Chapter III: War Parties

It has already been said that the highest ambition of the Pawnee young man was to be successful in war. His whole training, all his surroundings, caused him to believe that this success was the only thing worth living for. Life at best he regarded as hard enough, and only the fame to be acquired by the performance of brave deeds could sweeten it so as to make it endurable. To convey a notion of the way in which these war parties were originated, and of the manner in which they were led, I give here stories told me by three brave men who in the old days led out many war parties. The three stories were taken down from the lips of the narrators. Only one who is familiar with scenes in an Indian camp can conceive how much these stories lose by being put into cold type. As heard from the lips of the Indian, they have accessories of surroundings, voice and gesticulation, which add tremendously to their vividness and their interest. Your Indian is a real actor, and in telling a story he throws himself into his tale, and helps out his vocal speech with a sign vocabulary which almost tells the whole story to one who is ignorant of the language.

In the middle of the lodge the fire is burning, and over it hangs the pot which is ever bubbling. At the back of the lodge, opposite the doorway, sits the host, and above him to the lodge poles are tied the sacred bundles, their buckskin coverings black with the smoke and wear of years, perhaps of centuries. To the left of the host are the most important guests, and the other inmates of the lodge are scattered about here and there, the women being nearest the door. The host hands the pipe to some young man, who carefully fills it, and soon it is passing around the circle. Then a few remarks are made by the older men, and some question is asked which starts discussion. After that comes a pause, and then a middle-aged warrior begins a story. He is They-know-that-Leader, and he tells how he took the horses:

"They tell me that my father was a warrior, and in his time led out many war parties. In my young days I went out with war parties as a volunteer many times.

"In my trips with warriors I had closely watched their ways and movements. I had learned from them how to shoot and how to travel so as to escape discovery. I made three trips as leader. I resolved one time, just as we were setting out on the summer hunt, that during the hunt I would lead a party off on the warpath. I made my plans, but I waited first to make the sacrifice. At that time we did not go far; we came back to the village because the Sioux were about us on the hunt.

"On a certain day I played all day the stick game (_Satsa-wi-kah-tûsh_). In the afternoon I had lost everything I had. Late in the afternoon I called a few of the young men to sit down with me. When they had come and sat down with me, there were only a few. I said to them, 'I have called you together to let you know that I am poor in mind. I want to find out if _Ti-ra´-wa_ will take pity on me and help me. I intend that you and I shall go off somewhere on the warpath. Make your preparations to start in two days. Get your moccasins filled with food, get your awls and sinews, your arrows and your bows.'

"On the day I had set, in the night, we went out from the village, having with us the old man who had performed the ceremonies of the sacred things that I was to have with me. On the outskirts of the village, we stood in a row, and the old man prayed for our success. Then we were ready to start.

"Different war parties had gone out before I started, but I considered to see if there was not some way in which I could beat them. I made a plan by which I got ahead of them. We traveled fast, and went up to Grand Island to get some arrows--for my young men had but few arrows--and also to get some provisions. The next morning we again started, and went as far as we could that day. At night I performed ceremonies, as I had been directed. I filled a pipe and smoked to _Ti-ra´-wa_, as we have always done. That is the first thing we have to do. Then I told some of my young men to build a fire, and others to go off to a distance to watch.

"On a war party some one was always taken along who could shoot well. This time we had no one except myself. The next day I killed an antelope, but I did not sacrifice then, because those are not animals which we sacrifice. We had been gone three nights more before I killed anything more. The fourth day I killed a buck deer, and I sacrificed it. From that day on I never killed anything.

"After I had been out nine days I stole the horses. It was not always the same about stealing horses. It was not always done in the same way. It was daytime when my scouts discovered that there were people about; they saw signs of a village. They told me afterward that they had heard reports of guns during the day. They had not come back to tell me of this, but had gone by. I was coming on behind with the young men, when all at once I heard the report of a gun. As soon as I heard it I stopped, and sent two spies out to see what it was, and whether a camp was near. They wandered about in the timber, and came back and said that they saw nothing. I told my men that we would go off to a distance and wait there during the night. We waited there until morning, and when the sun got up we heard the report of guns in different directions, and sometimes coming toward us. We went to a cañon, and hid in the plum brush, and ate plums. Of course we were afraid, but we ate the plums. We thought that this might be the last time we would ever have any plums. They were shooting all about us, and seemed to be coming closer. In the afternoon, the shots stopped, and they went on to their camp.

