of its infrequency
it drew forth lavish sympathy. In the autumn a beautiful little girl,
the daughter of the sutler, was brought into the garrison dying with
diphtheria. There was no law, like the city ordinance, compelling a
warning placard to be placed on the door, and it would have been of
no avail in keeping her friends away. When I begged the heart-broken
mother to turn from the last breath of her idol, it seemed to me her
lot was too hard for human endurance. Every sorrow seemed much worse
out there, where we were so unaccustomed to suffering.

As I looked at the little waxen body prepared for burial, lying so like
a pretty flower, I did not wonder at the mother’s grief and despair.
She was a thousand miles from Eastern friends; her husband was absent
on business, and she among strangers. At another time, when a young
mother was caring for her newly-born babe, the little toddling brother
was unfortunately exposed to the cold, and fell violently ill with
pneumonia. Every lady came daily to help care for him, and at last
the officers’ repeatedly proffered services were accepted for night
nursing. I remember watching and admiring the tenderness of a handsome,
dashing young fellow as he walked the floor with the feverish little
sufferer, or rocked him patiently until dawn. And when I saw him often
afterwards gliding about in the dance, or riding beside some pretty
girl, I used to think to myself that I could tell his sweetheart
something good about him. We were all like one family--every one was so
quick to sympathize, so ready to act if trouble came.

After the trains had been taken off, and winter had fairly set in, the
young mother, whom we all loved, was in despair about clothing for her
little ones. We had reached a land where there were no seamstresses,
no ready-made clothing, and nothing suitable for children. Money did
no good, though our friend had abundance of that, but busy fingers
were needed. The ladies quietly arranged, as a surprise, a sewing-bee.
We impressed our brother Tom into our service, and taught him to use
the sewing-machine. A laughing crowd dropped scissors and thimbles at
parade-time and followed to the door to watch him hurry on his belt
and sabre and take his place--the quintessence then of everything
military and manly. A roomful of busy women, cutting, basting, making
button-holes, and joining together little garments, soon had a passable
outfit for the brave mother’s little ones, and even a gown for her own
sweet self. I do not remember ever seeing anything quite so Dutchy
and cumbersome, however, as those little children dressed in the
cobbled-out woollen clothes our ignorant fingers had fashioned.

A woman on the frontier is so cherished and appreciated, because she
has the courage to live out there, that there is nothing that is not
done for her if she be gracious and courteous. In twenty little ways
the officers spoiled us: they never allowed us to wait on ourselves, to
open or shut a door, draw up our own chair, or to do any little service
that they could perform for us. If we ran to the next house for a chat,
with a shawl thrown over our heads, we rarely got a chance to return
alone, but with this undignified head-covering were formally brought
back to our door! I wonder if it will seem that we were foolishly
petted if I reveal that our husbands buttoned our shoes, wrapped us up
if we went out, warmed our clothes before the fire, poured the water
for our bath out of the heavy pitcher, and studied to do innumerable
little services that a maid would have done for us in the States.

I don’t think it made us helpless, however. In our turn we watched
every chance we could to anticipate their wants. We did a hundred
things we would not have remembered to do had not the quickly passing
time brought nearer each day those hours of separation when we would
have no one to do for. I am sure I never saw more tender men than
the officers. One learned to conceal the fact that one was ailing or
fatigued, for it made them so anxious. The eyes of sister Margaret’s
husband come to me now, full of intense suffering for his wife, as she
silently read her home letters telling of our mother Custer’s failing
strength. She suppressed her weeping until they had retired and she
believed him asleep. She found her mistake when his gentle hands stole
softly to her cheeks to feel if they were moistened with tears.

So seldom did we hear of an officer’s unkindness to his wife, that a
very old legend used to be revived if a reference to anything of the
kind was needed. Before the war some officer wished to measure the
distance of a day’s march, and having no odometer elected his wife
to that office. The length of the revolution of a wheel was taken, a
white handkerchief tied to a spoke, and the madam was made to count the
rotations all day long. The story seldom failed to fire the blood of
the officers when it was told. They agreed that nothing but a long life
among Indians, and having the treatment of the squaw before him, would
cause a man to act with such brutality.

