edge of their basket, and looked over in alarm at the water rushing so
near them, sputtering and making wry mouths as it splashed against their
faces. Some of the dogs, encumbered by their loads, were carried down by
the current, yelping piteously; and the old squaws would rush into the
water, seize their favorites by the neck, and drag them out. As each
horse gained the bank, he scrambled up as he could. Stray horses and
colts came among the rest, often breaking away at full speed through the
crowd, followed by the old hags, screaming after their fashion on all
occasions of excitement. Buxom young squaws, blooming in all the charms
of vermilion, stood here and there on the bank, holding aloft their
master's lance, as a signal to collect the scattered portions of his
household. In a few moments the crowd melted away; each family, with its
horses and equipage, filing off to the plain at the rear of the fort;
and here, in the space of half an hour, arose sixty or seventy of
their tapering lodges. Their horses were feeding by hundreds over the
surrounding prairie, and their dogs were roaming everywhere. The fort
was full of men, and the children were whooping and yelling incessantly
under the walls.

These newcomers were scarcely arrived, when Bordeaux was running across
the fort, shouting to his squaw to bring him his spyglass. The obedient
Marie, the very model of a squaw, produced the instrument, and Bordeaux
hurried with it up to the wall. Pointing it to the eastward, he
exclaimed, with an oath, that the families were coming. But a few
moments elapsed before the heavy caravan of the emigrant wagons could
be seen, steadily advancing from the hills. They gained the river, and
without turning or pausing plunged in; they passed through, and slowly
ascending the opposing bank, kept directly on their way past the fort
and the Indian village, until, gaining a spot a quarter of a mile
distant, they wheeled into a circle. For some time our tranquillity