"While we were hiding here, many of the party feared that we had been seen. They wanted to start back as soon as it grew dark, but I deceived them. I told them that I was very thirsty, and that we would have to go down to a certain place near the river, and get a drink of water. After night we started, and as we were going along, we heard a dog bark. We stopped and sat down, and I told my companions that two men, whom I called by name, were to go and steal horses. 'But,' I said, 'I am going with them to look after them.' I told them to pull off their leggings and moccasins, because the brush was dry and caught on them, making a noise. We went together to a certain place near the village, and then these young men told me that they had been there the day before and had been discovered. Then they turned around and went back to where the party were hiding, but I went on to the village.

"When I came close to the village everything was still; the people were asleep. Where I entered the camp, there was a little timber growing, and here I stopped. While I was considering what I should do, a girl came out of a lodge, but she went away from me. If she had come toward me I should have killed her, for she would have discovered me. After the girl had entered a lodge, I went into the camp to where there were some horses. I drove them out of the camp. Six went back, and I drove nine to where I had left my party. The two that I had ordered to steal horses for me were there. When I came to the place, and found all my men there, I said to them, 'This is very good. I have stolen some horses for you. Now I will go back and get the rest of them for you.' One of the other men persuaded me not to go again, but to let him go. He did so, and brought the six other horses.

"It was the custom, if it was very difficult or dangerous to go to a place to steal horses, for the leader himself to go and do the work.

"After two nights on the return journey I divided the horses among the men. It used to be the custom after a party had been successful and brought back the horses for them to change their names. After this trip my name was changed to 'They-know-that-Leader.' It was the custom among the Pawnees if they brought in horses to make an offering. We felt that we owed something to _Ti-ra´-wa_, and we gave a horse to the priest, the old man who had performed the ceremonies. I was gone but thirteen days, and returned to my tribe."

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After him follows _A-ka-pa-kish_--Pities-the-Poor. He, too, tells his story, and explains why one of his war parties was unsuccessful:

"My father told me, if I should ever want to go off on a war party, to humble myself, and not to let a day pass without praying to _Ti-ra´-wa_ by my smokes. I must always remember to pray to _Ti-ra´-wa_ to give me a strong will, and to encourage and bless me in my worship to him. Even when I was eating I must always remember to pray to him. This I must do for some time before starting out.

"At one time I felt that I was poor, and I resolved to go off on the warpath. A warrior, whom I knew, went out and took a lot of horses. He had been as poor as I. I believed that this man had got his horses because he had prayed to _Ti-ra´-wa_, and I thought, 'If I pray to _Ti-ra´-wa_, why may I not do the same.' So I prayed. No one else knew what I intended. After I had made up my mind, I selected another man, one whom I could trust, and called him to tell him of my resolve. I made him sit by me in the lodge, and said to him, 'I want you to sit by me to-day, and smoke, and learn my intention.' After we had smoked, I said to him, 'My friend, I want you to know that we are on the warpath. We are going out to look for some horses.' After he had smoked, the other man replied, saying, 'Brother, it is well. Let us ask _Ti-ra´-wa_ to take pity on us, to help us on our war trip, and to let us bring home many horses.' We two were the leaders.

"Some time after we had talked together, and made up our minds what we would do, we selected certain young men that we could depend on, and told them that we were on the warpath. This was done in this way. We selected a pipe with which to have a sacred smoke, filled it and smoked. Then we called together into the lodge the others, who did not know our purpose. After they had assembled, I filled the pipe, and said, 'We are going on a war party. We have filled this pipe, and must decide what is to be done.' Then I passed the pipe to the man who sat next to me. If he wished to join us he smoked, and passed it to the next man. It was not allowed for any one to smoke unless he would go with this party. Some might refuse the pipe, saying, 'I have decided to go with another party.' The smoking of the pipe was a promise that the leader could depend on the man who smoked.

"They used to have a certain ceremony to follow before starting out on the warpath. It was something handed down, a special manner of praying to _Ti-ra´-wa_ that he would bless them in their warfare.