Domestic care sat very lightly on me. Nothing seemed to annoy my
husband more than to find me in the kitchen. He determinedly opposed
it for years, and begged me to make a promise that I would never go
there for more than a moment. We had such excellent servants that my
presence was unnecessary most of the time, but even in the intervals
when our fare was wretched he submitted uncomplainingly rather than
that I should be wearied. A great portion of the time my life was so
rough that he knew it taxed me to the utmost, and I never forgot to be
grateful that I was spared domestic care in garrison. We had so much
company that, though I enjoyed it, I sometimes grew weary. When the
winter came and there was little to do officially, my husband made
every preparation for our receptions: ordered the supplies, planned
the refreshment, and directed the servants. The consequence was that
I sometimes had as enjoyable a time as if I had been entertained at
some one else’s house. To prove how much pleasure I had, I recall a
speech that the family kept among a collection of my _faux pas_. They
overheard me saying to some of our guests, “Don’t go home, we are
having such a good time.” Afterwards the tormenting home circle asked
me if it would not have been in a little better taste to let the guests
say that!

We had such a number of my husband’s family in garrison that it
required an effort occasionally to prevent our being absorbed in one
another. A younger brother came on from Michigan to visit us, and
our sister Margaret’s husband had a sister and brother at the post.
Sometimes we found that nine of us were on one side of the room deeply
interested in conversation. Something would rouse us to a sense of our
selfishness, and I was the one sent off to look out the quiet ones
at the hop who needed entertaining. If I chanced to be struggling to
teach new steps in dancing to feet unaccustomed to anything but march
or drill, or strove to animate the one whom all pronounced a bore,
the family never failed to note it. They played every sly trick they
could to disconcert and tease me. I did not submit tamely. As soon
as I could, I made my way to them, and by threats and intimidations
scattered them to their duty!

At the hops the officers waited long and patiently for the women to
dance with them; sometimes the first waltz they could get during the
evening would not come before midnight. I think it would have been
very hard for me to have kept a level head with all the attention and
delightful flattery which the ordinary manners of officers convey, if
I had not remembered how we ladies were always in the minority. The
question whether one was old or young, pretty or plain, never seemed
to arise with them. I have seen them solicit the honor of taking a
grandmamma to drive, and even to ride as gallantly as if she were
young and fair. No men discover beauty and youth more quickly, but the
deference they feel for all women is always apparent.

It seemed very strange to me that with all the value that is set on
the presence of the women of an officer’s family at the frontier
posts, the book of army regulations makes no provision for them, but
in fact ignores them entirely! It enters into such minute detail in
its instructions, even giving the number of hours that bean-soup
should boil, that it would be natural to suppose that a paragraph or
two might be wasted on an officer’s wife! The servants and the company
laundresses are mentioned as being entitled to quarters and rations
and to the services of the surgeon. If an officer’s wife falls ill
she cannot _claim_ the attention of the doctor, though it is almost
unnecessary to say that she has it through his most urgent courtesy. I
have even known a surgeon, who from some official difficulty was not on
friendly terms with an officer, go personally and solicit the privilege
of prescribing through the illness of his wife, whom he knew but
slightly.

The officers used sportively to look up the rules in the army
regulations for camp followers, and read them out to us as they would
the riot act! In the event of any question being raised regarding our
privileges, we women really came under no other head in the book which
is the sole authority for our army. If we put down an emphatic foot,
declaring that we were going to take some decisive step to which they
were justly opposed as involving our safety, perhaps, we would be at
once reminded, in a laughingly exultant manner, of the provision of the
law. The regulations provide that the commanding officer has complete
control over all _camp followers_, with power to put them off the
reservation or detain them as he chooses. Nevertheless, though army
women have no visible thrones or sceptres, nor any acknowledged rights
according to military law, I never knew such queens as they, or saw
more willing subjects than they govern.




CHAPTER XIII.

A “STRONG HEART” DANCE!


The Indian scouts employed by our government and living at our post
belonged to a tribe called the Arickarees. This tribe was small, and
though not strong enough in numbers to attack the more powerful Sioux,
there was implacable enmity between them, and a constant desire for
revenge. During the preceding summer a band of Sioux came to Fort
Lincoln, and drew the scouts belonging to the infantry garrison out of
their quarters by some cunningly devised pretext. No sooner did they
appear than they were fired upon by the Sioux. They fought all day,
and finally the Rees succeeded in driving their enemies away. All this
took place right at the post, where the firing could be seen from the
windows. It was not known how many Sioux were killed, for all tribes
make extraordinary exertions to carry their dead from the field. Four
only were left. After some months the Sioux, for some reason best
known to themselves, sent word that they were coming for a treaty. The
Rees prepared to receive them with what they termed a “Strong Heart”
dance. A message inviting the garrison was sent by them, through the
interpreter, and we hailed with relief the variety in our existence
this spectacle would afford. Indian life was still a novelty to us,
for we had not been with any peaceable tribe before coming into Dakota.
We stowed ourselves away in long sleighs which took us to the quarters
of the scouts. Their buildings were of logs, and were long and low in
construction. Around the walls on the inside were bunks on which were
marks showing the quarters assigned to each family. When the outer door
closed upon us we could scarcely breathe; the atmosphere was stifling,
and loaded with the odor of smoked meat, tanned skins, and killikinick
tobacco. The place was lighted by burning logs in a large fireplace,
and the deep shadows threw into high-relief the figures that came into
the glare of the fire, and produced effects from which Doré might have
found material for a most powerful work.

