Chapter IV: “a Flock of Sheep That Leisurely Pass By.” (5)

Here is a confounding of things wholly different—the power of absolution, and knowledge infallible. Forgiveness _does_ depend upon the state of the soul, and, whether it be Christ or one of his ambassadors pronouncing absolution, the conditions requisite are absolutely one. Nor Christ nor his priest can pardon the impenitent; but infallible _knowledge_ of the state of the soul affects in no way the power of absolution. God reveals to any man his own soul’s condition, but to no man is given the power of self-absolution. So, also, he grants the power of absolution apart from the gift of infallible knowledge. The things are distinct and separate from each other. The latter of these powers our Lord alone possesses, but he seems not unfrequently, in the exercise of his ministry, to have purposely excluded all its influence over the former, to teach us that the two have no necessary dependence. Thus, he invests St. Peter with the power of the keys a short time before the fall of that apostle, and administers to Judas the clean Bread of Angels when he knows him to be a devil. Could a priest’s want of insight have results more appalling? But Bishop Atkinson here proposes a method most ingenious for testing priestly power, a “practical test” to be applied as follows: “When the power of Christ to forgive sins was doubted, he wrought a miracle to prove it, and thereby silenced the gainsayers. When the power of the priest to forgive sins is doubted, as it very frequently and very seriously is, can he work a miracle to demonstrate it?”

To demand a miracle in the sacrament of penance as a “practical test” of sacerdotal power is also to require it in every other sacrament and sacerdotal function. Has Bishop Atkinson tested by this rule _his_ baptisms, confirmations, communions, and, first of all, his orders? A “practical test” is of general application. When a child is baptized, the Episcopal clergyman thus speaks to the sponsors: “Seeing now, dearly beloved brethren, that this child is regenerate and grafted into Christ’s church, let us give thanks unto Almighty God for these benefits.” Here, should his “practical test” be demanded to verify this statement, could the bishop produce it? Again, at the end of a marriage he says: “_I_ pronounce you man and wife,” and “Whom God hath joined together let no man put asunder.” Is the clergyman then God? Else whence this change from first to third person?

How far, we are asked, in the judgment of a “thorough-going Roman Catholic”—one who is blind enough to take God at his word, while all the world smiles at his childish credulity—does the priest’s power of absolution actually extend? In the ordination service of the Episcopalian Prayer-Book stands this Catholic formula:

“Receive the Holy Ghost for the office and work of a priest in the church of God, now committed unto thee by the imposition of our hands. Whose sins thou dost forgive, they are forgiven; and whose sins thou dost retain, they are retained. And be thou a faithful dispenser of the word of God and of his holy sacraments; in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.”

* * * * *

Now, the Catholic believes the church means what she affirms; that the literal declaration is the literal truth, since God himself spake it. He therefore receives the priest in Christ’s person, believing that the sins which he remits are remitted. But he knows the conditions upon which depends his cure when he seeks divine remedies. He knows that Christ himself cannot pardon the impenitent, and that the humble priest is not greater than his Master; but, upon the _same conditions_ that the Son of God required, he believes the priest’s decision _must_ be ratified in heaven. He remembers, too, the promises vouchsafed to those receiving, and the overwhelming curse pronounced on those rejecting, the messenger of Christ—a judgment more dread than that on Tyre and Sidon.

Though Bishop Atkinson denounces _auricular_ confession, we are not to understand that he opposes all confession. Nay, he deems it sometimes salutary, “sometimes even obligatory, from the ignorance and doubts of the penitent, from the enormity of his crime, from his consequent tendency to despair. But it is a _drastic_ medicine, not to be taken regularly, for thus taken it enfeebles the patient.” Does Bishop Atkinson really mean to tell us that a state of too great sanctity is one to be discouraged? that some _bile_ of imperfection is essential to the health of the moral constitution? and that this the drastic medicine would too thoroughly remove? If not, what does he mean? Did he look upon confession as a wicked imposition, we could readily comprehend his aversion to its practice; but this he denies, directing his attacks against _auricular confession_, which by the Council of Trent is thus defined: “A confession of all mortal sins, _however secret, with all their circumstances_, to a priest, in secret.” Here the bishop shudders—that secret mortal sins, with their attendant circumstances, should be matter of confession, and to a _priest_, in _secret_! To commit them in broad daylight would not be half so terrible! Confessing them in _secret_ is that which most appalls him. Such, he gravely tells us, is not the rightful mode. The proper thing to use is a very mild dilution of this potent, drastic medicine—something that will soothe and lull the troubled conscience, not purge it of its guilt. To support his strong assertions, he appeals to Holy Scripture and to the early fathers. Here we have a long quotation from a work of Bishop Hopkins. From this we learn that “the apostles exercised their office of remitting or retaining sins; for the sins of those _whom they thought fit_ (mark well the restriction) were remitted in baptism, while the sins of those whom _they judged unfit_ were retained.” Again: “These inspired men required repentance towards God and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ, and then administered baptism for the remission of sins to those _whom they judged_ to be truly penitent.” In a word, they acted always in accordance with _their judgment_. Now, the basis of sound judgment is a thorough understanding of the cause to be adjudged, and without this understanding there can be no prudent judgment. Were our Lord’s apostles gods who could read man’s secret conscience? And if not, how could they know the matter they were judging, or give a righteous judgment until they knew the matter? And just here we would ask, What constitutes matter, if not mortal sins? Not venial sins, surely; for these no Roman Catholic is called upon to mention.

