es
abound. He will wish himself well out of it before the morning.

Drawing aside a few boughs, the Ottoes led the way by a narrow path
towards the centre of the thicket, and we soon found ourselves in an
open space, in which were pitched a couple of tents. Several women and
three or four men came out to greet us, and warmly shook my hands. I
felt truly, as John Pipestick had called me, a brother among them. They
placed me in a tent before a fire, and gave me warm food, and chafed my
limbs, and then covered me up with a buffalo robe. I quickly fell
asleep, and never have I slept so soundly in my life, or with a sense of
more perfect security. At last I awoke; I had not stirred for fourteen
hours. It was night, but the Indians were sitting up round the fire
cleaning their arms. They seemed highly pleased when I awoke.

"We have been waiting for you to start on an expedition," exclaimed John
Pipestick. "How do you feel? Are you able, think you, to walk?"

I got up and stretched my limbs. They felt a little stiff, and pained
me slightly, but I thought, I said, that exercise would take that off.

"No fear then," said John; "take some food. Our people are anxious to
start. I'll tell you all about it as we go along."

I lost no time in putting on my moccasins and in getting ready for a
start, after I had partaken of some pemmican and a warm broth, of which
a wild turkey formed the chief ingredient. I found a party of ten
Indians besides Pipestick, all armed with rifles, besides hatchets and
knives, and some had likewise bows and quivers of arrows at their backs.
In their buffalo-skin coats they looked very like a troop of bears.
The remainder of the party were preparing to follow with a light wagon,
in which they carried their tents and provisions, and four shaggy little
ponies to drag it. I saw that we were taking an easterly course. I
asked where we were going.

"To your tent," was the answer.

"But the Pawnees will have gone," I remarked.

"No fear of that while any liquor remains," he observed.

I knew that I might as well have spoken to the winds as have attempted
to dissuade my wild friends from attacking their enemies. Still I tried
to explain my view of the case. John seemed much struck by what I said.
He observed that he had never seen it in that light before. He had
been taught to do good to your friends, but to injure your enemies to
the utmost of your power. He had no notion that such