distance to
the Indian camp, he had been unable to reach it before daylight, and
that the Indians had broken camp and moved on. Later in the day,
however, another courier brought news that they had again gone into
camp, after making but a short march, at the mouth of Trail Creek, and
that, not deeming it safe to attack in daylight, Bradley had concealed
his command in the hills, and was now awaiting the arrival of the
infantry.

Upon receipt of this information, Gibbon took his men from the wagons
(leaving twenty men to guard the train), gave each man ninety rounds of
ammunition and one day's rations, and pushed, on on foot, having
ordered that the wagons should come up as fast as possible. The gallant
General with his faithful little band moved quietly but rapidly
forward, but owing to the bad condition of the trail, it was nearly
sundown when they reached Bradley's camp. Bradley informed his chief
that he believed the Indians intended to remain in their camp several
days, for he had secretly observed their movements from the top of a
neighboring hill, and found that the squaws were engaged in cutting and
peeling lodge-poles to take with them for use on the treeless plains of
the buffalo country.

On arriving at Bradley's camp, the men filed into the gulch, ate a
scanty supper of hard tack and raw pork, and, without camp-fires or
blankets, laid down to rest. Having conferred with Lieutenant Bradley
and his scouts as to the best disposition of the proposed attack,
General Gibbon ordered his adjutant to call him at 10 o'clock at night,
and lying down under the spreading branches of a pine tree, slept as
peacefully as a child.

He knew there was bloody work at hand for him and his veterans; that
the rising sun would see them contending against a savage foe that
outnumbered his own command more than three to one; that ere nightfall
many of his noble men, and perchance he himself, would sleep their long
sleep; yet he had a solemn duty to perform. It was a sad one; an awful
one, but it was nevertheless a duty. He and his men were there to fight
their country's battle. They were to avenge the blood of innocent men
and women, whom these savages had wantonly murdered but a few days
before in a neighboring Territory. He had been ordered to strike and to
punish them. He would strike, and the blow would be a telling one. Yet,
in the face of these facts--facts that would chill the blood of any man
unused to wars and scenes o