soned timber and fresh-cut logs were
being rapidly dovetailed and mortised, and long wagon trains laden with
stores and supplies, purchased by Major Burleigh's agents, were pushing
out across the Platte.

"Indians, indeed!" said that experienced officer disdainfully. "They do
not presume to interfere!" and long since the whisper had been going the
rounds that Major Burleigh's interest in the construction of that new
post, involving an expense of some hundreds of thousands of dollars, was
something more than official. In vain John Folsom and veteran officers
of the fighting force had pointed out that Indians never do interfere
when they see huge trains of provisions and supplies coming just where
they want them. Orders were orders, and the building went on. John
Folsom said that any day the news might come that Red Cloud and his
braves had massacred every man and carried off every woman in the new
cantonment. Wives and children were there, secure, as they believed,
behind the stout hearts and far and fast-shooting new breechloaders,
trustful, too, of the Indians whom they had often fed and welcomed at
their doors in the larger and less exposed garrison.

"Two of our companies can stand off a thousand Sioux," said one gallant
officer, who based his confident report on the fact that with fifty of
the new breechloaders, behind a log breastwork, he had whipped a horde
of mountain braves armed only with lance and bow and old "smooth-bores"
or squirrel rifles.

"We came down through the whole tribe," said Burleigh, with swelling
breast. "I had only a small troop of cavalry, and Red Cloud never so
much as raised a yelp. He knew who was running that outfit and didn't
care to try conclusions."

It all sounded very fine among the barrooms and over the poker-table at
Gate City, where Burleigh was a patron and an oracle, but in distant
camps along the Platte and Powder rivers, and among troopers and
linesmen nearer home there were odd glances, and nudging elbows whenever
Burleigh's boastings were repeated. Even as far as department
headquarters the story was being told that the mere report of "Big band
of Sioux ahead" sent in by the advance guard, a report that brought
Loring and Stone leaping nimbly out of the ambulance, rifle in hand and
ready for business, sent Burleigh under the seat and left him there
quaking.

"Get your men down from the Big Horn," was John Folsom's urgent advice
to the department commander. "Get your me