But why, some one may ask, must particulars be stated in making a confession? and what is your authority for the secrecy observed? To this we ask in turn, If a sin be stripped of its aggravating circumstances, will any man maintain that it is honestly confessed? and since _God_ does not require us to confess our sins in public, should his faithful representative demand more of the penitent? Yet it is to these conditions that the bishop makes objection, and thus his “drastic medicine” is a talent in a napkin, a useless, dormant power not intended to be exercised. But what says the Church of England on this subject of confession? According to the bishop, she has left it “strictly voluntary”; but in her Visitation of the Sick we find this rubric: “Here shall the sick man be moved to make a special confession of his sins, if he feel his conscience troubled with any weighty matter. After which confession the priest shall absolve him (if he humbly and heartily desire it) after this sort:

“‘Our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath left power to his church to absolve all sinners who truly repent and believe in him, of his great mercy forgive thee thine offences; and by his authority committed to me I absolve thee from thy sins.’” “Here _shall_ the sick man be moved to make confession.” Is it left so “_strictly_ voluntary” as the bishop has declared it? And why now to the sick man does the church propose confession, when in the time of health she never urged it on him? Is he now in a condition for this strange and stern requirement? But Bishop Atkinson would say: “It is only _weighty_ matter he is called upon to tell.” Are not _secret mortal sins_ the weights that now oppress him? And why is he exhorted to a _special_ declaration? Is it not that death is near? But who is he that reckons the number of his days, and can certify unerringly how long he has to live? The thief in the night does not warn us of his coming. Behoves it not, therefore, that we live as dying men, lest, in an hour we think not, the Son of Man should come? If so, the rubric cited is appropriate to all. Thus, in his own communion, Bishop Atkinson will find that _special_ confession to a priest is recommended, and that this confession has all that constitutes _auricular_, except the bond of secrecy which silences the priest. This is left to his honor or personal discretion, untrammelled by all vows. But the bishop further tells us he himself has heard confessions “which, if divulged, would not only have caused shame and anguish, but very probably have caused bloodshed—confessions,” he continues, “_which I keep as sacredly as any Roman Catholic can those made to him_.” This, in our humble judgment, seems to border on _auricular_.

We come now to the question of doctrinal development—a process, as the bishop thinks, for hatching any novelty that priestcraft may devise. To this system he attributes auricular confession, which, according to his reckoning, was first imposed upon the church by Innocent III. at the Fourth Lateran Council, in 1215. “And that this,” says he, “to the extent to which it was then carried, was a novelty in the church, is apparent from the tenor of the canon itself; for it requires _that it shall be often read_ publicly in the church, so that none may plead ignorant of the case.” In the _Book of Common Prayer_, at the baptismal office, appears the following rubric: “The minister of every parish _shall often admonish the people_ that they defer not the baptism of their children,” etc. Here, instructed by Bishop Atkinson, we learn, to our amazement, that the baptism of infants at a very tender age was first known in England after the Reformation, when this rubric was inserted. By his own line of argument we are forced to this conclusion: Had it not been a novelty, what need of this injunction? But, returning to our subject, does Bishop Atkinson forget that there existed heresies _before_ the thirteenth century, and that their watchword, like his own, was “Purity of Faith”? All remnants of these sects, of however ancient origin, are in unity with us upon this point of doctrine. To the Protestants alone belongs the honor of rejecting it, and hence they stand at variance, not only with the Pope, but with the rest of Christendom.

With regard to the new dogmas that have lately been defined, as Moehler well expresses it, our unity of doctrine is in _substance_, not in _form_. As the Infant in the manger and the Victim on the cross, identical in _substance_, were yet unlike in _form_, so also truth, in broader light, assumes more striking aspect. Calculus is but a _form_ of primary arithmetic. As in the natural order, so in the order spiritual, development is but the pulse of vigor and vitality. Even in the life of heaven itself they go “from strength to strength.” The loftiest branches of the oak were once within the acorn; nor could they have developed save as they there existed.

Thus, to a grain of mustard-seed our Lord compared the church, and to the mite of leaven that leavened the whole lump. She is “the pillar and the ground of truth,” which if once shaken, truth itself must fall. To her alone is man responsible, since God commissioned her to teach the world and bring all men to knowledge of his truth. To her St. Chrysostom and St. Augustine bowed; to her St. Ambrose and St. Bernard yielded entire submission. Like Bossuet and Fénelon, the doctors of all ages—whatever their contentions and discussions, however wide their difference of opinion—have ever looked to Rome, and sought her final judgment as the decree of God.

