CFMflr 
 
 Division jrC 9 9 
 
 Section . <S 4" O' 4 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2019 with funding from 
 Princeton Theological Seminary Library 
 
 https://archive.org/details/shoshonefolkloreOOolde_O 
 
SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 

SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 AS DISCOVERED FROM THE REV. JOHN ROBERTS, 
 A HIDDEN HERO, ON THE WIND RIVER INDIAN 
 RESERVATION IN WYOMING 
 
 v 
 
 BY 
 
 M 
 
 V 
 
 SARAH EMILIA OLDEN, 
 
 AUTHOR OF “THE PEOPLE OF TIPI SAPA" 
 AND “KAROC INDIAN STORIES” 
 
 MOREHOUSE PUBLISHING CO., 
 
 MILWAUKEE, WIS. 
 
COPYRIGHT BY 
 
 MOREHOUSE PUBLISHING CO. 
 1923 
 
TO THE REVEREND JOHN ROBERTS, 
 AND MRS. ROBERTS 
 AND THEIR FAMILY, 
 
 THIS LITTLE VOLUME IS 
 RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED 
 
Photograph by Sprout, Lander, Wyo. 
 
 SHOSHONE INDIAN WOMAN AND BABY 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Foreword .xi 
 
 I. Preliminary.1 
 
 II. The Shoshones and the Pigmies . 6 
 
 III. The Manners and Customs of the 
 
 Shoshones. 19 
 
 IV. Dances and Religious Beliefs . . 35 
 
 V. The Cemetery at Wind River . . 45 
 
 VI. Characteristics of the Shoshones 48 
 
 VII. Chief Washakie.54 
 
 VIII. The Rev. John Roberts ... 65 
 
 IX. Some Shoshones. 79 
 
 X. In Conclusion. 89 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 Shoshone Indian Woman and Baby . 
 
 .Frontispiece 
 
 opp. 
 
 Prairie Scene, Shoshone Reservation . 8 
 
 Barbara Meyers, Grand-daughter of Saca- 
 jawea, Guide to the Lewis Expedi¬ 
 tion, 1805 18 
 
 Log Cabin, Shoshone Reservation ... 26 
 
 Bishop Randall Hospital, Lander, Wyo. . 30 
 
 Indian Cemetery, Wind River, Wyo. . . 44 
 
 Chief Washakie.54 
 
 Crowheart Butte, Shoshone Reservation 56 
 Buildings of Church of the Redeemer, 
 
 Wind River, Wyo.66 
 
 Shoshone Mission School. Washakie's 
 Chapel. Girls of Shoshone Mission 
 School.88 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 HE chief source of information in writing 
 
 this book was the Reverend John Roberts 
 
 himself. Then I had recourse to the Jour¬ 
 nal of Lewis and Clark; Bird Woman, by James 
 Willard Schultz; The Journal of American His¬ 
 tory, Fulton Memorial number (1907), contain¬ 
 ing the very able article (page 467) by Grace 
 Raymond Hebard, Ph.D., Pilot of the First 
 White Men to Cross the American Continent— 
 Sacajawea; also, a little book, Wind River Reser¬ 
 vation, Wyoming, by the wife of Baird S. Cooper. 
 
 Rose Stagner, one of the school girls, gave me 
 some information. 
 
 Iva St. Clair and Molly Snyder told me little 
 stories; the former two, the latter, one. 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 PRELIMINARY 
 
 HE Wind River runs through western cen¬ 
 
 tral Wyoming, near the main range of the 
 
 Rockies. On the eastern slope of these 
 mountains is the Shoshone Indian Reservation, 
 and that was my destination. 
 
 It was a glorious morning when I left Rock 
 Springs on the western border to travel all the 
 way across the state to Cheyenne through the 
 Wyoming desert ; nothing in sight but endless 
 plains and low hills of peculiar limestone forma¬ 
 tion. Sometimes one of these hills appeared like 
 a mediaeval fortress with all its battlements and 
 towers. The limestone bluffs of Wyoming tell 
 of the ages which have passed, and seem an emb¬ 
 lem of everlasting stability. A log house here 
 and there, or a white tent, made me realize that 
 I was in an Indian country. 
 
 The clouds! I watched them all day long. 
 Sometimes pillars of them rested on the earth 
 supporting gigantic masses overhead; but most 
 of them represented animals or people. Of an¬ 
 tediluvians there was no end; and they ap- 
 
2 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 peared to be giving chase to shaggy polar bears 
 and fleecy sheep. Capricorn, with long horns 
 and beard, seemed to be looking on from a 
 distance and grinning at them all. Then a huge 
 salmon or a sturgeon would float by in the tur¬ 
 quoise sea of air, open-mouthed and gasping in 
 the high altitude. How calm and peaceful was 
 Socrates with round face and bald head, resting 
 on his laurels! Xantippe was not there. Buddha 
 could be plainly seen, looking down upon the 
 earth with benign, placid countenance. Who is 
 the man with the aristocratic, regular profile? 
 Oh, what a long skip from Buddha! It is surely 
 Alexander Hamilton. Many other worthies ap¬ 
 peared from time to time, then changed and dis¬ 
 solved themselves into airy nothing. Thus did 
 these imaginary figures keep me occupied for 
 hours, and help dispose of the tedium of the 
 journey. 
 