Before the ceremonies began, we women went round the place to see the
papooses in their mothers’ arms, as they sat in the bunks or on the
earthen floor. Each mother held her baby up for our inspection, with
as much pride as if there had never been a little one on earth before.
The squaws were not permitted to come near the charmed circle in front
of the fire, where the mimic orchestra beat their drums; they were
allowed to sing at a distance, and joined in the low monotone of the
musicians. At regular intervals, as if keeping time, they jerked out a
nasal twanging note which was emphasized by the coarse voices of the
warriors. The dancers were naked, except for the customary covering
over their loins. They had attached to their belts beads and metal
ornaments. Some had so fastened to their girdles the feathers from the
tail of the wild turkey, that they stood up straight as the savages
bent over in the evolutions of the dance. One leg and arm would be
painted bright vermilion or blue, and the other a vivid green, with
cabalistic characters drawn on them in black. The faces were hideous,
being painted in all colors. A few had necklaces of bears’ claws, on
which they set great value. These hung over the bronze shoulders, the
claws pointing into the brown skin of their chests. One, evidently
poorer than the rest, had a rudely cut shirt made out of an old
ham-bag, on which the trade-mark and name of the manufacturing firm
figured conspicuously as his sole decoration. Another, equally poor,
wore only the covering over his hips, while suspended by a cord from
his neck was a huge tin toy horse. From the scalp-lock of some there
was a strip of cloth falling to the ground, on which silver disks made
of coins were fastened at close intervals.

In the plait of hair falling to their waists we saw sticks crossed
and running through the braid. The interpreter explained that these
represented “coups.” Our attention was arrested at once by a little
four-year-old boy, who, from time to time during the evening, was
brought to the circle by his mother, and left to make his little
whirling gyrations around the ring of the dancers. It was explained to
us that he had won his right to join in the festivities of the tribe
when the fight took place the summer before, to settle which this
treaty was planned. Of the four Sioux left on the battle-field that
day, one, though mortally wounded, was not yet dead when the retreat
took place. A Ree squaw, knowing that it would count her child “a
coup” if he put another wound in the already dying man, sent him out
and incited the child to plunge a knife into the wounded warrior. As
a reward he was given the privilege of joining in all celebrations,
and the right to wear an eagle feather standing straight from the
scalp-lock of his tiny head. We saw the mother’s eyes gleam with pride
as she watched this miniature warrior admitted among the mature and
experienced braves. All the dancers rotated around together for a time,
their bodies always bent, and they howled as they moved. In the shadowy
gloom, only momentarily made brilliant by the flashes of light from the
fire, these grotesque, crouching figures were wild enough for gnomes.
Only occasionally, where there was a large mixture of white blood, did
we see a well-developed figure. The legs and arms of Indians are almost
invariably thin. None of them ever do any manual labor to produce
muscle, and their bones are decidedly conspicuous.

We were surprised to observe that though dancing in so small a space,
and weaving in and out in countless figures, without an apparent effort
to avoid collisions, they never interfered or caught their brandished
weapons in the ornaments of one another’s toggery. When a warrior
wished to speak, he made some sign to the others. They then sat down
around him, and the music ceased. He began with a recital of his
achievements--Indians never fail to recapitulate these as a preface
to each speech. Sometimes the speaker’s career was illustrated, and a
cotton sheet was unfolded on which were painted a number of primitive
figures. He gradually grew more and more earnest; his dull eyes glared
as he pointed to the scalps he had taken, which were even then
dangling from his belt. Finally the warrior began to give presents, and
to receive them in return, as is the custom on those occasions. If he
gave a pony, he declared it by throwing down a stick on which were cut
notches that signified the gift to the recipient.

After several had told their “coups,” for so they designate their
deeds of prowess, one bounded with great energy into the circle. He
narrated with spirit how he had revenged the death of two of their band
by killing the murderer at the last fight at the post. Before any one
realized it, an old squaw pushed her way violently into the open space,
threw down a roll of calico at his feet, and flung off her leggings and
blanket as presents in her gratitude, for it was of her husband and son
that h

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