l be killed if I sit down to tell stories before
the frost begins."

But to leave this digression. We remained encamped on this spot five
days, during three of which the hunters were at work incessantly, and
immense quantities of meat and hides were brought in. Great alarm,
however, prevailed in the village. All were on the alert. The young men
were ranging through the country as scouts, and the old men paid careful
attention to omens and prodigies, and especially to their dreams. In
order to convey to the enemy (who, if they were in the neighborhood,
must inevitably have known of our presence) the impression that we were
constantly on the watch, piles of sticks and stones were erected on all
the surrounding hills, in such a manner as to appear at a distance like
sentinels. Often, even to this hour, that scene will rise before my
mind like a visible reality: the tall white rocks; the old pine trees
on their summits; the sandy stream that ran along their bases and half
encircled the village; and the wild-sage bushes, with their dull
green hue and their medicinal odor, that covered all the neighboring
declivities. Hour after hour the squaws would pass and repass with their
vessels of water between the stream and the lodges. For the most part
no one was to be seen in the camp but women and children, two or three
super-annuated old men, and a few lazy and worthless young ones.
These, together with the dogs, now grown fat and good-natured with the
abundance in the camp, were its only tenants. Still it presented a busy
and bustling scene. In all quarters the meat, hung on cords of hide, was
drying in the sun, and around the lodges the squaws, young and old,
were laboring on the fresh hides that were stretched upon the ground,
scraping the hair from one side and the still adhering flesh from the
other, and rubbing into them the brains of the buffalo, in order to
render them soft and pliant.

In mercy to myself and my horse, I never went out with the hunters after
the first day. Of late, however, I had been gaining strength rapidly, as
was always the case upon every respite of my disorder. I was soon able
to walk with ease. Raymond and I would go out upon the neighboring
prairies to shoot antelope, or sometimes to assail straggling buffalo,
on foot, an attempt in which we met with rather indifferent success. To
kill a bull with a rifle-ball is a difficult art, in the secret of which
I was as yet very imperfectly initiated. As