When All Was Reported Safe, The Horses Were
Cast Loose And Turned Out To Graze.
Were such precautions
generally observed by traders and hunters, we should not so often
hear of parties being surprised by the Indians.
Having stated the military arrangements of the captain, we may
here mention a mode of defence on the open prairie, which we have
heard from a veteran in the Indian trade. When a party of
trappers is on a journey with a convoy of goods or peltries,
every man has three pack-horses under his care; each horse laden
with three packs. Every man is provided with a picket with an
iron head, a mallet, and hobbles, or leathern fetters for the
horses. The trappers proceed across the prairie in a long line;
or sometimes three parallel lines, sufficiently distant from each
other to prevent the packs from interfering. At an alarm, when
there is no covert at hand, the line wheels so as to bring the
front to the rear and form a circle. All then dismount, drive
their pickets into the ground in the centre, fasten the horses to
them, and hobble their forelegs, so that, in case of alarm, they
cannot break away. Then they unload them, and dispose of their
packs as breastworks on the periphery of the circle; each man
having nine packs behind which to shelter himself. In this
promptly-formed fortress, they await the assault of the enemy,
and are enabled to set large bands of Indians at defiance.
The first night of his march, Captain Bonneville encamped upon
Henry's Fork; an upper branch of Snake River, called after the
first American trader that erected a fort beyond the mountains.
About an hour after all hands had come to a halt the clatter of
hoofs was heard, and a solitary female, of the Nez Perce tribe,
came galloping up. She was mounted on a mustang or half wild
horse, which she managed by a long rope hitched round the under
jaw by way of bridle. Dismounting, she walked silently into the
midst of the camp, and there seated herself on the ground, still
holding her horse by the long halter.
The sudden and lonely apparition of this woman, and her calm yet
resolute demeanor, awakened universal curiosity. The hunters and
trappers gathered round, and gazed on her as something
mysterious. She remained silent, but maintained her air of
calmness and self-possession. Captain Bonneville approached and
interrogated her as to the object of her mysterious visit. Her
answer was brief but earnest - "I love the whites - I will go
with them." She was forthwith invited to a lodge, of which she
readily took possession, and from that time forward was
considered one of the camp.
In consequence, very probably, of the military precautions of
Captain Bonneville, he conducted his party in safety through this
hazardous region. No accident of a disastrous kind occurred,
excepting the loss of a horse, which, in passing along the giddy
edge of a precipice, called the Cornice, a dangerous pass between
Jackson's and Pierre's Hole, fell over the brink, and was dashed
to pieces.
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