Free John Ermine of the Yellowstone by Frederic Remington

gave me. I have danced it with the warriors; I am a warrior now.”
    The old man’s worst fears had been realized, but after eating he had the story from White Weasel.
    “When I reached the village, my father’s and mother’s hearts grew big at the sight of my gun and lion’s skin. My mother had made the buckskins you sent down by my father
into clothes both for yourself and for myself.” Here he presented the hermit with his new dress, made beautiful with yellow ochre and with long fringes at back and sleeves, and open at the
front, as was the white man’s custom.
    “Long-Horse,” the boy continued, “was making up a party to go to the Dakotahs. I asked to be one of them, but he thought I was young. I said my medicine was strong and that my
horse was fat. He said I was young to learn the warpath secret, but after smoking my talk he consented. I had only eight cartridges and one horse, all the other Indians having two apiece. Your old
pack-pony is a war-horse now, father; he has carried a warrior,” and the turquoise eyes gleamed brilliantly. “Long-Horse had a big band; we made the warpath medicine and travelled many
sleeps with our backs to the sun. One morning our scouts found two men, an Absaroke and a white man, and brought them in. They belonged to the white warriors’ camp, which was fighting the
Dakotahs, who were all around them, and these men were going for help. Long-Horse moved toward this place guided by the men we had met. Before the sun was up, the Absaroke rode into the camp of the
white soldiers, and they were glad to see us. They had the white cloth lodges and many wagons, but their horses had been taken by the Dakotahs and they had lost some soldiers. The white men had put
their dead men in the ground. I saw where they had dug in the earth and left mounds such as the prairie dog builds. The camp was on the low ground, and back of this were bluffs. When the sun gave
light, we could see the Cut-Throats swarm on their hill as the ants do when you lift a stone. There were five Cut-Throats to one white soldier, and the white men could not go out to them. While the
white men had no women, they had more wagons than I could count, loaded with sugar and coffee until the wheels cut the ground. I never knew there was so much coffee and sugar; where does it come
from, father? The white men are rich, and there are so few of them that each has more than he wants. In a place of that kind the Absaroke would have run away, but the white men cannot run, and they
think more of the coffee and sugar than they do of their own lives. It made my head weak when I saw the enemy; they rode swiftly; they were all warriors, for they all had the war-feathers in their
hair. They had guns, and as they rode they made the gestures of women and snakes and dogs at us. They rode away from a spot which they pointed at, and then they pointed at us, saying we were
buffalo that always ran away like this. Long-Horse and the white chief, a big man with short hair, made a long talk. The Absaroke gave their old travelling-ponies to the white warriors, who put
their own saddles on them. These white soldiers mounted the ponies on the wrong side, and tired as the horses were, they jumped like rabbits under them. Though I was afraid of the enemy, I had to
laugh, father.
    “When we were ready, we charged the enemy, and they fled before us; we followed them until they gained the rough hills. We fired at the Dakotahs, and they fired at us, they always working
backward in the rough cañons, where we were afraid to follow on horseback because Long-Horse said they were trying to lead us into an ambuscade. All day we fought, although very few were
killed. At night the white soldiers and many Absaroke rode swiftly back to the camp. Long-Horse with half of the Absaroke stopped in the strong woods high up on one side of a ravine, and I stayed
with them. I had only four cartridges left. All night we lay there and allowed their scouts