father's place, has grown up in the work, speaks both languages fluently, and is greatly revered by all the Dakotas, who lovingly call him "John." He is the general superintendent of the Presbyterian work among the Dakotas. The Rev. A. L. Riggs, D. D., of Santee, Neb., whom the Indians called "Zitkadan Washtay" or "Good Bird," when a babe at Lac-qui-Parle, with his brother, Rev. Thomas L. Riggs, are men of might in the Congregational department of the work. They are sons of the Rev. Stephen R. Riggs, who entered the work in 1837. Rev. John Baptiste Renville of Iyakaptapte (Ascension) is the youngest son of the famous Joseph Renville. His is the longest pastorate in the Dakotas. He is an able and eloquent minister, a faithful pastor and a genial Christian gentleman. He is the owner of a good farm and a comfortable home well furnished, and is greatly beloved by both whites and Indians.

Rev. Artemus Ehnamane (Walking Through) was a famous warrior in his youth. He participated in the early bitter contests of his nation with the Chippewas, danced the scalp dance on the present site of Minneapolis (then a windswept prairie), was converted in the Mankato revivals of '63 and is now pastor of a very large native congregation. Rev. John Eastman, a young man of promise, is a Presbyterian pastor, and Government agent for the Flandreau Band. He claims for his people, "every adult a member of the church and every child of school age in school."

PROPHETS AND BLACK GOWNS

In the early days of the work of the mission among the Dakotas, a new prophet arose in the southwest (Tavibo), known as the Nevada prophet. The spirit of God, so to speak, was working among the Indians of almost every tribe. From far distant Oregon they sent representatives to Nevada, and on their return they sent a mission to Gen. William Clark, of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, then residing at St. Louis, for his judgment on the Nevada prophet. The party spent a winter at St. Louis, where one of them died, the others returning home the next spring. In answer to their Macedonian call Rev. Fr. Peter John DeSmet, born in Belgium in 1801, who came to the United States in 1821, was sent to the Flatheads. Father DeSmet, mentioned in Chapter XIV as having charge of the education of Charles F. Picotte, left Westport, Missouri, April 30, 1840, with the annual expedition of the American Fur Company in the caravan of Capt. James Dripps on the way to Green River. At the Cheyenne village Father DeSmet was hailed as a minister of the Great Spirit, and as the chief met him, shaking his hand, he said: "Black Gown, my heart was filled with joy when I learned who you were. My lodge never received a visitor for whom I feel greater esteem. As soon as I was apprised of your coming I ordered my great kettle to be filled, and in your honor I commanded that my three fattest dogs should be served."

Father DeSmet, at a council, stated the object of his visit, and the Indians assured him they would provide for the “black gown" (priest) who might be sent to them. When he was yet a long distance off, the Flatheads sent an escort of warriors to protect him. They claimed that in a battle with the Blackfeet, in which sixty of their men were engaged five days, they killed fifty Blackfeet without losing one man; that the Great Spirit knew they were going to protect his messenger and so gave them power over their enemies.

The trappers and traders had assembled in great numbers at the Green River rendezvous, where an altar was built on an elevation and surrounded with boughs and flowers, and mass was celebrated, a great number being present. After his address the Indians deliberated nearly an hour and then said, “Black Gown, the words of thy mouth have found their way to our hearts; they will never be forgotten. Our country is open for thee. Teach us what we have to do to please the Great Spirit, and we will do according to your words."

On several occasions Father DeSmet visited the Dakota Indians, and the same cordial greeting was given him by all the tribes, regardless of their relations to each other. Their souls went out to him as the visible representative of the Great Spirit who had the power to quiet their troubled minds when in contact with them.

The story of the Shawnee prophet, an earlier Indian character, is told in a previous chapter in Part One and further information as to the christianizing of the Dakotas is related in connection with the Sioux massacre, after which the conquest of the Sioux was carried to Dakota soil.

Many of the missionary establishments that have spread and multiplied among the Sioux are the direct outgrowth of the labors of the pioneers, both men and women, herein mentioned. Alfred L. Riggs, the founder of the Santee Mission Training School at Santee, Nebraska, passed away on April 15, 1916, after forty-six years of successful work in the footsteps of his father, the noted translator.