Bishop Gibbons, in reply to the “Charge” of Bishop Atkinson, remarked the contradictory doctrines that prevail in the Anglican communion with regard to confession; some execrating it as a Romish innovation, while others, holding tenets identical with ours, preach and practise its observance as a sacrament of Christ. Bishop Atkinson professes to discover a parallel to this in the various opinions of the Catholic theologians with respect to the limits of the Pope’s infallibility. Let us see upon what grounds he establishes comparison, and how far the comparison is supported. Papal Infallibility is a dogma of the church, an article of faith, to be by all accepted under the last penalty of excommunication. With the Protestant the force of this dogma is experienced, not, indeed, as to the Pope, but with regard to Holy Scripture, which, as the word of God, he _must_ hold to be infallible. Now, the general truth that the Bible is infallible the Catholic and Protestant both equally maintain. To doubt it would be heresy. But admitting, as we do, the general proposition, how many minor differences remain to be adjusted! The Catholic believes that the church alone is able to interpret Holy Scripture, and that without her guidance men may wrest God’s very word unto their own destruction; that the written Word requires some infallible interpreter before we can rely upon its meaning as infallible, since the Scriptures, though infallible, inspire not every reader with their own infallibility. But the common run of Protestants receive their Holy Bible as if it had been printed and handed down from heaven in the language, form, and binding with which they are familiar. They forget that, after all, it is a mere translation and as liable to corruption as any other text in the hands of a translator. The Pope they think presumptuous; the printer and translator infallible. But even here believers may hold diverse opinions with integrity of faith. “How far,” one may ask, “extends infallibility? Is it only in the spirit, or in the letter also? ‘Unless a man _hate_ his father and his mother he cannot be my disciple.’ ‘If ye shall ask _anything_ in my name, I will do it.’ With what exact restriction are these words to be received? Can errors typographical, misrenderings, etc., affect in any way the truth of the infallible? Are all the dates and numbers, in their common acceptation, infallibly correct? Does inspiration equally pervade the whole Bible, the Old and New Testaments? How must we understand St. Paul’s teaching by command and teaching by permission? Was he in each infallible?” All these questions might arise among sincere believers holding the general truth that the Scriptures are infallible. As we have before observed, Papal Infallibility is an established dogma, an article of faith, and the questions now at issue among Catholic theologians are precisely of the nature of those among all Protestants with regard to Holy Scripture. When a definition of a dogma of faith has been promulgated to the universal church, it is acknowledged as infallible by all; but the Pope sometimes teaches in a less determined species, and _then only_ can even the most lax theologians raise the question how far his teaching binds. Are disputes among the Anglicans analogous to these? Bishop Atkinson would stickle for his sacerdotal character; Bishop Whittle, of Virginia, would hoot the very notion. At Mount Calvary, in Baltimore, a child becomes regenerate in the sacrament of baptism; at St. Peter’s, five squares distant, no such change can be effected. At the former Mass is said and the Sacred Host is worshipped; at the latter the Host is bread, and to worship it is idolatry. For whether it be bread or the golden calf adored, such worship is idolatrous. And if the Host be Christ, _not_ to worship is denial of our Blessed Lord’s Divinity.

Are the Quaker and the Mormon more at variance in faith? But Bishop Atkinson interrupts us. “I am not the church,” he says, “nor is Bishop Whittle, nor the pastors of the churches to which you have referred.” Be it granted; but we ask, then, What _is_ your church’s teaching? Surely, one of you is wrong, and has the church no voice to decide the question for us? Can idolatry be taught in her communion with impunity? For, in Dr. Gramnici’s judgment, this is Mr. Richie’s crime: the worship of the creature instead of the Creator. It is too true. All that the Church of England boasts is _latitude_ of doctrine. She has no power of utterance to define or to condemn. The wranglings of her children have silenced her for ever. The enormities of Darwin, if they threatened, could not rouse her; nor, roused, has she the unity to utter an anathema.

Having noticed many points on which we differ from Bishop Atkinson, in conclusion we remark one on which we quite agree. This is when, speaking of St. Bernard, he styles him “the great saint.” But the question upon which he appeals to this great father is hardly one on which we hoped to find the bishop laudatory. Having chosen him, however, to plead his cause against _us_, we needs must think that he supports his advocate, and holds him orthodox, at least, upon the point at issue—the Immaculate Conception. Let us hear what St. Bernard has to offer on this point. “Thou art that chosen Lady,” says he, “in whom our Lord found repose, and in whom he has deposited all his treasures without measure. Hence the whole world, O my most holy Lady! honors thy chaste womb as the temple of God, in which the salvation of the world began. Thou, O great Mother of God! art the enclosed garden into which the hand of a sinner never entered to gather its flowers. Thou art the paradise of God; from thee issued forth the fountain of living water that irrigates the whole world. The day on which thou camest into the world can indeed be called a day of salvation, a day of grace. Thou art fair as the moon; the moon illumines the night with the light it receives from the sun, and thou enlightenest our darkness with the splendor of thy virtues. But thou art fairer than the moon; for in thee there is neither spot nor shadow. Thou art bright as the sun—I mean as that Sun which created the world. He was chosen amongst all men, and thou wast chosen amongst all women. O sweet, O great, O all-amiable Mary! no tongue can pronounce thy name but thou inflamest it with love.”

A DAY AMONG THE KIOWAS AND COMANCHES.

It was rather cold and frosty in the early January morning as we rode eastward from Otter Creek to the Kiowa and Comanche reservation, in the Indian Territory. Toward noon, however, the sun came out, brilliant and warm. The effect on the transparent covering of the trees and shrubs was dazzlingly beautiful. Some were encased in a bright armor, cunningly linked in chains of crescents. I detached a perfect “ice-plant,” with every curve of the stem, every nerve of the leaves, taken in ice. The humblest weeds on the prairie sparkled with frosty diamonds. But as the sun grew warmer they began to bend under their gorgeous burdens, as if wearied by their splendor, like tired beauties after a ball.

