washakie's bold attitude—tells his councilors they are fools—says the white men, who are wise, have books—tells the tradition of how the indians fell into darkness—great spirit angry at the red man—advocates that the indians live like white people—his powerful speech gains the day for us—shoshone tradition—we start home—a hungry trip—return to the indians, finding them sullen—fourth of july celebration at fort supply—return home.
the book passed around the entire circle without a solitary friend, and came back to our hands. the chief reached for it, and when he got hold of the volume he looked at and opened it, turned leaf after leaf as readily as though he had been accustomed to books, then straightened to his full height as he sat there, and looked around the circle. "are you all done talking?" he asked. seeing every man with his hand on his mouth, he spoke: "you are all fools; you are blind, and cannot see; you have no ears, for you do not hear; you are fools, for you do not understand. these men are our friends. the great mormon captain has talked with our father above the clouds, and he told the mormon captain to send these good men here to tell us the truth, and not a lie. they have not got forked tongues. they talk straight, with one tongue, and tell us that after a few more snows the buffalo will be gone, and if we do not learn some other way to get something to eat, we will starve to death. now, we know that is the truth, for this country was once covered with buffalo, elk, deer and antelope, and we had plenty to eat, and also robes for bedding, and to make lodges. but now, since the white man has made a road across our land, and has killed off our game, we are hungry, and there is nothing for us eat. our women and children cry for food, and we have no meat to give them. the time was when our father who lives above the clouds loved our fathers who lived long ago, and his face was bright, and he talked with our fathers. his face shone upon them, and their skins were white like the white man's. then they were wise, and wrote books, and the great father talked good to them but after a while our people would not hear him, and they quarreled and stole and fought, until the great father got mad, because his children would not hear him talk. then he turned his face away from them, and his back to them and that caused a shade to come over them, and that is why our skin is black and our minds dark." stripping up his shirt sleeve, he continued: "that darkness came because the great father's back was towards us, and now we cannot see as the white man sees. we can make a bow and arrows, but the white man's mind is strong and light." picking up a colt's revolver, he went on: "the white man can make this, and a little thing that he carries in his pocket, so that he can tell where the sun is on a dark day and when it is night he can tell when it will come daylight. this is because the face of the father is towards him, and his back is towards us. but after a while the great father will quit being mad, and will turn his face towards us. then our skin will be light." here the chief showed his bare arm again, and said: "then our mind will be strong like the white man's, and we can make and use things like he does."
the chief next drew a strong contrast between the indian's way of living and the white man's, telling his people that the mode of the white man was far preferable to that of the indian. he also told them that the great father had directed "the big mormon captain to send these men to us to talk good talk, and they have talked good, and made our hearts feel very glad, and we feel that it is good for them to come and shake hands. they are our friends, and we will be their friends. their horses may drink our water, and eat our grass, and they may sleep in peace in our land. we will build houses by their houses, and they will teach us to till the soil as they do. then, when the snow comes and the game is fat, we can leave our families by the mormons, and go and hunt, and not be afraid of our families being disturbed by other indians, or by anybody else, for the mormons are a good people. let these three good men go, and find a good place for us to live, close by where they live; and after a while we will come, and they will show us how to build houses, for they are our good and true friends, and we wish they would go home, and bring some blankets, powder and lead, knives, paints, beads, flour, sugar and coffee, to trade for our furs, pelts and robes."
washakie spoke thus with great power and wisdom, while his wise old councilors sat with their heads bowed, and their hands over their mouths, only grunting assent to the strong points of his powerful speech, of which this account is only a brief synopsis.
no vote was taken, but seemingly every man gave his assent to the chief's decision, by a grunt of approval. then each man quietly withdrew, and a kettle of boiled antelope meat was set before us. the chief had a separate dish put before him. then we retired for the night.
the camp was almost destitute of food, notwithstanding the squirrels and sagehens that had been taken the day before. the whole camp was hungry, and the last morsel of our provisions was gone, so next morning, june 9th, we left camp, having a very scant breakfast of meat; but we had introduced the book of mormon, and had had the pleasure of having it received favorably by washakie, the great shoshone chief, and his council, as the history of their forefathers. the chief said the wolves had written that book when they were men, but had since been turned into wolves; that being an ancient tradition among the shoshones.
