they lived in a precarious
hand-to-mouth fashion, having no allies but a small force of
Minnetarees near by.

But Fate had managed the matter very well, no doubt, in depriving these
people of effective strength in war; for at this time the head chief of
the Minnetaree villages was a man who, given opportunity, would have
made the river run red with the blood of his enemies. This was Le
Borgne, a one-eyed old despot, of surpassing cruelty and
bloodthirstiness, whose very name, even in his present position, would
compel a shiver of apprehension. A chief such as he, at the head of
forces matched to his ferocious desires, would have changed the history
of the Upper Missouri. As it was, he spent most of his villainous
instincts for his own private amusement,--occasionally slaughtering one
of his warriors who had given him displeasure, or butchering a couple
of his wives whose society had grown irksome; and between times he
leered with his solitary evil eye upon the traders, contriving ways for
getting whiskey with which to bait his passions. The British traders of
the Hudson Bay and Northwest companies had long before secured a strong
foothold in this territory, and had sought by every means to monopolize
the traffic. The ubiquitous French were there also, domiciled in the
villages, and some of them had taken squaws to wife. With schooling
from such as these, old Le Borgne had cut his wisdom teeth; he had made
himself master of many low tricks and subtleties practiced by white
traders and vagabonds; he was as skillful as the best of them in making
promises, and as skillful as the worst in breaking them. He was a
scamp, and a blackguard.

Lewis and Clark succeeded directly in effecting a treaty of peace
between the Mandans and Ricaras, and among other small tribes of the
region round about; but they were powerless in trying to reconcile
these people to the Sioux, who were the bogie-men of the plains, and
who conducted themselves in every affair of peace or war with the
arrogance of incontestable power. Not death itself could extinguish the
hatred that was felt for them by the weaker tribes, compelled to skulk
and tremble.

Early in November the officers received a visit from two squaws, who
had been taken prisoners by the Mandans, many years before, in a war
with the Snake Indians of the Rocky Mountains. One of these squaws was
named Sacajawea, the "Bird Woman"; she had been but a child at the time
of her capture, when sh