In the afternoon the weather was as clear and balmy as on a day in June. Our way lay through the most beautiful part of the Indian Territory. We skirted the southern slopes of the Wichita Mountains. These, as if in honor of our coming, exhibited all their jewelry in its brightest lustre. Down their dark slopes ran shining streams, like chains of silver adorning their broad breasts. Stones of gray and yellow and green and purple were heaped together in distracting profusion, the whole seen through the most surpassingly tender of violet tints, too delicate to be compared to the filmiest marriage-morning lace. As we proceeded the country became more and more diversified. Upland and vale succeeded each other in delightful variety. Beautiful glens, wooded slopes, bold mountain-crests, filled the landscape. The day had become warm enough to free the babble of the scores of pretty little streams that flow into the Cache. We rode through groves of mesquite and forests of oaks. The long, straight paths through the oak-woods made one think of the long alleys of Versailles. We pass along the Main Cache; the scenery is ravishing. To the right flows the stream. It is thickly wooded; and through the English effect, produced by the smoke of a prairie fire in the far distance, it brings back the memory of a railroad glimpse of the line of Windsor Forest. Occasional circles of oaks in the midst of noble stretches of upland render more striking the likeness to the park scenery of old England. To the left are the mountains. They actually furnish the luxury of rocks, covered with moss and mould as green as you could see upon Irish ruins. What a joy was the spectacle of so lovely a region to our eyes, that had been starved for months on sand-hills and treeless deserts!

We passed hundreds of lovely sites for cottages, in pleasant nooks, sheltered from all cold winds by wooded slopes that opened towards the south and bounded semi-circular vales of marvellous fertility. Indeed, in beauty of scenery and in richness of soil I think this portion of the Indian Territory may be considered the garden of the western world.

But, alas! nothing earthly is perfect. The brightest prospect has its shadow. Over this seeming paradise, where you can see in a day’s journey the loveliest characteristics of the most favored climes, malaria spreads its black and baleful wings.

I visited the reservation of the Kiowas and Comanches soon after it was entered by one of the expeditions that operated against the hostile bands of these Indians and of the Cheyennes in the winter of 187-. This force had driven in a number of Kiowas and Comanches. It was a close race between the troops and the Indians. But the latter, having the great advantage of the start, throwing away all _impedimenta_, leaving their line of flight marked by abandoned lodges, lodge-poles, ponies, cooking utensils, etc., had won the race by a few hours only, and surrendered not a moment too soon. I wanted to see all I could see of Indians while opportunity offered. I visited the commanding officer of the adjoining military post, and made known to him my wishes. He received me with great courtesy and kindness, placed a vehicle at my disposal, and instructed his interpreter to accompany me through the Indian camps. The Indians had pitched their _tepies_ in the timbered bottoms along the streams for several miles around the fort.

The interpreter was an “old Indian man.” I found him intelligent and polite. He had evidently been well brought up and fairly educated. His language was generally good; and when he indulged, occasionally, in a graphic, frontier mode of expression, it was easy to see that this was an after-graft, though not the less apt and piquant on that account. The Indians on the reservation were divided into two great classes, those under civil and those under military control. The former were under charge of the agent; the latter under that of the commander of the fort. These were again subdivided into the incarcerated, the enrolled, and the paroled (pronounced by the employees of the post and reservation, _pay-rolled_).

The imprisoned were again subdivided into two classes: the more guilty and dangerous, who were placed in irons and confined under strict surveillance in the post guard-house; and the Indians of less note and guilt, who were in confinement, but not in irons. Of the first the principal was White Horse, a Kiowa chief, a murderer, ravisher, and as great a general scoundrel as could be found in any tribe. These really “bad Indians” did not number more than half a dozen. The Comanches and Kiowas belonging to the second subdivision were confined within the walls of an extensive but unfinished stone building, intended for an ice-house, one hundred and fifty feet by forty. They numbered about a hundred and twenty.

I told the interpreter I should like to begin by a visit to White Horse.

“Then,” said he, “we shall have to see the officer of the day; for the sergeant of the guard has orders to let no one visit White Horse without special instructions.”

Two old squaws, evidently in great distress, now came up to the interpreter, and, having shaken hands with him, began to talk to him with great eagerness.

“You’re in luck,” said the interpreter to me. “These are two of his mothers who want permission to see him.”

“Two of his mothers!” I exclaimed. “How many mothers has he, for heaven’s sake?”

“Only one regular one,” he replied, laughing. “The other is his aunt; but among these Indians the aunts also call themselves mothers.”

Accompanied by the two squaws, we went to seek the officer of the day. We soon found him. He was a tall, fine-looking, genial, impulsive Kentuckian, a cavalry officer. He went with us to the guard-house. He first took the interpreter and myself into the prison-room where White Horse’s five companions were confined. They looked greatly dispirited. They all shook hands with us with great warmth. I noticed the eagerness of the last hand-shaker, who seemed to fear that we might leave the cell before he had gone through the ceremony with each of us. Poor wretches! I presume they thought their hour was nearly come, and, like drowning men, they grasped even at the semblance of straws. They evidently had some rough idea of “making interest” with the victor “pale-faces” in a forlorn hope for pardon. They were effusive in their manifestations of friendship for the officer, who, with his revolver in his belt and his long cavalry sabre clanking at his heels, represented Force to them. Force is something Indians understand, and they respect its emblems. Indeed, most of them have been afforded but poor opportunities to understand anything else.

