s of the teepee. With shaking knees and hard-set teeth,
the women peered out upon the Dakota men prowling about with bows and
arrows.

At length when the morning sun also peeped over the eastern horizon at
the armed Dakotas, the red eagle walked out upon the edge of the cliff.
Pluming his gorgeous feathers, he ruffled his neck and flapped his
strong wings together. Then he dived into the air. Slowly he winged his
way over the round camp ground; over the men with their strong bows and
arrows! In an instant the long bows were bent. Strong straight arrows
with red feathered tips sped upward to the blue sky. Ah! slowly moved
those indifferent wings, untouched by the poison-beaked arrows. Off to
the west beyond the reach of arrow, beyond the reach of eye, the red
eagle flew away.

A sudden clamor of high-pitched voices broke the deadly stillness of
the dawn. The women talked excitedly about the invulnerable red of the
eagle's feathers, while the would-be heroes sulked within their wigwams.
"He-he-he!" groaned the chieftain.

On the evening of the same day sat a group of hunters around a bright
burning fire. They were talking of a strange young man whom they spied
while out upon a hunt for deer beyond the bluffs. They saw the stranger
taking aim. Following the point of his arrow with their eyes, they
beheld a herd of buffalo. The arrow sprang from the bow! It darted into
the skull of the foremost buffalo. But unlike other arrows it pierced
through the head of the creature and spinning in the air lit into the
next buffalo head. One by one the buffalo fell upon the sweet grass they
were grazing. With straight quivering limbs they lay on their sides. The
young man stood calmly by, counting on his fingers the buffalo as they
dropped dead to the ground. When the last one fell, he ran thither and
picking up his magic arrow wiped it carefully on the soft grass. He
slipped it into his long fringed quiver.

"He is going to make a feast for some hungry tribe of men or beasts!"
cried the hunters among themselves as they hastened away.

They were afraid of the stranger with the sacred arrow. When the
hunter's tale of the stranger's arrow reached the ears of the chieftain,
his face brightened with a smile. He sent forth fleet horsemen, to learn
of him his birth, his name, and his deeds.

"If he is the avenger with the magic arrow, sprung up from the earth out
of a clot of buffalo blood, bid him come hither. Let him kill the red
eag