nold, rising from the couch of fur. "He's too
polite to enter the teepee uninvited."

"By all means let his eyes rest upon us," laughed Holden.

The two men then advanced, while one threw open the flap of the tent.
And the picture that met their eyes was one that struck the strangers
with admiration, for it seemed to throw the years back to the days when
the Indian ruled the prairie--the days that knew the youth of Ballantyne
and the prime of Fenimore Cooper.

Ranged in a semicircle before the tent was a crowd of braves and
warriors--all arrayed in the picturesque garb that was unspoilt by any
touch of Saxon attire, such as is commonly seen among redskins of the
present day. Except that the old-time bows and arrows were replaced by
more modern muzzle-loaders, there was nothing to suggest any association
with white men and white men's tastes.

But it was not so much the background of natives that impressed the
Englishmen. Their admiration was called to the central figure. He was an
Indian of enormous size--tall, squarely built, and equally proportioned.
His head was surmounted with a turban of black fox decorated with eagle
feathers that were continued like a wing right down his back and nearly
touched the ground. His black hair was threaded with many coloured
beads, some of which resembled (and actually were proved to be) nuggets
of pure gold. Necklaces of beads and animals' teeth hung in many
strands upon the breast of his deerskin shirt. Leggings and moccasins
were a mass of beads, feathers, and porcupines' quills woven in
intricately fantastic designs. And, over all, there hung in graceful
folds an ermine robe of spotless white.

This was the great chief of the Dacotahs. Mighty Hand was his name, and
that hand was famed for its deeds of valour as equally for its deeds of
kindness. He was sole monarch of a mighty branch-tribe of the Dacotahs
that had long been separated from its renegade brethren, preferring to
maintain the old life in the forest and on the prairie rather than a
workhouse existence in a Government Reserve. He led his people far from
the haunts of white men, and his life was only harmful to the game that
supplied his people's needs. Powder and other necessaries he obtained
from frontier trading-stations. But he was known as a man of peace and a
man of spotless honour. Hence his irregular life and failure to comply
with Government Reserve regulations had been hitherto winked at by the
officials.