we rode hard all day the day that we left the shoshone camp, and at sundown camped by a mountain leek spring, without a bite to eat. nor had we had anything to eat at dinner time; so we made our supper of mountain leeks. next morning, the 10th, we had leeks for breakfast, and at sunrise we were in the saddle, and on our way back to where we had left the other brethren. i was on the lead, with a double-barreled shotgun before me. we had not gone very far before a blue mountain pheasant flew up from under my horse's head, and lit in the trail a few yards in front. i shot it so quickly that i never thought of my horse being frightened. another man jumped from his saddle, and had the bird skinned before the blood had stopped flowing, while the other built a fire. the pheasant was broiled and eaten before the animal heat could have gone out of it, if it had been left where it was shot. then we traveled all that our horses could bear until 3 o'clock p.m., when we came to a flock of sagehens. as i was still on the lead, i shot three of them before the rest fled. we broiled one of them, and soon devoured it, as we had the other bird, then continued our journey till evening.
as we traveled along by a small stream of water, i saw a fish about eighteen inches long, and almost as quick as thought shot at and stunned it, so that it turned up at the top of the water long enough for an indian boy who was traveling with us to shoot an arrow through it. with the arrow sticking through it, the fish shot up to where the creek widened out, and i, thinking the water only knee-deep, plunged in up to my hips. i caught the fish, we broiled it for supper, and ate it as we had done the birds and leeks—without salt or pepper.
on the 11th we had a bird for breakfast, and traveled till afternoon, counting that we had journeyed about one hundred and twenty-five miles, and reached our camp, where we found all well. the boys soon spread a white man's meal before us, and each of us did our part without a grumble. then we made a short drive, and on the 12th pushed forward on our way to fort supply, reaching that place on the 14th. we found all well, and in good spirits.
june 15th we loaded two wagons with a large assortment of indian goods, as we had agreed to meet the indians with the merchandise, in twenty days, on the labarg, a tributary of green river. on the 20th we reached that stream and as there were no indians there i sent joshua terry, e. barney ward, and my cousin james m. brown, to inform the red men that we were on time as agreed. it seemed that after we left them they had quarreled and divided into three parties, and came very near righting among themselves. they were therefore very different in spirit to when we left them. at last they began to come and lodge in three distinct camps around our wagons.
on the 28th, all the indians were very sullen and did not seem to be the same people they were a few days before. knowing something of their nature, we turned out about seventy-five dollars' worth of provisions and other goods as a present. still that did not seem to satisfy them; they wanted all we had. finally i told them that we had done as we had agreed to do, and if they wished to trade we were ready. they continued to manifest a very mean spirit, and we were not able to sell more than five hundred dollars' worth of goods out of a stock of three thousand dollars.
on june 30th we left three of our party with the indians, while the rest of us returned to fort supply with our stock of goods. the indians felt very bad because we had not given them all we had. it was july 4th when we arrived at the fort, and found the brethren there celebrating the glorious independence day. i was quite ill, but the brethren insisted on my taking the lead of the ceremonies. that being my birthday, i accepted the offer, and we had a very enjoyable time.
from july 5th to the 18th we continued our farm labors. then e. b. ward and three or four other men, including myself, set out on a little exploring trip among the hills. we crossed over to henry's fork, then returned to smith's fork, where we selected a place for the indians to settle when they saw fit. having thus completed our obligations to them, we returned to the fort, and continued our labors until august 1st, when we had a recruit of twelve men sent to us, under command of john phelps. about august 3rd or 4th i rebaptized all the elders, and baptized three of the first shoshone women that ever came into the church. their names were mary, sally ward, and corger. i also baptized a young indian man named corsetsy. from the 5th to the 7th, the indians came and went, attended our meetings regularly, and felt very friendly and somewhat inquisitive. we gave them a few presents. they said they were well pleased to have us locate in their country, and were satisfied with the places we had selected for them to settle and live upon as we did. on the 7th of august, joshua terry and i started for salt lake city, each with an ox team and two wagons loaded with furs, pelts and robes. we arrived in the city on the 11th, and reported our success to governor young, who was pleased with our efforts. we also settled for the goods we had had of him.
on the 13th i started for ogden city, and reached there the next day, meeting my wife and firstborn child, a daughter, who was born august 10th.