 The train pulled out of Cheyenne that night at 
 eleven o’clock; and next morning, about five, 
 reached a God-forsaken place called Orin Junc¬ 
 tion. There I had to change cars, and found in 
 this tiny hamlet a small hotel, a general store, a 
 few minute houses set in the midst of a limitless 
 prairie, and any number of cattle wandering 
 about at random. I watched the sunrise from a 
 sea of entrancing red and gold; but soon had to 
 come down to earth, and breakfast at the hotel. 
 I tried to do my duty by the porridge, pancakes, 
 bacon, and eggs, to which the train hands seemed 
 
PRELIMINARY 
 
 3 
 
 to be doing ample justice. After a nap in a noisy 
 room, I made my way over to the station. 
 
 The train to Lander, for which I was waiting, 
 was due at 11:25 A.M., if on time, which never 
 happened. This morning, to my dismay, I found 
 it was annulled! A bridge some distance down 
 the line had caught fire and been burned away; 
 and there was no telling when the train would 
 come through! A kindly freight hand suggested 
 my taking the local at noon, to Douglas. He said 
 it was a much better place than Orin in which to 
 wait. Noon came, and I could see no local, only 
 a long freight. My benefactor soon made his ap¬ 
 pearance. 
 
 '‘Have you made up your mind to go to Doug¬ 
 las?” he asked. 
 
 “Yes,” I replied, “but I don’t see any local.” 
 
 “This is it,” he said, pointing to the freight 
 train; so there was nothing left to do but climb 
 into the caboose. It was a ride of only fourteen 
 miles. I found Douglas a nice little town, and re¬ 
 joicing in the ownership of a Carnegie library. 
 Seeing Back to Methuselah close at hand, I 
 whiled away an hour or so; but did not find 
 Bernard Shaw at all in accord with my mood. 
 
 I was expecting to be called up any time in 
 the night, at the Hotel la Bonte, to take the 11:25 
 A.M. train of the day before. They thought it 
 might come through at midnight. Next morn¬ 
 ing at six my telephone rang, and I was informed 
 that the train for Lander was due at 7:15. About 
 
4 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 8:15 it actually arrived, or one in place of it; 
 twenty-one hours behind time! I reached Lander 
 in the evening, too late for a stage to Wind 
 River. The hotel, there, was pleasant, with a 
 blazing fire of logs on the hearth in the great 
 office. 
 
 At eight next morning, I found myself the 
 only passenger on a stage packed with luggage 
 and mail bags and bound for the Indian Reserva¬ 
 tion. It was a lovely drive of eighteen miles in 
 the bright sunshine, past well-irrigated farms 
 on either hand. Some were yielding their third 
 crop of alfalfa in one season. The Government 
 has the management of the construction and 
 maintenance of the irrigation system, and 
 charges the farmers one dollar per acre. Every¬ 
 where the Herefords were feeding in great 
 droves—red cattle with white faces; also the 
 coal black Polangus variety, both of them very 
 hardy and well adapted to ranch conditions. 
 Large groups of Indians, employed by the Gov¬ 
 ernment at six dollars a day, were working on the 
 roads. 
 
 After the driver distributed the mail, by hurl¬ 
 ing it with forceful and steady aim at the various 
 boxes en route as he drove rapidly along, and 
 leaving several sacks at the village of Wind 
 River, he took me over to the Shoshone Indian 
 School for girls. I found in the midst of these 
 green pastures and fine farm lands, a plain, old- 
 fashioned brick residential building supple- 
 
PRELIMINARY 
 
 5 
 
 mented by quaint log cottages and a log church 
 and school house combined. I had come here 
 for information about the Shoshones, and was a 
 surprise visitor. I was very kindly and courte¬ 
 ously received by the Rev. John Roberts and his 
 daughters; had the front living room assigned 
 to me, and was told that I would be considered 
 the Bishop’s guest while there. Mrs. Roberts 
 was away on a much needed vacation. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 THE SHOSHONES AND THE PIGMIES 
 
 I T was providential that I was led here to 
 visit with such lovely Christian people; and 
 my sojourn with them was most interesting 
 and delightful. I enjoyed, too, my gloriously 
 sunny room with its broad, entrancing vistas. 
 The two youngest daughters, Marian and Gwen, 
 girls of unusual refinement and culture, 
 were doing the cooking and giving all the in¬ 
 struction as well. The school is a veritable bee¬ 
 hive in itself; breakfast at seven for every one; 
 after which the kitchen work is attended to and 
 the dormitories put in order;then prayers at nine. 
 There are special days for the girls to wash and 
 iron and churn and sweep and mop and sew. Cer¬ 
 tain ones are selected to prepare the vegetables 
 for the noon dinner. The afternoon is devoted 
 to school, and then there is time for romping out- 
 of-doors until six o’clock. 
 
 The children love to sing hymns, and at eve¬ 
 ning prayers are allowed to sing six of their own 
 choosing; sometimes seven and eight. The girls 
 are nice and friendly and courteous, and seem 
 
THE SHOSHONES AND THE PIGMIES 
 
 7 
 
 very happy in their excellent home. On Satur¬ 
 day mornings the parents or other relatives, at¬ 
 tired in gay blankets, drive in their “buggies” to 
 the school and take their respective children off 
 to log cabin or tent until Sunday afternoon, when 
 all assemble for service at four o’clock. 
 
