they said. They did not understand what they saw.
The truth is that these men were prepared for danger of attacks by
enemies, and were ready to do their best to save their families from
harm.

Carrying on their backs all their property, except the little which
the dogs might pack, it is evident that the Indians in those days
could not make long journeys.

In those days they had no buckets of wood or tin in which to carry
water. Instead, they used a vessel like a bag or sack, made from the
soft membrane of one of the stomachs of the buffalo. This, after it
had been cleansed and all the openings from it save one had been
tied up, the women filled at the stream with a spoon made of
buffalo horn or with a larger ladle of the horn of the wild sheep.
Because this water-skin was soft and flexible, it could not stand on
the ground, and they hung it up, sometimes on the limb of a tree,
more often on one of the poles of the lodge, or sometimes on a
tripod--three sticks coming together at the top and standing spread
out at the ground.

Most of the meat cooked for the family was roasted, yet much of it
was boiled, sometimes in a bowl of stone, sometimes in a kettle made
of a fresh hide or of the paunch of the buffalo. Sometimes these
skin or paunch kettles were supported at the sides by stakes stuck
in the ground, and sometimes a hole dug in the ground was lined with
the hide, which was so arranged as to be water-tight. They were not,
as may be imagined, put over a fire, but when filled with cold water
this water was heated in quite another way. Near by a fire was
built, in which were thrown large stones, and on top of the stones
more wood was piled; so that after a time, when the wood had burnt
down, the stones were very hot--sometimes red hot. With two rather
short-handled forked sticks, the women took from the fire one of the
hot stones, and put it in the water in the hide kettle, and as it
cooled, took it out and put in another hot stone. Thus the water was
soon heated, and boiled and cooked whatever was in the kettle. To be
sure, there were some ashes and a little dirt in the soup, but that
was not regarded as important.

This was long before the Indians knew of matches, or even of flint
and steel. In those days to make a fire was not easy and it took a
long time. By his knees or feet a man held in position on the ground
a piece of soft, dry wood in which two or three little hollows had
been dug out, and taking another s