bound with an iron chain; he threw from
him his clothes and his blanket. He was a prisoner, and needed not the
clothing of a Dahcotah, born free.

"The grey morning dawned as they entered the large door of the fort. His
old father soon followed him; he offered to stay, himself, as a
prisoner, if his young son could be set free.

"It is in vain, then, that we would contend with the white man; they
keep a watch over all our actions. They _work in the night_."

"The long knives will ever triumph, when the medicine men of our nation
speak as you do," said Two Stars. "I have lived near them always, and
have never been their prisoner. I have suffered from cold in the winter,
and have never asked clothing, and from hunger, and have never asked
food. My wife has never stood at the gate to ask bread, nor have my
daughters adorned themselves to attract the eyes of their young men. I
will live and die on the land of my forefathers, without asking a favor
of an enemy. They call themselves the friends of the Dahcotahs. They are
our friends when they want our lands or our furs.

"They are our worst enemies; they have trampled us under foot. We do not
chase the deer on the prairies as eagerly as they have hunted us down.
They steal from us our rights, and then gain us over by fair words. I
hate them; and had not our warriors turned women, and learned to fear
them, I would gladly climb their walls, and shout the war-cry in their
ears. The Great Spirit has indeed forsaken his children, when their
warriors and wise men talk of submission to their foes."

CHAPTER II.

Well might Harpstenah sit in her lodge and weep. The sorrows of her life
passed in review before her. Yet she was once the belle of an Indian
village; no step so light, no laugh so merry as hers. She possessed too,
a spirit and a firmness not often found among women.

She was by birth the third daughter, who is always called Harpstenah
among the Sioux. Her sisters were married, and she had seen but fourteen
summers when old Cloudy Sky, the medicine man, came to her parents to
buy her for his wife.

They dared not refuse him, for they were afraid to offend a medicine
man, and a war chief besides. Cloudy Sky was willing to pay them well
for their child. So she was told that her fate for life was determined
upon. Her promised bridegroom had seen the snows of eighty winters.

It was a bright night in the "moon for strawberries." [Footnote: The
month of June.] Ha