 Their lines have fallen in pleasant places, as 
 they have a beautiful and extensive country for 
 their home. It is as large as a whole state in 
 itself, this mighty tableland of prairie over a 
 mile high, stretching far into the unknown, ex¬ 
 cept where it melts into the green, lavender, and 
 brown slopes of the Rockies, rich in hemlock and 
 spruce, and white and yellow pine timber. Then 
 there are the sparkling days, and “the golden eve¬ 
 ning brightening in the west”, and the great 
 brilliant moon in the spangled, sapphire heavens. 
 Once in awhile the shriek of the night hawk 
 came, weird and shrill, over the fields, and from 
 afar off the wild, almost human, cry of the 
 coyote. Here is nature in all its glory; and it 
 gives one a feeling of intense nearness to the 
 Creator. I had not been here long before Mr. 
 Roberts told me an interesting story about the 
 night hawk, or goatsucker as it is sometimes 
 called; showing that white men can do just as 
 mean things as Indians. 
 
 Once upon a time, a white man was making 
 his way down one of these great mountains. A 
 huge boulder loosened behind him and was com¬ 
 ing along rapidly, threatening to crush him. He 
 
8 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 ran headlong over the trail and finally came to a 
 washout. Crouching down beside it hurriedly, 
 he escaped being struck by the boulder; but it 
 landed right over him and pinned him in com¬ 
 pletely. He called loudly for help. “What is 
 the trouble?” inquired a night hawk, answering 
 his cries. “I must get out of this place,” said the 
 man; “but there is no opening large enough.” 
 “I’ll see that you are freed,” replied the night 
 hawk. The great bird flew up to heaven, and 
 came down with a rush of wind in his wings. Af¬ 
 ter he had done this three times, the boulder di¬ 
 vided in the middle. The man crawled out 
 through the opening. Then he said softly to his 
 deliverer, which was perched close to him upon 
 the boulder: “I want to thank you for what you 
 have done.” No sooner had he uttered these 
 words than he seized the bird by his great wide 
 beak and tore him open! That is why the night 
 hawk always flies about now with his mouth 
 open. 
 
 The Shoshone Indians, before they were lim¬ 
 ited to the Wind River Reservation, lived, 
 many, many years ago, all through this region. 
 It was then inhabited by a race of pigmies or 
 nimerigars similar to those found in Australia 
 and Africa. The Arapahoes said they were of 
 very low mentality. They probably intermarried 
 with the Shoshones, because some of these In¬ 
 dians are small in stature. They were childlike 
 and irresponsible, but remarkably gifted in quali- 
 
PRAIRIE SCENE, SHOSHONE RESERVATION 
 
THE SHOSHONES AND THE PIGMIES 
 
 9 
 
 ties which enabled them to procure food and skin 
 clothing, and to subsist under very unfavorable 
 conditions. The pigmies were stealthy stalkers 
 and great fighters, too. The shots fired by these 
 little people, with poisoned arrows and unerring 
 aim, meant sure death, and picked off the intrud¬ 
 ing Shoshones rapidly. The Arapahoes say they 
 were also cannibals. They even hunted them 
 down, carried them to their houses hewn out of 
 rocks in the deep canyons, and ate them. To 
 this day, the houses of these pigmies can be seen 
 in the depths of the mountains, and many of their 
 skeletons have been found. 
 
 One brilliant moonlight night a daring pigmy 
 gave chase to a big Arapahoe. The latter on com¬ 
 ing to a narrow stream, leaped over it. The 
 pigmy looked before he leaped, and found the 
 stream too wide for him to jump over. Seeing 
 the moon and stars reflected in the water, he said 
 to himself: “That creek is too deep for me to 
 cross”; and returned to his people. So the Ara¬ 
 pahoe escaped uninjured. 
 
 The Shoshones say the pigmies looked some¬ 
 thing like our Santa Claus. They were clad in 
 goatskins and always carried a great quiver of 
 arrows over their backs. Not so very long ago, 
 a Shoshone actually beheld one. He was walk¬ 
 ing on the edge of a very high cliff, when he 
 heard a cry like that of a child. Looking down 
 cautiously, he saw one of the little people on a 
 ledge, being mercilessly attacked by an eagle. 
 
10 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 The Shoshone clambered over the rocks and 
 drove the eagle away. The little fellow expressed 
 deep gratitude, telling the Shoshone he had saved 
 his life. 
 
 It was almost impossible to kill these little 
 people; but they were so tormenting that the 
 Arapahoes were determined to get rid of them, 
 so they made war on them and exterminated the 
 whole race. They hemmed them in a great gorge 
 or canyon through which ran a rushing stream. 
 Out of this canyon there was no way of escape, 
 excepting in the direction of the enemy. The 
 beleaguering Indians had set fire to the brush in 
 the canyon, which was rapidly making its way 
 towards the pigmies. They gathered in council 
 with a view to devising means of escape. 
 
