ed, the Indians of course had
to move from cover to cover in order to approach, and so had at times
to expose themselves. When the whites fired at all they fired at a man,
whether moving, or motionless, whom they could clearly see, while the
Indians could only shoot at the smoke, which imperfectly marked the
position of their unseen foes. In consequence the assailants speedily
found that it was a task of hopeless danger to try in such a manner to
close in on three plains veterans, men of iron nerve and skilled in the
use of the rifle. Yet some of the more daring crept up very close to the
patch of brush, and one actually got inside it, and was killed among the
bedding that lay by the smouldering camp-fire. The wounded and such of
the dead as did not lie in too exposed positions were promptly taken
away by their comrades; but seven bodies fell into the hands of the
three hunters. I asked Woody how many he himself had killed. He said
he could only be sure of two that he got; one he shot in the head as
he peeped over a bush, and the other he shot through the smoke as
he attempted to rush in. "My, how that Indian did yell," said Woody,
retrospectively, "_he_ was no great of a Stoic." After two or three
hours of this deadly skirmishing, which resulted in nothing more serious
to the whites than in two of them being slightly wounded, the Sioux
became disheartened by the loss they were suffering and withdrew,
confining themselves thereafter to a long range and harmless fusillade.
When it was dark the three men crept out to the river bed, and taking
advantage of the pitchy night broke through the circle of their foes;
they managed to reach the settlements without further molestation,
having lost everything except their rifles.

For many years one of the most important of the wilderness dwellers was
the West Point officer, and no man has played a greater part than he
in the wild warfare which opened the regions beyond the Mississippi to
white settlement. Since 1879, there has been but little regular Indian
fighting in the North, though there have been one or two very tedious
and wearisome campaigns waged against the Apaches in the South. Even in
the North, however, there have been occasional uprisings which had to be
quelled by the regular troops.

After my elk hunt in September, 1891, I came out through the Yellowstone
Park, as I have elsewhere related, riding in company with a surveyor
of the Burlington and Quincy railroad, wh