s we have killed, and he remembers that he has no deeds, being
young. When he thinks of this sometimes he talks words without sense.
But my son is a good man."

The father again extended his hand, which trembled a little. The Sioux
had listened, looking at him with respect, and forgetful of Cheschapah,
who now stood before them with a cup of cold water.

"You shall see," he said, "who it is that talks words without sense."

Two Whistles and the young bucks crowded to watch, but the old men sat
where they were. As Cheschapah stood relishing his audience, Pounded
Meat stepped up suddenly and upset the cup. He went to the stream and
refilled it himself. "Now make it boil," said he.

Cheschapah smiled, and as he spread his hand quickly over the cup, the
water foamed up.

"Huh!" said Two Whistles, startled.

The medicine-man quickly seized his moment. "What does Pounded Meat
know of my medicine?" said he. "The dog is cooked. Let the dance begin."

The drums set up their dull, blunt beating, and the crowd of young and
less important bucks came from the outer circle nearer to the council.
Cheschapah set the pot in the midst of the flat camp, to be the centre
of the dance. None of the old chiefs said more to him, but sat apart
with the empty cup, having words among themselves. The flame reared high
into the dark, and showed the rock wall towering close, and at its feet
the light lay red on the streaming water. The young Sioux stripped naked
of their blankets, hanging them in a screen against the wind from the
jaws of the canon, with more constant shouts as the drumming beat
louder, and strokes of echo fell from the black cliffs. The figures
twinkled across each other in the glare, drifting and alert, till the
dog-dance shaped itself into twelve dancers with a united sway of body
and arms, one and another singing his song against the lifted sound of
the drums. The twelve sank crouching in simulated hunt for an enemy back
and forth over the same space, swinging together.

Presently they sprang with a shout upon their feet, for they had taken
the enemy. Cheschapah, leading the line closer to the central pot, began
a new figure, dancing the pursuit of the bear. This went faster; and
after the bear was taken, followed the elk-hunt, and a new sway and
crouch of the twelve gesturing bodies. The thudding drums were
ceaseless; and as the dance went always faster and always nearer the dog
pot, the steady blows of sound inflamed t