 One little fellow stood up and called out to his 
 people: “Who knows most? Let him now stand 
 forth and tell us how we can save our women 
 and children from being consumed by the ad¬ 
 vancing fire!” A little wise one stood up and re¬ 
 plied: “We'will dig a hole in the sand and put 
 our women and children in the hole; then cover 
 them with an earthen roof, so that the fire can¬ 
 not reach them. Another little brown man clam¬ 
 bered to the top of a rock, and calling out to his 
 people, asked: “How do we cook meat? We 
 make a hole in the ground; we put our meat in 
 the hole; we cover it with an earthen roof; we 
 light a fire on the roof; that’s the way we roast 
 our meat. Do we want to roast our women 
 
THE SHOSHONES AND THE PIGMIES 
 
 11 
 
 and children?” So that plan was abandoned. 
 
 The crier again went through the ranks and 
 called out to his people: “Who knows most? 
 Who knows most? Let him now tell us how we 
 can save our women and children from the ad¬ 
 vancing fire.” Directly, another little pigmy 
 named Solomon arose and said: “We will place 
 them in the river, with their heads above water; 
 that is the way we will save our women and chil¬ 
 dren.” After a short silence another little pigmy 
 mounted a rock and asked the assembly: “How 
 do we boil buffalo meat?” He himself replied: 
 “We make a hollow in the ground; we open out 
 the buffalo hide; and fitting it carefully in the 
 hollow, we fill it with river water. We put our 
 meat in cold water. We light a fire and heat 
 rocks, and drop the hot rocks into the water un¬ 
 til it boils and cooks our buffalo meat; that is 
 how we cook our buffalo meat. The fire is ad¬ 
 vancing upon us in the brush on each side of 
 the creek. It will heat the rocks, boulders, and 
 stones, do we want to boil our women and chil¬ 
 dren?” So that plan, too, was not feasible. 
 
 In despair, again the tribal crier called out, 
 “Who knows most? Who knows most? Let him 
 again come forth and tell us how we can save our 
 women and children from the fire that draws 
 near us.” Then an important little wiseacre, as 
 brown as a berry, stood forth and said: “I know 
 of a plan by which we can save our women and 
 children from the fire. Do you see these tall 
 
12 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 trees around us? Let us now hurriedly build 
 nests in their topmost branches; and let us place 
 therein our women and children, where they will 
 be safe, out of the reach of the fire. That is what 
 we will do!” They one and all shouted: “He 
 knows most! He knows most! He has shown 
 us how to save our women and children!” 
 
 So the nests were placed very high in the trees, 
 and the women and children were packed in them 
 for safety. Meantime the great sea of fire was 
 rolling up the canyon and soon reached the trees, 
 burning them down, together with the nests; so 
 the women and children were all destroyed. The 
 pigmies themselves had no means of escape, and 
 that is why there are no pigmies to trouble us 
 today. 
 
 This narrative shows their low mentality. Ni- 
 nimbeb, or the personified Bad Luck of the Sho¬ 
 shones, of whom more will be told later, was 
 probably the result of the pigmies and their 
 pranks. They were generally invisible, and nearly 
 always in the woods, or in the shade of canyons. 
 
 (It is the same way in Africa. A negro woman 
 has her baby lying in the shade close beside her; 
 a pigmy comes along, takes it away, and puts a 
 pigmy baby in its place. If a negro pursues it 
 he is shot by some invisible foe in the brush. The 
 pigmy if he steals vegetables, always leaves 
 a piece of venison in payment. If he is followed 
 up, the pursuer is invariably shot with a poisoned 
 arrow.) 
 
THE SHOSHONES AND THE PIGMIES 
 
 13 
 
 The real name of the Shoshones is Nimina 
 (people). They are the people; everyone else is 
 outlandish. They call themselves Shoshones only 
 to the whites and members of strange tribes. 
 Their name is derived from Shont-Shonip, which 
 means abundance of grass, because they always 
 camped where the grass was plentiful. It was 
 also the material with which they formerly con¬ 
 structed their wigwams. They are divided into 
 three bands; the So-so-go or walkers, who al¬ 
 ways went everywhere on foot; second, the Doo- 
 goo-riga, or sheep-eaters. This band was more 
 intelligent, and very warlike. They wandered 
 off into the mountains and took their dogs with 
 them. They found mountain sheep in abun¬ 
 dance ; when the dogs saw the sheep on an emi¬ 
 nence, they surrounded them and, holding them 
 at bay, waited until the Indians came forward to 
 kill them with their flint-headed arrows. The 
 third band, the Shoshones, was the smallest of 
 all, but very influential, and gave their name to 
 the whole tribe. They may have come in con¬ 
 tact with some high official through whom the 
 one name was given to all the bands. The Sho¬ 
 shones themselves are a band of the Snake tribe; 
 who are called Snakes because they are so illu¬ 
 sive. Some of this tribe, too, are known to eat 
 snakes. 
 
 The Shoshones carried on a brisk trade in 
 shells obtained from the Coast Indians. In the 
 early days Wyoming was the great fur, buffalo, 
 
14 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 and game middle range of the continent. Its 
 mountain fastnesses and deep canyons concealed 
 both game and men. Coming gradually into con¬ 
 tact with agents of the Hudson Bay Company 
 or the French Canadians, the Shoshones obtained 
 beads and firearms; and many of the older mem¬ 
 bers of the tribe can speak French. The Cana¬ 
 dians established trading posts among them as 
 early as 1805 and 1806. A report then reached 
 Congress that this region was worthless; merely 
 a hunting ground for Indians. Thomas Jefferson, 
 who was President at that time, thought it would 
 be well to investigate the matter, and commis¬ 
 sioned two young men, Captain Meriweather 
 Lewis and Captain William Clarke, to find out a 
 way to the Pacific Ocean and ascertain whether 
 this great western land was, or was not, worth 
 claiming for the United States. 
 