From that inspiring hymn, "Onward, Christian Soldiers," written by S. Baring-Gould (1865), the following lines are selected:

Like a mighty army

Moves the Church of God;
Brothers, we are treading

Where the saints have trod;

We are not divided,

All one Body we,

One in hope and doctrine,

One in charity.

Onward, Christian soldiers,

Marching as to war,

With the cross of Jesus

Going on before!

CHAPTER XVII

THE CONQUEST OF THE SIOUX-Continued

THE RELIGION OF THE DAKOTA INDIANS--THE GHOST DANCE-THE PROPHET OF THE DELAWARES-TAVIBO-SHORT BULL-KICKING BEAR-DEATH OF SITTING BULL-THE BATTLE OF WOUNDED KNEE-END OF THE GHOST DANCE CRAZEEVER PRESENT FEAR OF INDIANS AMONG THE PIONEERS-WOVOKA'S GOLDEN RULE -FRONTIER HARDSHIPS THE BLIZZARD-RED RIVER FLOODS THE RODMAN WANAMAKER EXPEDITION.

"Thy spirit, Independence, let me share:
Lord of the lion heart and eagle eye,

Thy steps I follow with my bosom bare

Nor heed the storm that howls along the sky."

-Tobias Smollett (1721-1771), Ode to Independence.

"Hope springs eternal in the human breast." The Indians of America, no less than the white men of Europe, and the brown men of Asia, have had many prophets and messiahs, who have taught them in spiritual things.

Among the Indian teachers, one of the most noted was the prophet of the Delawares, who claimed to have visions in which he received instructions from the Master of Life, who taught a return to the simple life of the red man as the only avenue to Indian happiness. His followers were required to give up all they had acquired from the white men and return to the fire sticks and bows and arrows of their fathers, when it would be possible for them to organize and drive away the white men who were encroaching upon them.

The story of the Shawnee prophet has already been given in these pages. Born during this period of excitement another Indian prophet appeared in Nevada, Tavibo, said to have been the father of the Indian messiah of 1890. He taught the resurrection of the dead and restoration of the game and the disappearance of the whites, leaving their effects and improvements to be enjoyed by the Indians.

To bring about these results it was taught that there must be obedience to the ten commandments, and in addition they must cease using intoxicating liquors and refrain from gambling and horse racing. The propaganda was carried on secretly, and it was accompanied by a dance, which was the forerunner of the ghost dance. Since 1871 there have been other messiahs, all teaching substantially the same thing, their highest hopes being centered on the return of the game, and the disappearance of the whites, when the Indian should again enter on the life enjoyed by their fathers.

When Tavibo died, in 1870, he left a son, Wovoka, then fourteen years of age, who had been reared in the land of his father, Mason Valley, Nevada, and who

dreamed his dreams, and as he says when the sun died, meaning an eclipse, he went up into heaven and saw God and all of the people who died long ago, and returning from his sleep he told his people what he had seen and heard, and his fame went out to all Indian lands, and the tribes sent their wise men to see and know of him. Dakota sent its representatives and the delegates declared that each one, though of different tribes and language, heard Wovoka in his own tongue. And Wovoka told them that they must not hurt anyone or do any harm to anyone; that they must not fight and must always do right for it would give them much satisfaction; that they must not tell any lies or refuse to work for the whites or make any trouble for them; that when their friends die they must not cry. He charged them that they must not tell the white people but that the son of God had returned to the earth; that the dead were alive and there would be no more sickness, and everyone would be young again; this might be in the fall or in the spring, he could not tell, but they must dance every six weeks, every night for four nights and the fifth night till morning. Then they must bathe in the river and go home, and when they danced they must make a feast and have food that everyone might eat. And he gave them some new food and some sacred paint, and promised that he would come to them sometime.

And thus equipped the wise men of the tribes returned to their people to teach the return of the ghosts and inaugurate the ghost dance. For the ghosts were coming and they were driving before them vast herds of antelope and buffalo and

other game.

