d
buffalo meat, the produce of his hunting. Such were the first specimens
that we met--and very indifferent ones they were--of the genuine savages
of the prairie.

They were the Pawnees whom Kearsley had encountered the day before, and
belonged to a large hunting party known to be ranging the prairie in the
vicinity. They strode rapidly past, within a furlong of our tents,
not pausing or looking toward us, after the manner of Indians when
meditating mischief or conscious of ill-desert. I went out and met them;
and had an amicable conference with the chief, presenting him with
half a pound of tobacco, at which unmerited bounty he expressed much
gratification. These fellows, or some of their companions had committed
a dastardly outrage upon an emigrant party in advance of us. Two men,
out on horseback at a distance, were seized by them, but lashing their
horses, they broke loose and fled. At this the Pawnees raised the yell
and shot at them, transfixing the hindermost through the back with
several arrows, while his companion galloped away and brought in the
news to his party. The panic-stricken emigrants remained for several
days in camp, not daring even to send out in quest of the dead body.

The reader will recollect Turner, the man whose narrow escape was
mentioned not long since. We heard that the men, whom the entreaties
of his wife induced to go in search of him, found him leisurely driving
along his recovered oxen, and whistling in utter contempt of the Pawnee
nation. His party was encamped within two miles of us; but we passed
them that morning, while the men were driving in the oxen, and the women
packing their domestic utensils and their numerous offspring in the
spacious patriarchal wagons. As we looked back we saw their caravan
dragging its slow length along the plain; wearily toiling on its way, to
found new empires in the West.

Our New England climate is mild and equable compared with that of the
Platte. This very morning, for instance, was close and sultry, the sun
rising with a faint oppressive heat; when suddenly darkness gathered in
the west, and a furious blast of sleet and hail drove full in our faces,
icy cold, and urged with such demoniac vehemence that it felt like a
storm of needles. It was curious to see the horses; they faced about
in extreme displeasure, holding their tails like whipped dogs, and
shivering as the angry gusts, howling louder than a concert of wolves,
swept over us. Wright's l