 When Lewis and Clark, with their party of 
 men, in the autumn of 1804 reached the Mandan 
 and Minnetaree Indian villages not far from the 
 present sight of Bismarck, North Dakota, they 
 built a fort and established themselves for the 
 winter. There they became acquainted with a 
 French Canadian trader, Touissant Charboneau. 
 He was then married to two Shoshone Indian 
 girls whom he had won in gambling from a Min¬ 
 netaree chief. This chief had captured the girls 
 during a fierce battle with the Shoshones. 
 
 When the ice broke up in the spring of 1805, 
 Lewis and Clark, prepared to start westward on 
 
THE SHOSHONES AND THE PIGMIES 
 
 15 
 
 their journey, employed Charboneau to be their 
 interpreter and to accompany them to the Every- 
 Where-Salt-Water (the Pacific Ocean). But 
 Sacajawea, his favorite wife, the younger Sho¬ 
 shone Indian girl, proved to be the real interpre¬ 
 ter as well as guide, and so made a place for her¬ 
 self in history. She was only fifteen when, with 
 her helpless baby boy, she piloted the party of 
 government men on their long, dangerous, and 
 fatiguing route. Sacajawea was nice-looking; 
 short of stature, spare of figure, rapid in her 
 movements. In the Lewis and Clark Journals it 
 is recorded that she was keenly intelligent and 
 observant; full of resources in trouble, plucky 
 and determined. She guided the party unerringly 
 through mountain passes and lonely places. 
 Cheerful, resourceful, tireless, faithful, she in¬ 
 spired them all. She was capable, too, of real, 
 genuine deep feeling, manifested to such a de¬ 
 gree that it astonished Lewis and Clark. It was 
 her devotion to their cause which made the ex¬ 
 pedition a success, all the way to the Big-Water- 
 near-the-Setting-Sun; so it is largely owing to 
 this Shoshone Indian woman that the part of our 
 country now called Washington, Oregon, Idaho, 
 and Wyoming, was considered of value, and re¬ 
 tained by the United States Government. It 
 has been well said that this journey resulted in 
 the greatest real estate transaction ever recorded 
 in history. 
 
 The name Sacajawea, according to Mr. Rob- 
 
16 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 erts, who has made a careful study of the Sho¬ 
 shone language, is derived from Sac—canoe, 
 boat or raft; a—the, jawe—launcher. The final 
 a is supposed to be silent. She obtained the 
 name Sacajawea from being so efficient in help¬ 
 ing to launch the boats on the great western 
 journey. She is also called Bo-i-naw or Grass 
 Woman; and Bird Woman. 
 
 Sacajawea’s life has two periods; that in the 
 vigor of her splendid young womanhood; then in 
 old age, white haired and well preserved. Her 
 two sons, Baptiste, the infant that accompanied 
 her to the Pacific and back, and Basil, the 
 adopted child of her sister, who died, were per¬ 
 sonally known to Mr. Roberts. He states that in 
 1883 Sacajawea, then living on the Shoshone 
 reservation, was wonderfully active and intelli¬ 
 gent, considering her great age. She was illiter¬ 
 ate, but spoke French, as did her two sons. She 
 walked alone and was bright to the last. Saca¬ 
 jawea had no sickness, but was found dead one 
 morning, April 9, 1884, on her shake-down of 
 blankets and quilts in her tipi. In the afternoon 
 of the same day, Mr. Roberts gave her Christian 
 burial, laying her to rest and to await her 
 resurrection. So the State of Wyoming, 
 which was not traversed by the explorers either 
 on the journey to the Coast or on the return, 
 claims the distinction of having had the re¬ 
 nowned Indian woman guide a resident within 
 its borders for many years, and holds, now, 
 
THE SHOSHONES AND THE PIGMIES 
 
 17 
 
 all that is mortal of this native-born Amer¬ 
 ican. 
 
 No further mention is made of this woman un¬ 
 til twenty years later, when Mr. Bruno Louis 
 Zimm, the New York sculptor, prepared to model 
 a statue of Sacajawea for the St. Louis Fair in 
 1904. Mr. Zimm spent a year in studying the 
 literature and ethnology involved in this subject. 
 When the time came for him to procure a model 
 typical of a woman of the Shoshone tribe, he was 
 instructed to correspond with the Rev. Mr. Rob¬ 
 erts, who had then worked among these people 
 as a missionary for over twenty-years. Mr. Rob¬ 
 erts directed Mr. Zimm’s attention to one of the 
 young Shoshone women, Miss Virginia Grant, 
 who was at that time a student at the Carlisle In¬ 
 dian School. She is pronounced to be decidedly 
 typical of this tribe. Mr. Roberts at the same 
 time examined his parish records, which he had 
 carefully kept since assuming his duties with the 
 Shoshone Indians, and found noted under date 
 of 1884, Apr. 9th; “Basil’s mother, Shoshone, one 
 hundred years; residence, Shoshone Agency; 
 cause of death, old age; place of burial, Burial 
 Ground, Shoshone Agency.” 
 