One of the Indians who was present at the Mason Valley conference with Wovoka said of the meeting:

"Heap talk all the time. Indians hear all about it everywhere, Indians come from long way off to hear him. They come from east; they make signs. All Indians must dance, everywhere keep on dancing. Pretty soon Big Man come. He bring back all game, of every kind, the game being thick everywhere. All dead Indians come back and live again. They all be strong, just like young Indians. and have fine time. When Old Man come this way then all Indians go to the moutains, high up away from the whites. Whites can't hurt Indians then. Then while Indians go way up high big flood come and all white people get drowned. After that water go away, then nobody but Indians everywhere, all kinds of game thick. Indians who don't dance, who do not believe this word, will grow little, just about a foot high and stay that way. Some will be turned into wood and will be burned in fire."

The returning delegates brought this new religion to the Dakota Indians in the winter of 1889 and 1890. Sitting Bull was its chief exponent at Standing Rock. Kicking Bull and Big Foot were at the Sheyenne Agency and Short Bull was the demonstrator at the Rosebud. Short Bull had visited Wovoka; he had touched the hand of the Messiah; had received from him the holy bread and the sacred paint and had listened to his words; he had received messages through him from his friends in spirit-land and had been told of their homes and their employments, and of the vast herds of buffalo and other game and had been assured that the day was soon coming when there would no longer be any whites to make them afraid. He told the Indians that they were living the sacred life; that the soldiers' guns were the only thing of which they were afraid, but these belonged to their father in heaven, and they should no longer fear the soldiers.

He said: "If the soldiers surround you four deep, three of you on whom I have placed the holy shirt, shall sing a song which I have taught you, passing around them, when someone will fall dead. The others will start to run, but their horses will sink. The riders will jump from their horses and they will sink also. Then you can do to them as you desire. Now you must know this that all of the race will be dead, there will be only 5,000 living on earth." He urged that they should dance and be prepared for the time when these things should come.

And thus they were prepared for the events of 1890. The agent at Pine Ridge was frantic with fear. He telegraphed every day for troops. In August, 1890, 2,000 Indians met for the dance near Pine Ridge Agency and refused to give it up when ordered by the agent to stop. They leveled their guns, threatening armed resistance to any interference. At the mere rumor of coming soldiers they fled to the Bad Lands, where they were joined by malcontents from other agencies. Short Bull at the Rosebud and Big Foot at the Sheyenne, also persisted in the dance.

October 9, 1890, a party of Indians under Kicking Bear left the Sheyenne Agency to visit Sitting Bull. He had invited them to visit him at his camp on the Grand River to inaugurate the ghost dance there. The dance had begun at Sheyenne River in September.

Sitting Bull's heart was bad. He had broken the pipe of peace which had hung on his cabin wall since his surrender in 1881, declaring that he wanted to fight, and that he wanted to die. He had ceased to visit the agency. As a young man he refused to live at the agencies. He had spent the summers on the plains and the winters in the Bad Lands, or mountains, or in the timber on the Mouse River. Though a medicine man rather than a warrior, he had great influence with the Indians, drawing them to him and wielding them and the malcontents of almost every tribe against the whites.

Agent James McLaughlin, of the Standing Rock Agency, visited Sitting Bull's camp to induce him to return to the agency but he failed and the dance went on. Col. William F. Cody (Buffalo Bill) was employed by the Indian office at Washington to go to his camp, in the hope that he could influence him, but without avail. Major McLaughlin, who had succeeded much better than the other agents in controlling the Indians under his charge, advised against Sitting Bull's arrest at that time, lest it should lead to an outbreak, but his arrest had been determined upon by the Indian office. It was known that he intended to join the malcontents at the Pine Ridge Agency and that he had been invited to come there for "God was about to appear." He had asked permission to go but had prepared to go without permission. So on September 14, 1890, it was determined to make the arrest without further delay. There were some forty Indian police available and two companies of military, by forced marching from Fort Yates, were placed in supporting distance.

Sitting Bull's arrest was made December 15, 1890, but the police were immediately surrounded by one hundred and fifty or more of his friends on whom he called to rescue him. Whereupon they rushed upon the police and engaged in a hand-to-hand battle. One of Sitting Bull's followers shot Lieut. Bull Head, the officer in command of the Indian police, in the side. Bull Head turned and shot Sitting Bull, who was also shot at the same time by Sergt. Red Tomahawk. Sergt. Shave Head was also shot. Catch the Bear, of Sitting Bull's party, who