en
fight. Such characters as those of Crazy Horse and Chief Joseph are not
easily found among so-called civilized people. The reputation of great
men is apt to be shadowed by questionable motives and policies, but here
are two pure patriots, as worthy of honor as any who ever breathed God's
air in the wide spaces of a new world.

SITTING BULL

IT is not easy to characterize Sitting Bull, of all Sioux chiefs most
generally known to the American people. There are few to whom his name
is not familiar, and still fewer who have learned to connect it with
anything more than the conventional notion of a bloodthirsty savage. The
man was an enigma at best. He was not impulsive, nor was he phlegmatic.
He was most serious when he seemed to be jocose. He was gifted with the
power of sarcasm, and few have used it more artfully than he.

His father was one of the best-known members of the Unkpapa band of
Sioux. The manner of this man's death was characteristic. One day, when
the Unkpapas were attacked by a large war party of Crows, he fell upon
the enemy's war leader with his knife. In a hand-to-hand combat of
this sort, we count the victor as entitled to a war bonnet of trailing
plumes. It means certain death to one or both. In this case, both men
dealt a mortal stroke, and Jumping Buffalo, the father of Sitting Bull,
fell from his saddle and died in a few minutes. The other died later
from the effects of the wound.

Sitting Bull's boyhood must have been a happy one. It was long after the
day of the dog-travaux, and his father owned many ponies of variegated
colors. It was said of him in a joking way that his legs were bowed like
the ribs of the ponies that he rode constantly from childhood. He had
also a common nickname that was much to the point. It was "Hunkeshnee",
which means "Slow", referring to his inability to run fast, or more
probably to the fact that he seldom appeared on foot. In their boyish
games he was wont to take the part of the "old man", but this does not
mean that he was not active and brave. It is told that after a buffalo
hunt the boys were enjoying a mimic hunt with the calves that had been
left behind. A large calf turned viciously on Sitting Bull, whose pony
had thrown him, but the alert youth got hold of both ears and struggled
until the calf was pushed back into a buffalo wallow in a sitting
posture. The boys shouted: "He has subdued the buffalo calf! He made
it sit down!" And from this inciden