BOOK I. THE INDIANS IN THE BLACK HILLS. CHAPTER I. THE BLACK HILLS. Closely embraced between the two principal forks of the Cheyenne river arises a magnificent group of mountains. extending about one hundred miles north and south and about sixty miles east and west. To this group of mountains the great Dakota or Sioux nation gave the name of Pa-ha-sap-pah, or Black Hills. The geographical location of these hills the Montenegro of America is between the meridians 102 degr. 30 min. and 105 degr. longitude west from Greenwich; or 25 degr. 30 min. and 28 degr. west from Washington; and between 43 degr. 20 min. and 40 degr. 45 min. north latitude. The boundary line between the States of South Dakota and Wyoming is on the twenty-seventh meridian west from Washington; consequently about two-thirds of this area lies within the State of South Dakota. The area in South Dakota forms the counties of Butte, Lawrence, Meade, Pennington, Custer and Fall River. The present population is about forty thousand. Up to the year 1875 this region, now studded with towns and villages, traversed by the panting steam car, the lightning telegraph and the convenient telephone, was a wilderness, lying untouched almost by aught save the hand of nature. But she has been very lavish in bestowing her gifts. Here the blue hills rise beyond and above the other, higher and higher till the lofty points kindle with the early light, and the overshadowing ridges, like masses of black clouds, touch the skies. Here the rocky cliffs towering in naked grandeur mock the lightning, and send from peak to peak the loudest peal of the thunderstorm. Here wholesome water gushes forth profusely from a thousand springs which, through fifty different creeks, send their water to the Cheyenne on to the Missouri and the Gulf of Mexico.* Here the Scotch pine, the black and white spruce, burr oak, white elm, aspen, white birch, ash and box elder cover the hill-sides and the banks of the rivers. Wild plums and cherries and numerous kind of berries are grow Names of the creeks: Gold Run, Deadwood, Whitewood, Bear Butte, Boulder, Two Bit, False Bottom, Iron, Stinking Chicken, Spruce, Redwater, Spearfish, Whitetail, Bobtail, Fantail, Sheeptail, Blacktail, Grizzly, Ruby, Potae, Squaw, Spring, Cottonwood, Ninemile, Deadman's Alcali, Morris, Pleasant, Antelope, Box Elder, Elk, Cherry, Plum, Horse, Indian, Crow, Owl, Lame Jonny, Crooked Oak, Jim, Rapid, Battle, French, Slate, Gimlet, Tenderfoot, Calamity, Beaver, Cascade, and Fall River. ing here in abundance. In times gone by the forest was the home of the grizzly bear, the panther, mountain lion, mountain sheep, elk and antelope, deer and wolf. The beaver built his villages along the creeks, and the prairiedogs had their towns along the foot-hills. The buffalo was king of the prairie, and the fox, prairie-wolf and a thousand other animals made their home here. The creeks and rivers were filled with nutritious fishes. Abundance of game, abundance of skins, abundance of everything which could satisfy the desire of the untutored red man. Here his chieftains ruled and warrior braves fought and hunted. The smoke of their wigwams and the fires of their councils rose in every canyon from Beaver Creek to Redwater. The shouts of victory and the war-dance rung through the mountains and the glades. The thick arrow and the deadly tomahawk whistled through the forest. Here once the warriors stood in their glory. Mothers played with their infants and gazed on the scene with the warm hopes of the future. The aged and weak sat down but they wept not. They would soon be at rest in the regions where the Great Spirit dwelt, in a home prepared for them beyond these western skies. But this region, the last one they called their home, they could not long call their own. Before the greed of the pale-face and the steel they faded as the snow melts away before the vernal sun. CHAPTER II. THE CROWS. The first inhabitants of the Black Hills and of whom we have any authentic information are the Crows. They were called "Belantsea" by their neighbors, but called themselves "Absaroka anything that flies. They have left their foot-prints in the numerous trails which cross the hills, and the inscriptions found on the rocks in Bear Butte Canyon, along Rapid Creek, Elk Creek and Minnekata; in the remnants of their wigwams found where now stand the prosperous towns of Rapid, Sturgis, Custer, and Hot Springs. According to their tradition they formerly occupied the whole range of the Rocky Mountains with the beautiful valleys on both sides, from the Saskatchewan in the north and as far south as the mountains continue. Alexander v. Humboldt and other reliable authorities are of the opinion that the Crows are a branch of the original Toltecs. The history which establishes the migration of the Toltecs and Aztecs from the mountains of the northwest is extremely vague as to time. But from the similarity of their monuments it seems certain that the Aztecs and the Toltecs were portions of the same race. The different names were given them from the different periods of their migration or from the position to which they respectively went. Some of the people in Mexico to-day apply the term "Toltec" (Toh-tec) mountaineers to the people of the mountains, and "Aztec" (or Ah-na-tec) — lowlanders to the people of the plains. Most probably the Crows, as a branch of the Toltec family in their southward migration, left the main group and crossed the Rocky Mountains about the year 1200 A. D., and gradually extending their meanderings as far east as the Missouri. --- The following is their story of creation, to which they owe their existence. The same has been told by one of their number. "Long ago there was a great flood and only one man was left, whom we call the Old Man,' because it happened so long ago and we have talked of him so much. This Old Man' was a god. He saw a duck and said to it: Come here, my brother.' He was sitting on a high hill — Bear Butte. He said to the duck: Go down to the water and get some clay and I will see what I can do with it.' The duck went away and stayed a long time. Coming to the surface it had a small bit of mud. The god said he would make a something out of it, and added: We are here by ourselves; it is bad. Holding the mud in his hands till it dried, then blowing it in different directions, there was dry land all about it. The god, the duck and the ground was all that existed. He then made the mountains and creeks. After that they asked each other to do certain things. The duck asked the god to do certain things and among them to make Indians for the prairie. The god took some dirt in his hand, blew it away and there |