The officer then conducted us to a private room, into which he ordered White Horse to be brought. A clanking of chains was heard along the corridor, and White Horse, doubly ironed, stood in the door-way. He entered, not without a certain untutored majesty of gait, maugre his irons. He put out his manacled hands, and energetically went through the ceremony of hand-shaking, beginning with the officer of the day, and giving him an extra shake at the end.

White Horse was a large, powerful Indian. He wore a dark-colored blanket which covered his entire person. I could discern no indications of ferocity in his countenance. His face, on the contrary, had rather what I should call a Chadband cast. His flesh seemed soft, oily, and “puffy.”

White Horse’s mother and aunt were now permitted to enter. The mother rushed to her son, threw her arms around him, kissed him on both cheeks, while the tears rolled down her face; but she uttered not a word. The aunt kissed him in like manner. White Horse submitted to their embraces, but made no motion of responding affection. He seemed a little nervous under their caresses, and probably under our observation. The mother took hold of his chain, looked at it for a moment, and then came another paroxysm of silent grief, revealing itself in tears alone. They sat on a rough wooden bench, White Horse in the centre, his mother on his right, his aunt on the left, each holding one of his hands in both of hers. White Horse uttered no sound; no gesture betrayed any emotion, yet I thought I could detect a moistening of the eye. This made me feel that I had no business there, gazing on his grief and that of the poor Indian women. I suppose I ought to be ashamed to say it; but the truth must be told, and I must confess that, villain as he was, I could not help feeling for him. Of course it was a weakness, but I am miserably weak in such matters. I believe I should have pleaded for mercy towards him, though he showed little mercy to others. There are few human beings who do not, at some time in their lives, need mercy shown them; and when they themselves cry out for it, it must be a great consolation to them to reflect, as they look back, that they, in their time, have not been deaf to the cries of others.

I signified a wish to withdraw, and left, accompanied by the officer and the interpreter. Before we were permitted to depart, however, we had to shake hands with White Horse and the two squaws. The women looked at us with an appealing expression, as if, in their poor, simple minds, they thought it possible that, in some way or other, we might have an influence on the fate of the son.

We next visited the unfinished building in which the one hundred and twenty lesser Indian criminals were confined. They were bestowed in a sufficiently comfortable manner. Common tents were ranged along the walls, and there were fires burning at proper distances down the centre of the building. The occupants of the tents were mostly engaged in gambling with monte cards and in various other ways. Your Indian is unfortunately “a born gambler.” They quitted their play, however, and crowded around us, eager to shake hands with us, and uttering the Indian monosyllabic expression of satisfaction, which sounds as if written “how.” This hand-shaking took some time, as every Indian insisted on going through the ceremony. When I supposed I had shaken my way through the crowd, I was touched on the arm, and, turning, met a face which was evidently not that of an Indian, though its owner was garbed in Indian guise. He put out his hand, saying “how” in the usual way. I said to him in rather “Brummagem” Spanish that he was not an “Indio.”

He shook his head and replied: “No.”

“Mejicano?” I asked.

“Si,” he replied with a broad grin.

The other Indians crowded around us, laughing and nodding their heads, ejaculating: “Mejicano! How! how!” and turning towards each other with gestures of wonder or admiration (exactly as I have seen the chorus do at the Italian opera). This was no doubt done with a rude idea of flattering me on my perspicacity. There are worse judges of human nature than the untutored Indian. I suppose there is very little doubt that, had I any power over their fate, the compliment would not have been thrown away on me, or on most men for that matter.

Of course they wanted tobacco, and we gave them what we had about us. They had a good deal to say to the interpreter. Every one had some little grievance to complain of or want to be satisfied. At length, after some more hand-shaking, we escaped from them.

On leaving the prison-house we learned that we should not find the principal Indians in their camps until later in the day, as they were then collecting in the commanding officer’s office to talk about sending a party to find some of the Cheyennes, who, having been driven from the brakes of the Staked Plains, were supposed to have gone to southern New Mexico. The interpreter said I should have a good opportunity to see the “head men” there; we could visit the camps afterwards. To the office we went, and found there about fifteen or twenty chiefs, among them Little Crow and Kicking Bird, the head chief of the Kiowas. If ever there were a good Indian—and there are many very honest people west of the Mississippi who think that no live Indian can be good—I think Kicking Bird was a good Indian. During the recent troubles he never left his reservation, was constant in using his influence in favor of the whites, and never wavered in his fidelity to the government.

He was a fine-looking Indian, and had as winning a countenance as I have looked upon anywhere. The expression of his eyes was remarkably soft and pleasing. There was a quiet, natural dignity in his manners, tempered by great natural grace. I was taken by his appearance from the first, and shook hands with him with pleasure and sincerity, which was not the case on every occasion of hand-shaking that morning. Kicking Bird, as nearly as one can judge an Indian’s age (an Indian is generally as great a chronological difficulty as a negro), was then about thirty-five years old. He was somewhat above the middle height, richly but not gaudily dressed. Hanging by a loop from his left breast were a pair of silver tweezers.

