ur high when some
six hundred Sioux were espied riding in close ranks along the bank of
the Platte. The Indians discovered the troops at the same moment, and
at once gave battle. The Indian is not a coward, though he frequently
declines combat if the odds are not largely in his favor.

In this engagement the Sioux outnumbered the soldiers three to one,
and the latter fell back slowly until they reached a ravine. Here they
tethered their horses and waited the course of Indian events, which,
as usual, came in circular form. The Sioux surrounded the regulars, and
finding them comparatively few in number, made a gallant charge.

But bows and arrows are futile against powder and ball, and the warriors
reeled back from a scathing fire, leaving a score of their number dead.

Another charge, another repulse; and then a council of war. This lasted
an hour, and evidently evolved a brilliant stratagem, for the Sioux
divided into two bands, and while one made a show of withdrawing, the
other circled around and around the position where the soldiers lay.

At a point in this revolving belt of redskins rode a well-mounted,
handsome warrior, plainly a chief. It had been Will's experience that
to lay low a chief was half the battle when fighting Indians, but this
particular mogul kept just out of rifle-shot. There are, however, as
many ways of killing an Indian as of killing a cat; so Will crawled on
hands and knees along the ravine to a point which he thought would be
within range of the chief when next he swung around the circle.

The calculation was close enough, and when the warrior came loping
along, slacking his pace to cross the ravine, Will rose and fired.

It was a good four hundred yards, but the warrior pitched from his seat,
and his pony ran down the ravine into the ranks of the soldiers, who
were so elated over the success of the shot that they voted the animal
to Will as a trophy.

The fallen warrior was Tall Bull, one of the ablest chiefs the Sioux
ever had. His death so disheartened his braves that they at once
retreated.

A union of General Carr's scattered forces followed, and a few days
later an engagement took place in which three hundred warriors and a
large number of ponies were captured. Some white captives were released,
and several hundred squaws made prisoners.

Among these latter was the amiable widow of Tall Bull, who, far from
cherishing animosity against Will as the slayer of her spouse, took
prid