Adopted by Yellow Dog's Tribe--The War Dance]

The bullet holes in my leg and breast also healed in a surprisingly
short time. That was good salve all right. As soon as I was well enough
I took part in the Indian dances. One kind or another was in progress
all the time. The war dance and the medicine dance seemed the most
popular. When in the war dance the savages danced around me in a circle,
making gestures, chanting, with every now and then a blood curdling
yell, always keeping time to a sort of music provided by stretching
buffalo skins tightly over a hoop.

When I was well enough I joined the dances, and I think I soon made a
good dancer. The medicine dance varies from the war dance only that in
the medicine dance the Indians danced around a boiling pot, the pot
being filled with roots and water and they dance around it while it
boils. The medicine dance occurs about daylight.

I very soon learned their ways and to understand them, though our
conversation was mostly carried on by means of signs. They soon gave me
to understand that I was to marry the chief's daughter, promising me 100
ponies to do so, and she was literally thrown in my arms; as for the
lady she seemed perfectly willing if not anxious to become my bride. She
was a beautiful woman, or rather girl; in fact all the squaws of this
tribe were good looking, out of the ordinary, but I had other notions
just then and did not want to get married under such circumstances, but
for prudence sake I seemed to enter into their plans, but at the same
time keeping a sharp lookout for a chance to escape. I noted where the
Indians kept their horses at night, even picking out the handsome and
fleet Indian pony which I meant to use should opportunity occur, and I
seemed to fall in with the Indians' plans and seemed to them so
contented that they gave me more and more freedom and relaxed the strict
watch they had kept on me, and finally in about thirty days from the
time of my capture my opportunity arrived.

[Illustration: My Escape--I Ride a Hundred Miles in Twelve Hours Without
a Saddle]

My wounds were now nearly well, and gave me no trouble. It was a dark,
cloudy night, and the Indians, grown careless in their fancied security,
had relaxed their watchfulness. After they had all thrown themselves on
the ground and the quiet of the camp proclaimed them all asleep I got up
and crawling on my hands and knees, using the greatest caution for fear
of making a noise,