After the “talk” was over and the arrangements for sending out the party agreed upon, every chief except Kicking Bird had some private “axe to grind”—something to ask for. As the presentation of these “private bills” was likely to take much time, we withdrew, mounted our wagon, and drove to the Kiowa camp.

The camps of the three tribes, Kiowas, Comanches, and Apaches, were pitched in the fringe of timber that borders Medicine Bluff Creek and the Main Cache. The day was bright and warm for the season. The scarlet and white blankets of the Indians, seen here and there among the trees, gave life and color to the landscape. Crowds of children gambolled and shouted, and seemed to enjoy themselves intensely. They had no idea they were the children of a doomed and dying race. There was no trace among them of the stoicism of the Indian of maturer years. No crowd of French urchins playing around the Tour Saint Jacques in the grounds of the Palais Royal, or the gardens of the Tuileries, was ever more full of gayety and _espièglerie_ than these little savages. They threw their arms about and “kicked loose legs” as naturally and with as much _abandon_ as any white children could have done. Some, more industriously inclined, built little _tepies_, or lodges; others made tiny camp-fires, playing “war-party”; others, with miniature bows and arrows, skipped along, shooting at the small birds that crossed their path. Now an urchin, more bold than the rest, would hop alongside our wagon and return our “how, how” with compound interest. Emboldened by his example, others would follow, until we had a crowd of little red-skins of both sexes about us, hopping, laughing, and “how-how”-ing. Occasionally they indulged in a general shout of good-natured merriment, which may very probably have been caused by some more than usually good joke at our expense.

Our first visit was to Kicking Bird’s lodge. It was quite roomy, being a _tepie_ of twenty-four poles. In rear of the lodge, and carefully covered by a paulin, like the carriage of any civilized gentleman, stood our friend Kicking Bird’s “buggy.”

Kicking Bird had not yet returned from the talk at the post. His wife, a buxom young squaw, profusely beaded, brightly blanketed, vermilion-cheeked, but not over-washed, did the honors. She had a child about ten months old—a lively, stout little red rascal, whose flesh was as firm as vulcanized rubber. The little wretch was just beginning to walk. He was _in puris_, of course. He took wonderfully to us. He would try to walk across the lodge to each of us in turn, falling at every other step, and getting up again with a loud crow of determination. Then he would toddle from one to the other, holding by our boot-tops as we stood in a circle around him, and being jumped as high as arms would admit of by each in turn, to his intense delight and the great enjoyment of his mother.

We walked through the camp and watched the squaws tanning buffalo-hides and preparing antelope-skins. I was very anxious to get a papoose-board, as a telegram from a medical friend had just informed me that there was an opportunity of utilizing such a piece of furniture in the family of a very particular friend. But I could not beg or buy one, even with the help of my friend the interpreter. We asked several squaws, but not one of them would sell. I heard afterwards that an extravagantly high price, backed by the Indian agent’s influence, failed to procure one. The squaws no doubt consider it “bad medicine” to sell a papoose-board.

A gaudily-dressed Indian, whose cheeks were streaked with paint of all the colors of the rainbow, approached us. In my civilized simplicity I supposed that this glaring individual was some very big chief indeed. I asked the interpreter what great chief he was.

“Some Indian _plug_,” responded that gentleman; “no chief at all.”

“How comes he to be so extravagantly adorned?”

“They can wear anything they can beg, buy, or steal.”

My mistake reminds me of a similar one made by Indians with regard to some white visitors. Col. —— visited an Indian camp, accompanied by some officers and a cavalry escort. The colonel and the officers were dressed in fatigue uniform, with merely gold enough about them to indicate their rank to a close observer on close inspection. The observed of all the Indian observers, however, was a “fancy” Dutch bugler, with his double yellow stripe and his bars of yellow braid across his breast. To him the most respectful homage and the greatest consideration were paid.

As we passed one of the Kiowa lodges, a young man, seemingly about twenty-five or twenty-eight years old, came out to meet us with outstretched arms. With the exception of Kicking Bird, he was the most pleasing Indian I met. He was very fair-skinned for an Indian, bright, intelligent-looking, with a frankness of manner rare among Indians. He was presented to me as Big Tree, a paroled Indian.

The interpreter told me that, up to the time Big Tree was taken with Satanta, the former was an Indian of no note. He was innocent of crime, and achieved a reputation merely by his accidental associations with Satanta.

Notwithstanding the lesson I had received, when we met some gaudily-bedizened Indian I could not refrain from asking who he was.

The interpreter’s answer was invariably: “Only some Indian _plug_.”

We drove to the Comanche camp, and visited the lodge of Quirz-Quip, or “Antelope-Chewer.” I had met him at the “talk” in the morning. He recognized me and shook hands in a very friendly manner. Quirz-Quip’s countenance was not an attractive one. It was at its best then, however, for he was in high glee at his good fortune in reaching the reservation, even with the loss of almost everything he had, and the troops close at his heels. He only got in a few hours ahead of them, and they had been gaining on him hourly. As his dinner was ready, Antelope-Chewer invited us in to join him in the repast, and I accepted the invitation eagerly.

