should follow, we were to lead them into the ambush. They took our bait
exactly as we had hoped! It was a matter of a very few minutes, for
every soldier lay dead in a shorter time than it takes to annihilate a
small herd of buffalo.

"This attack was hastened because most of the Sioux on the Missouri
River and eastward had begun to talk of suing for peace. But even this
did not stop the peace movement. The very next year a treaty was signed
at Fort Rice, Dakota Territory, by nearly all the Sioux chiefs, in which
it was agreed on the part of the Great Father in Washington that all the
country north of the Republican River in Nebraska, including the Black
Hills and the Big Horn Mountains, was to be always Sioux country, and no
white man should intrude upon it without our permission. Even with this
agreement Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse were not satisfied, and they
would not sign.

"Up to this time I had fought in some important battles, but had
achieved no great deed. I was ambitious to make a name for myself.
I joined war parties against the Crows, Mandans, Gros Ventres, and
Pawnees, and gained some little distinction.

"It was when the white men found the yellow metal in our country, and
came in great numbers, driving away our game, that we took up arms
against them for the last time. I must say here that the chiefs who were
loudest for war were among the first to submit and accept reservation
life. Spotted Tail was a great warrior, yet he was one of the first to
yield, because he was promised by the Chief Soldiers that they would
make him chief of all the Sioux. Ugh! he would have stayed with Sitting
Bull to the last had it not been for his ambition.

"About this time we young warriors began to watch the trails of the
white men into the Black Hills, and when we saw a wagon coming we would
hide at the crossing and kill them all without much trouble. We did
this to discourage the whites from coming into our country without our
permission. It was the duty of our Great Father at Washington, by the
agreement of 1868, to keep his white children away.

"During the troublesome time after this treaty, which no one seemed to
respect, either white or Indian [but the whites broke it first], I was
like many other young men--much on the warpath, but with little honor.
I had not yet become noted for any great deed. Finally, Wapaypay and I
waylaid and killed a white soldier on his way from the fort to his home
in the east.

"T