 It is said that the statue made by Mr. Zimm 
 not only depicts the true type of a Shoshone 
 woman, but also portrays Sacajawea’s nature. 
 It is a stoical figure, expressing calm endurance 
 and suffering, and on the face an expression of 
 patient curiosity. She wears the Minnetaree cos- 
 
18 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 tune. The papoose is modelled after the child 
 of William Sitting Bull, son of the great chief. 
 
 Mrs. Eva Emily Dye attracted considerable at¬ 
 tention to the Shoshone heroine in her book, The 
 Conquest. In 1905, at the time of the Lewis and 
 Clark Exposition held in Portland, Oregon, Miss 
 Alice Cooper’s spirited and graceful statue was 
 erected by the women of Oregon at a cost of 
 $7,000. It represents an ideal type, an Indian 
 woman clad in soft skins; and folded firmly into 
 them on her back is a sweet little child. The 
 head of Sacajawea is uplifted, her right arm 
 and hand are stretching forward, and she is 
 standing on a lofty, rough rock. 
 
BARBARA MEYERS 
 
 Grand-daughter of Sacajawea, Guide to the 
 Lewis Expedition, 1805. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE 
 SHOSHONE INDIANS 
 
 T HE Shoshones, or the human denizens of 
 this glorious land, lived first in their 
 grass-thatched wigwams, but often be¬ 
 took themselves to the dens and caves of the 
 mountains; in less fear of the wild beasts than 
 of their powerful enemies who roamed the plains. 
 After a time they built themselves small, com¬ 
 pact houses with one room, of slender logs and 
 slightly sloping roof. These are still used among 
 them, as well as the picturesque tipis and the low 
 army tents. 
 
 CLOTHING 
 
 The Shoshone Indians wore buckskin cloth¬ 
 ing made from the skins of mountain sheep, very 
 soft and pliable, and prepared by themselves. 
 Two skins were sewed together with the tail ends 
 uppermost, the hoofs and tails being left for or¬ 
 naments, and the fore hoofs trailing on the 
 ground. This was peculiarly the dress for the 
 women. Over these skin garments were worn 
 heavier ones of deer or elk skin, and in winter, 
 
20 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 buffalo robes, when they could be procured. 
 
 The skin dresses were ornamented with por¬ 
 cupine quills and shells obtained from the Coast 
 Indians. Later, they were elaborately adorned 
 with beads which came to them in large quanti¬ 
 ties through trading with the French Canadians. 
 The Shoshone women now wear gowns of red 
 or blue trade cloth, gaily colored blankets, and 
 sometimes beaded moccasins. Their hair, in two 
 braids, hangs in front over each shoulder and 
 they adorn themselves with many chains of 
 beads and shells. The men wear the ordinary 
 clothing of the whites, supplemented by tall- 
 crowned, wide-brimmed felt hats of light gray, 
 brown, or black, the crowns being wound about 
 with scarfs of various colors. They are also par¬ 
 tial to bright-colored neckerchiefs; and some of 
 them have handsome fur coats. They still wrap 
 themselves in their blankets when at home or 
 driving in their open wagons. 
 
 OCCUPATIONS 
 
 The women did all the work and made the 
 clothing. The beadwork designs of the Shoshones 
 consist entirely of flowers. The usual occupa¬ 
 tions of the men were hunting, trapping, and 
 fighting. The trappers secured pine logs, bored 
 holes in them about an inch in diameter, and 
 filled them with melted fat mixed with strych¬ 
 nine and sugar. The male wolves came and ate 
 the fat, licking it slowly. The poison had time 
 to act before they could get away from the logs. 
 
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 
 
 21 
 
 In fighting their enemies the Shoshones used 
 poisoned arrows. They secured the poison by 
 placing the liver of an antelope or a deer on an 
 ant hill, which aggravated the ants to such an ex¬ 
 tent that they filled the liver with their venom. 
 Then it was cut into small pieces and dried and 
 afterwards reduced to powder. This substance, 
 a deadly poison, was rubbed on the points of 
 their arrows. It caused gangrene which was fol¬ 
 lowed by death. 
 
 JUSTICE 
 
 In the case of murder, which was very rare, 
 the nearest relative became the avenger, and was 
 justified in taking the life of the murderer. 
 
 MARRIAGES 
 
 The infant daughters of these Indians were of¬ 
 ten betrothed by the father to men who were 
 grown, either for themselves or for their sons. 
 If this was not the case, the father of the young 
 man sometimes asked the relatives of the young 
 woman fancied by his son whether it was agree¬ 
 able to them for his son to take her unto himself. 
 There was no special ceremony. The Shoshone 
 simply took the girl or woman he selected to his 
 tent or lodging, with perhaps an extra supply of 
 skins, porcupine quills, chains of shells, or a 
 horse. 
 
 These Indians treated their wives very cruelly, 
 often beating them so severely as to kill them. 
 They gashed the faces of the poor women, too, 
 
22 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 and cut off their noses; a plain case of “cutting 
 off your nose to spite your face”; for what must 
 their appearance have been ever after ? But the 
 Shoshone men had not a keen eye for beauty. 
 They insisted that their wives deserved ill-treat¬ 
 ment, because they behaved so badly. 
 