The lodge was a large and comfortable one. No doubt it had been kept standing on the reservation for the use of the squaws and children while Antelope-Chewer was on the war-path, and for a pleasant and safe resting-place for that gentleman when the troops made the war-path too hot for him. Mats were placed around the lodge. On these we sat tailor-fashion. Valises, made of buffalo-hide, scraped and painted in the usual Indian fashion, were placed at intervals around the _tepie_. The fire was in the centre, in a hole eighteen inches or two feet deep. The lodge was pleasantly warmed, and there was not the least smoke. Two young bucks occupied about four yards of the lodge. They lay stretched at full length on their backs. Each had a bow and arrow, with which he amused himself by toying. The arrow was in its place, ready to be sped. Ever and anon they would draw the arrows back to the head, and then relax the strings again. I felt that the rascals would have sent the barbs through us with pleasure, if they could only do so with safety. We were unarmed, it is true; but there were thirteen companies of cavalry and five of infantry within a mile and a half, and the chances of ultimate escape were more than doubtful. I should not wish to meet even my worthy friend Quirz-Quip off the reservation, if I were unarmed and no help near.

The young men merely nodded to us as we entered, without changing their positions or intermitting their bow-play. They gave us a half-careless, half-supercilious smile, and glanced at each other, as if they should say:

“Buffalo-Heart, my boy! what _does_ the governor mean by bringing these fellows here?”

They seemed to look upon us as a pair of young scions of the old French _noblesse_ might have looked upon a republican guard detail entering their private apartments in their ancestral château.

We shook hands and exchanged grunts with the squaws and children. The interpreter joked Quirz-Quip about his race with the troops. The Indian laughed, indulged in several “how-hows” and _buenos_ (the Comanches use a good many Spanish words), and shook hands with me again with great seeming cordiality. He was evidently very much elated by his good fortune in getting to a place of safety, and showed it by repeated chuckles.

Dinner being ready, we drew closer to the festive fire-hole in which the viands were cooking. As a not very comely old squaw put forth a not very clean hand and arm to serve the first course, a young gentleman who had joined our party made a precipitate retreat. The young fellow was troubled with a delicate stomach. Another gentleman, having tasted of the first course, said he found the _tepie_ rather close and withdrew. There remained of our party, then, only the interpreter and my unworthy self to do honor to Antelope-Chewer’s hospitality.

The party assembled around the hospitable stew-pan consisted of the old squaw who did the honors of the camp-kettle; a younger squaw, plump and dirty, evidently the latest favorite; Antelope-Chewer and several little Chewers, ranging from six months to twelve years old; the aristocratic young bucks (whose food was handed to them by the old squaw), the interpreter, and the writer. The repast consisted of stewed buffalo meat served in the vessel in which it was cooked. Each _convive_ takes his clasp-knife in his right hand, seizes one end of the piece of meat with the thumb and forefinger of his left, and cuts off a piece of the required size. It is “bad medicine,” as well as _mauvais goût_, to take more than you can consume. The manner in which salt was used struck me as being an improvement on our civilized mode of using it. It was served dissolved in water in a shallow vessel, and each guest dipped his piece of meat in the fluid. Of course if this method were adopted in our hotels or boarding-houses, I should wish to have my salt and water served in an “individual” salt-vessel.

There was no bread. The Indians on the reservation had received no flour for weeks. We had the Indian substitute for bread—the fat of the meat cut off in strips, pressed, and served separately, cold. There are worse substitutes. A cup of coffee (without milk, of course) concluded the repast. It was by no means bad. It was hot and strong, though not quite sweet enough, as the ration of sugar issued to the Indians was insufficient. I enjoyed it, however. It is only justice to say that Quirz-Quip’s coffee was much better than some I have tasted in railroad eating-houses and “end of the track” towns.

Dinner being over, we left the lodge to walk through the camp, and especially to visit and view a bridge made by the Indians themselves across the Medicine Bluff. It was a structure of mud and logs quite creditable to Indian ingenuity and industry. It showed that the lessons of their teacher—the beaver—had not been thrown away upon them.

We invited Antelope-Chewer to come with us to the fort bakery, and we would make him a present of a dozen loaves of bread. He consented, but said he wanted his squaw to go too.

“He wants her to carry back the bread,” said the interpreter.

We agreed, and got into the wagon. Quirz-Quip desired that the plump and dirty squaw should ride inside with us. To this we would not submit, and insisted that she should take the seat beside the driver. Indeed, I felt already an itching sensation all over me—no doubt the effect of imagination; for the interpreter assured me there was no danger of anything of the kind, unless I should spend a night in a lodge. I assured him that such a thing was not at all probable. Nevertheless, and notwithstanding two or three baths, it was some days before my epidermis regained its accustomed tranquillity.

We drove to the Apache camp for our young friends who had fled from Quirz-Quip’s hospitality, and returned by the Comanche chief’s lodge to pick up the plump and dirty squaw. She had become tired of waiting, and had gone away, much to her lord’s disgust and our satisfaction.

We drove to the bakery and bought a dozen loaves of bread for Quirz-Quip. He wished us to drive him back to his camp with the bread. The interpreter told him we could not do it. Then the modest Comanche asked us to lend him the wagon to take the bread. The interpreter shook his head, and assured him that it was impossible.

“Then,” said Quirz-Quip, “how am I to get the bread to camp?”

“If you are too lazy to pack it,” said the interpreter, “you can leave, and be confounded.”

