ted,
and the trappers spent a last night round camp-fires, spinning yarns of
the hunt.

Early in the morning when the Rocky Mountain men were sallying from the
valley, they met a cavalcade of one hundred and fifty Blackfeet. Each
party halted to survey its opponent. In less than ten years the Rocky
Mountain men had lost more than seventy comrades among hostiles. Even
now the Indians were flourishing a flag captured from murdered Hudson's
Bay hunters.

The number of whites disconcerted the Indians. Their warlike advance
gave place to friendliness. One chief came forward with the hand of
comity extended. The whites were not deceived. Many a time had Rocky
Mountain trappers been lured to their death by such overtures.

No excuse is offered for the hunters. The code of the wilderness never
lays the unction of a hypocritical excuse to conscience. The trappers
sent two scouts to parley with the detested enemy. One trapper, with
Indian blood in his veins and Indian thirst for the avengement of a
kinsman's death in his heart, grasped the chief's extended hand with the
clasp of a steel trap. On the instant the other scout fired. The
powerless chief fell dead; and using their horses as a breastwork, the
Blackfeet hastily threw themselves behind some timber, cast up trenches,
and shot from cover.

All the trappers at the _rendezvous_ spurred to the fight, priming guns,
casting off valuables, making their wills as they rode. The battle
lasted all day; and when under cover of night the Indians withdrew,
twelve men lay dead on the trappers' side, as many more were wounded;
and the Blackfeet's loss was twice as great. For years this tribe
exacted heavy atonement for the death of warriors behind the trenches of
Pierre's Hole.

Leaving Pierre's Hole the mountaineers scattered to their rocky
fastnesses, but no sooner had they pitched camp on good hunting-grounds
than the strangers who had shadowed them at the _rendezvous_ came up.
Breaking camp, the Rocky Mountain men would steal away by new and
unknown passes to another valley. A day or two later, having followed by
tent-poles dragging the ground, or brushwood broken by the passing
packers, the pertinacious rivals would reappear. This went on
persistently for three months.

Infuriated by such tactics, the mountaineers planned to lead the spies a
dance. Plunging into the territory of hostiles they gave their pursuers
the slip. Neither party probably intended that matters should b