 0 
 
 CHILDREN 
 
 The children of these Indians did not undergo 
 the training that was common among the Sioux 
 and other tribes. They were wild birds. Once 
 a Shoshone sold a horse to a white man and was 
 paid cash. After a little time he returned for the 
 animal. “Give it back to me!” he said to the 
 owner. “It is my son’s horse, but I will keep the 
 money!” The boy was on hand to shoot the 
 white man if he did not return the horse at once. 
 
 They are very cruel to animals, and still catch 
 rabbits with their hands. They chase the poor 
 little creatures until they are tired out, and then 
 fall on them. Again they take the withes of 
 thorn bushes and stir them around in the rabbit 
 holes. The long thorns become twisted in the 
 hair of the rabbits, making it easy to drag them 
 cut; then they torment the poor beasts by beat¬ 
 ing them or by prolonged strangling. 
 
 . MEDICINE MEN, DISEASES 
 
 Bah-witch-yagat —Buffalo Bellowing, or Bull 
 Lake. 
 
 Bull Lake is an enchanted sheet of water sit¬ 
 uated in a deep canyon. When the wind rushes 
 
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 
 
 23 
 
 through this gorge it sounds like a buffalo bel¬ 
 lowing. Then the Indian medicine men can see 
 a huge, gray buffalo rise from the lake. As he 
 stands on the water, the buffalo shakes his mane 
 and tail, and bellows with a roar like thunder. 
 Near the water’s edge is an enchanted rock or 
 cliff; and on it are hieroglyphics; writing, or 
 magic, is what the Indians call these signs. 
 
 A Shoshone who wants to be a medicine man 
 has to go to this lake and sleep near it all night. 
 He then becomes endowed with magic or spiri¬ 
 tual power. A certain Indian, named Ti-bot-sie, 
 thought he would try the experiment. He tied 
 his horse to a tree a long way off, then went over 
 to the lake and endeavored to compose himself 
 to sleep. All night long he heard awful sounds 
 and beheld terrible ghosts. He was so frightened 
 that he covered his head securely with his blan¬ 
 kets. Ti-bot-sie was determined, though, to be¬ 
 come a medicine man. He braved these terrors 
 until shortly before dawn, when a rattlesnake 
 interfered and buzzed so close to his ear as to 
 upset his over-wrought nerves entirely. Ti-bot- 
 sie jumped up, fled to his horse, and rode away 
 like the wind. So he could not become a medicine 
 man, because he was overcome with fear at Buf¬ 
 falo Lake. 
 
 Ti-bot-sie went hunting one day with a friend 
 of Mr. Roberts. His companion shot seven times 
 at an elk across the lake in the mountains. The 
 animal never moved. “Stop!” shouted Ti-bot-sie 
 
24 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 rushing to the man and holding down his arms. 
 “That is not an elk; it is an apparition!” 
 
 As a rule these Indians are not afraid to pick 
 up rattlesnakes. Moo-yah-vo, a Shoshone cate¬ 
 chist, seized one by the neck, which prevented 
 its biting him. The snake was very strong, and 
 wound itself about Moo-yah-vo’s arm. Another 
 Indian, seeing a rattler advancing towards him, 
 laid his hand on the ground, and let the snake 
 crawl over it as well as up his sleeve; and it was 
 not a rattlesnake that anyone else had had any 
 dealings with. 
 
 These doctors or medicine men sang and 
 danced around the patient to the beating of a 
 drum. They often cut the arms and legs of the 
 sick as a cure for the disease; and sometimes gave 
 them a medicine made of herbs. These men, as 
 a rule, went about and assumed that they had the 
 power or spirit of medicine in them. Mr. Roberts 
 told me of a doctor who had papers to show his 
 authority. One night this medicine man was ly¬ 
 ing awake in his tipi. He heard his name called 
 two or three times by someone from above, and 
 he finally answered. 
 
 “Come out of your tipi,” said the voice. 
 
 He immediately went outside but could dis¬ 
 cern no one. 
 
 In a moment the Voice said: “I give this paper 
 to you.” 
 
 He looked up and saw a paper floating from 
 the sky down towards his tipi. He ran up the 
 
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 
 
 25 
 
 tipi pole; and standing on the topmost end, tip¬ 
 toe, seized the document as it went by. 
 
 “And that is the way,” said he, “in which I got 
 my papers giving me authority to become a 
 medicine man.” 
 
 He chewed roots, and, mixing the juice with 
 water, dispersed it over the patient, as a Chinese 
 laundryman of old sprinkled clothes. He also 
 used suggestion, often saying to the sick man 
 or woman: “You are not sick now!” 
 
 “No, I am not,” was the reply. 
 
 “You are much better.” 
 
 “Yes, I am.” 
 
 The medicine man still retains his great influ¬ 
 ence ; and the Shoshones, in cases of serious ill¬ 
 ness, believe more in him than they do in the 
 physicians furnished by the Government. 
 
 The Shoshone medicine men formerly pos¬ 
 sessed a kind of talisman in the shape of a small 
 black stone. When they took it with them to the 
 lodge or cabin of a person who was ill, for the 
 purpose of healing him, it was sure to bring 
 about good health; but if a medicine man had a 
 grudge against the family, or if he was paid by 
 an enemy to bring affliction upon that family, he 
 carried the little stone to their lodge, and left it, 
 securely hidden. The family would then invari¬ 
 ably be visited with severe illness or even death. 
 If this little black stone were rubbed on a bullet 
 or the point of an arrow, the aim of either would 
 be unerring. 
 
