, killing many and destroying
a large amount of property, before a part of the tribe fled into Canada
and the rest surrendered to General Sibley.

Next came the struggle of the Western Sioux and Northern Cheyennes in
defence of their homes. The building of the Northern Pacific and the
Union Pacific transcontinental railroads had necessitated the making of
new treaties with these people. Scarcely was the agreement completed by
which they ceded a right of way in return for assurances of permanent
and absolute possession of other territory, including the Black Hills
and Bighorn Mountains, when gold was discovered in these regions. This
fact created great excitement and a general determination to dispossess
the Sioux of the country just guaranteed to them, which no white man was
to enter without the consent of three fourths of the adult men of the
tribe.

Public excitement was intense, and the Government found itself unable
to clear the country of intruders and to protect the rights of the
Sioux. It was reported that there were no less than fifteen thousand men
in the Black Hills district placer-mining and prospecting for the yellow
metal. The authority of the United States was defied almost openly by
the frontier press and people. Then the Indians took matters into their
own hands, carried on a guerilla warfare against immigrants, and
harassed the forts until the army was forced to enter upon a campaign
against them. In 1868 another treaty was made, but the great chief, Red
Cloud, would not sign it until he saw forts C. F. Smith and Phil Kearney
abandoned. Here is probably the only instance in American history in
which a single Indian chief was able to enforce his demands and make a
great government back down. At that time it would have cost immense sums
of money and many lives to conquer him, and would have retarded the
development of the West by many years.

It is a fact that Sitting Bull was thoroughly opposed to yielding any
more territory. No doubt he foresaw the inevitable result. He had taken
up the cause of the Eastern Sioux in Minnesota and fought Sibley and
Sully in 1862. He had supported Red Cloud in his protests against the
establishment of the Bozeman trail, and against the new forts, although
thus far these aggressions had not affected him directly. But when
surveyors began work on the Northern Pacific, they entered his
particular domain, and it was time for him to fight in its defence.
Unfortunately for h