"At last everything was ready for the start. The young men had their packs made up. They carried cooked pounded corn, and pounded buffalo meat mixed with tallow; and sometimes the loads were heavy. Some would carry ten pairs of moccasins, each one stuffed full of corn, or pounded buffalo meat. They were well fed. The loads were so heavy that at first we would only make short marches. The leaders had to see that the young men were not overworked.

"When all was ready, the priest who performed the ceremonies met us. He brought with him the sacred bundle which we were to take with us. At night when it was all still, after every one was asleep, the ceremonies were performed. We smoked and worshiped to the east and west, and to the north and south, and prayed for success.

"On that night we started, and went as far as we could; and the next day, toward evening, when we stopped, we dug out a fire-place, like the one in a lodge, and we two leaders sat by it, facing the east, while before us were the sacred things. The leader has to be a good orator, he has to speak to his young men, and advise them well, encouraging them to be strong-hearted. He would speak to them and say, 'We have but a short time to live, so while we are on this trip let us determine to be single-minded. Let us all look to _Ti-ra´-wa_, who is the ruler over all things, and ask him to take pity on us, and bless our warpath. We must respect the animals that the ruler has made and not kill any of them; no birds, nor wolves, nor any creeping things.' Not a night passed but that, after we were seated in a circle, I would talk to the party, and pray, and hope that _Ti-ra´-wa_ would bless us and take pity on us, and that we might be the party that would have good success. On my war parties I had to watch at all times, even when I was resting, to see that my young men should, before they slept, pray to _Ti-ra´-wa_ that they might dream something good, and that it might come to pass.

"The old priest who had performed the ceremonies, and had let me take the sacred things, had told me to kill a particular kind of animal, a deer, and sacrifice it. I sent some spies ahead to look over the country, and a messenger came back from them, saying that they had seen some animals. He did not describe them, and I ordered the messenger to have the hunter kill them. I heard the report of a gun. The hunter with two shots killed three. They were antelope. When the hunter came to me he told me what he had done, and described the animals which he had killed. They were not the animals I had been directed to kill for the sacrifice. I hesitated, for I did not know what to do. I did not wish to eat these animals before the sacrifice had been made. To do this is bad. It troubled me. I was troubled, because if we ate them it would look as if we cared nothing for _Ti-ra´-wa_. Finally we ate what had been killed, and made no sacrifice. Afterward we killed two more and ate them, and still made no sacrifice.

"One night I dreamed that the hunter had shot a buffalo. It fell, but as we went up to it, it got up and ran off. We went on for eight days, and had made no sacrifice to _Ti-ra´-wa_. One day my scouts saw a man sitting on a hill. Some of them wanted to shoot at him, but the others said 'no.' They came back to tell me about it, and when they had returned to the place where they had seen him, the man was gone. The man had seen my spies. Not far off was a village, and the warriors in it came to look for us, but we ran away. They hunted for us, but we had got out of their sight. After this we came back home."

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Curly Chief, second chief of the Kit-ke-hahk´-i band, is the last, and he tells how he sacrificed a scalp:

"It was in the fall, before the winter buffalo hunt was made, that I thought I would go on the warpath. Every little while I would call a few men to sit down with me, and would tell them that I had it in mind to go on the warpath.

"The people went out on the winter hunt and killed buffalo, and while they were on their way back to the village, I started on the warpath with a number of young men. From the camp we went south to the Arkansas River. When we reached that river, it began to snow, and the snow fell six feet deep. We stopped in one place eleven days, till the snow got less deep. From there we went on to the sandhills by the North Canadian. One day as we were going along, we saw far off three Indians on foot. They were Kiowas. Probably they had been on the warpath and had lost their horses. We attacked and killed them. They did not fight. We killed them like women. Then, indeed, we divided the scalps, and made many of them. From there we started home, and found the tribe camped on the Solomon River. When we reached home there was great joy, and we danced the scalp dance.

"I sacrificed a scalp to _Ti-ra´-wa_. I felt that he had given me the victory over my enemies, and for this reason I wanted to give him something, I wanted to make an acknowledgment of his goodness to me. He had taken pity on me and helped me. It was a sacrifice greater than the sacrifice of the buffalo meat. Not many men have made it, but once in a while you see some one who has been noticed by the Ruler. It is our aim, after we have been helped, to give thanks."

RELIGION.