As we drove away, we saw him, with a rueful countenance, spreading out his blanket on the floor to receive the coveted bread but hated load.

On our return from the camps we passed by the agency. I asked what kind of a man the agent was. I was answered that he was “a good sort of man,” but “he knows nothing about Indians or their ways.”

“He is a Quaker, I suppose.”

“A kind of a _made-up_ Quaker, like a good many of ‘em.”

We stopped at the agency door, and I was introduced to the agent. He was a gentleman in his manners, and looked to me like an honest man. There was to be an issue of blankets on the following day. The agent kindly said he would be glad to have me present, and if I would come he would send a wagon for me. I accepted at once.

The Indian agent was as good as his word. He sent a carriage for us about half-past eight next morning. The issue was to take place about half-past nine. It was nearly half-past eleven, however, before the Indians began to arrive. Your Indian is invariably unpunctual. You may set what hour you please, but you cannot make him come until he is quite ready. By half-past twelve they began coming in considerable numbers and the issue commenced. The women and children were out in great force, and were in high good-humor, chatting and laughing in the gayest manner possible. Each family ranges itself in a semi-circle; the chief, or male head thereof, stood about the centre of the chord. Each chief, after receiving the number of blankets to which he was entitled, tore in two a double blanket of each color; there were only black and white blankets to be issued that day, no scarlet ones, greatly to the disappointment of the squaws and children. Beginning at one end of the semi-circle, the chief threw a piece of each color at the head of the person for whom it was intended. It was caught with a shout of glee and many remarks, evidently of a humorous nature, judging by the laughter with which they were hailed. Sometimes the dignified chief, with as near an approach to a smile as his dignity would allow, threw a joke with the blanket at the head of a dependant. His jokes, like those of all persons in power, were always greeted with applause. When the blanket was so thrown as to strike the recipient full in the face, the merriment was uproarious. Our friend Quirz-Quip was present, of course. He was very busy, getting all he could, and dividing what he got among his interesting family. He was harder to please than if he had always been a good Indian and had never left the reservation to go on the war-path.

The blankets were of very good quality. They were marked with the letters U. S. I. D. It was found necessary to stamp the blankets to prevent the Indians from gambling or trading them away to Mexicans in the summer.

Here and there some wretched squaws stood apart from the general throng, as if they were Pariahs among their sisters. They seemed utterly forlorn and miserable. They took no interest in the busy scene before them. Their faces wore an expression of blank hopelessness. The world had nothing for them in the present, nothing in the future. They came to the issue as mere drudges, to carry back the blankets to the camps. They had each an angular piece cut out of the nostril. This is the Scarlet Letter of the Comanches.

When the issue was over I visited the Indian hospital and had quite an interesting chat with the doctor. The Indians were then suffering a good deal from colds, influenza, etc., brought on by exposure at night, “making medicine”—_i.e._, performing incantations. As we went from the hospital to the carpenter’s shop, I met young Satanta, a paroled prisoner, son of the notorious Satanta who was delivered by the War Department to the civil authorities in Texas to be tried for murders and robberies committed by him within the boundaries of that State. Satanta, Jr., was a bright-eyed young man of twenty. He wore a long, straight red feather in his hat, and carried in his hand a bow, from which ever and anon he discharged an arrow as he went, and picked it up again.

An Indian, who evidently thought he was suffering under a very great grievance, now met us and talked very earnestly and excitedly to the interpreter.

“That Indian is smarting under the sense of some great wrong, real or fancied,” I said.

“Yes,” said the interpreter, smiling; “he has trouble with another Indian about a greyhound pup. I promised this fellow and another a pup each (I have the finest greyhounds in the Territory). The other fellow, while I was away, took both the pups, and won’t give this fellow his. They are just like children in many things.”

There was little doing in the carpenter’s shop. I was shown some work done by a young Indian which was fair, for an Indian. There were no Indians at work, but I was told that Kicking Bird’s son was to begin his apprenticeship the following week.

Nor was there anything doing at the school. There were hopes of opening it the following month, with twenty Apaches, twenty Kiowas, and the same number of Comanches.

The trader at the military post was also the trader for the Indians. The store was thronged from morning to sunset by Indians of both sexes. Comanches, Kiowas, Apaches, hung around in groups, standing in the doorways, blocking up the windows, when they were closed, with their faces against the panes, or their heads and the upper part of their bodies thrust in when they were open. The majority of the trader’s store-idlers are women, young girls, and children. They are by no means backward in begging. The clerks told me it was not wise to leave anything on the counter even for a moment when the red brethren and sisters were in the store; they had to be watched as narrowly as fashionable white kleptomaniacs.

I was rather pleased with the appearance of the Indian agent. He seemed honest and frank. Of his ignorance or knowledge of Indians and their ways I can say nothing. “Old Indian men” are apt to think that, in the way of knowledge of Indians, they have pulled the ladder up after them.

I thanked the agent for his politeness, and said that, if he did not think it impertinent, I should like to ask a question or two for my own information and satisfaction. He replied that he would be very happy to give me any information in his power.

“Well,” said I, “not to mince matters, you know they say a great many hard things about Indian agents.”

“Of course I do. When I received this appointment, one of my most intimate friends wrote to me not to accept it, warning me that, were I as pure as snow, I should be denounced by everybody as a swindler and a thief before six months.”