trike from the east."
He never dreams that behind that solid curtain of bluff Ogallalla, Sans
Arc, Uncapapa, and Blackfoot lurk in myriads. "The biggest Indian
village on the continent!" they say, he shouts to the nearest column;
but only the northern limits of it could he see. Far, far away in the
East the church-bells are ringing out their glad welcome to the
God-given day of rest. Mothers, sisters, wives, lift up a prayer for the
loved ones on the savage frontier. Aloft the sun in cloudless splendor
looks down on all. Westward press the comrade columns, until, reaching
the head of a shallow ravine that leads northwestward towards the
stream, the Long Hair spurs to the front,--Oh, those beautiful Kentucky
sorrels! Oh, those gallant, loyal hearts!--and the eager, bearded faces,
the erect, athletic forms, the fluttering guidons, one by one are lost
to view as they wind away down the coulee; one by one they disappear
from sight, from hearing, of the comrades now trotting down the bluffs
to the west. Take the last look upon them, fellows,--five fated
companies. Obedient to their leader's order, loyal, steadfast,
unmurmuring to the bitter end, they vanish once and for all from loving
eyes. Only as gashed, lifeless, mutilated forms will we ever see them
again.

Who has not read the story of the Little Horn? Why repeat it here? Who
that was there will ever forget the sight that burst upon the astonished
eyes of Reno's men when, breaking through the willows along the stream
and reaching the level bench, they saw, not five miles away to the
north, as was the first idea, but here in their very front, only long
rifle-shot away, the southern outskirts of the great Indian metropolis
that stretched away for miles to the north. God of battles! was this a
position, was this a force to be assailed by one regiment? Why linger
over it?--the half-hearted advance of the dismounted skirmish line; the
hesitating rally; then the volley from the willows; the flanking
warriors on the west; the sudden consciousness of their pitiful numbers
as against the hordes now swarming upon them; the mad rush for the
bluffs, with the yelling Indians dragging the rearmost from their steeds
and butchering them as they rode; the Henrys and Winchesters pumping
their bullets into the fleeing mass; the plunge into the seething
waters; the panting scramble up the steep and slippery banks; the
breathless halt at the crest, and then, then the backward glance at the