26 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 Some years ago a Shoshone came to Mr. Rob¬ 
 erts in great distress. He had recently lost his 
 wife from consumption. As she was dying, she 
 turned to him and asked him to tell her the pre¬ 
 cise truth. “About what?” he inquired. 
 
 “Why, whether you are tired of me or not,” 
 she whispered. “Haven’t you the little black 
 stone, the talisman, hidden in our lodge so as to 
 get rid of me?” 
 
 “It pained me very much,” said the Indian, “to 
 have her doubt my love for her.” 
 
 At this point Mr. Roberts told me a story of 
 an Arapahoe who considered himself especially 
 called to be a medicine man. “I was young,” he 
 said, “an orphan and very poor. I went out on 
 the great plains and wept and bewailed my mis¬ 
 fortune. While in this state of grief, I looked 
 up, and in front of me were a bear, a badger, 
 and an eagle. ‘What is your trouble?’ said they 
 to me, and I told them. ‘Don’t weep; cheer up!’ 
 they answered; ‘we will make you a medicine 
 man. As a reward for your work, you will be 
 rich.’ After a long silence the bear looked at 
 me, plucked off one of his claws, and passed it to 
 me with the words: ‘By this token I bestow upon 
 thee all knowledge which exists on this earth.’ 
 After a while the little badger bowed to me. Then 
 he pulled off his claw and handed it to me, say¬ 
 ing: ‘With this token I bestow upon thee all 
 knowledge under the earth.’ Last of all the 
 eagle passed me one of his talons and said: ‘With 
 
LOG CABIN, SHOSHONE RESERVATION 
 
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 
 
 27 
 
 this token I bestow on thee all knowledge in the 
 heavens above the earth/ ” “Here they all are,” 
 said the Indian to Mr. Roberts; and pulling out 
 a buckskin string which he wore around his neck, 
 he showed him suspended upon it the claw of 
 a bear, one of a badger, and the talon of an 
 eagle. “What do you think of that?” he asked. 
 “For a man to tell lies about another human be¬ 
 ing is a very bad thing,” replied Mr. Roberts, 
 “but to tell lies about God, as you have done, is 
 a heap worse.” The Indian, turning as white as 
 a sheet, was evidently very much frightened. He 
 got up, saying as he went out: “But I pray to 
 God not to take me away.” 
 
 Some little time ago, one of the Shoshones 
 stabbed another in the back. The knife did not 
 penetrate far, for it struck a bone. The Indian 
 who was wounded remarked, “He could not 
 harm me; I have a turtle’s shell inside of me, 
 under my skin. I can take the turtle out through 
 my mouth whenever I choose; I am a medicine 
 man!” Mr. Roberts in talking with another In¬ 
 dian about it said: “Do you believe that?” 
 “Why yes, of course,” he replied, “That man 
 showed me the turtle; it was in his tent!” 
 
 A Shoshone Indian boy, well known to Mr. 
 Roberts, was very ill, and became unconscious. 
 The parents called in a medicine man. “The 
 moog-wah, the personality of the boy, is gone,” 
 he said. “There is nothing left but the breath. I 
 shall have to die myself in order to call him back. 
 
28 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 Come into the other room,” he requested of the 
 boy’s father. “Now I am going to be dead” said 
 he. “I will lie down on the floor perfectly still. 
 Then turn me over on my face. After two or 
 three hours, come in, and pound me on the back 
 three times to bring me to life.” The father of 
 the boy followed his instructions to the letter. 
 The medicine man roused himself slowly, and 
 remarked: “I was really dead. I went across 
 to the western side of the mountains, and found 
 your boy playing with all the little dead boys, I 
 called him back.” The boy recovered conscious¬ 
 ness and became quite well again. 
 
 This same medicine man did a queer thing. A 
 Shoshone Indian had a large family, of which the 
 youngest child, a girl, was very precocious. 
 When only two or three months old, she could 
 not only run around, but talk. The parents spoke 
 to the medicine man about it. “That little girl 
 is not a bit like other children,” he said, “And do 
 you know what is the matter with her? Why 
 Ninimbeb (the little devil of the Shoshones, of 
 which more later) has taken possession of her 
 and made her body his dwelling place. She will 
 bring no end of trouble on you and your family. 
 You will all become sick and die. For your own 
 sakes, there is only one thing you can do. Take 
 the child off to the mountains and leave her 
 there. When her body dies, Ninimbeb will come 
 out of her. 
 
 The poor parents believed all this; so with sor- 
 
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 
 
 29 
 
 rowful steps they started one day for the moun¬ 
 tains with the little child. On the way they met 
 a man who was part Mexican and part Indian, 
 and stopped to talk to him. “Where are you 
 going?’ ’he inquired. Then they told him their 
 story. He was furious, and swore in a terrible 
 manner. “You will do no such cruel thing!” said 
 he. “I will have the child baptized and make her 
 one of my own family.” The Mexican brought 
 the child to Mr. Roberts for baptism, for he 
 thought that ceremony would drive out the evil 
 spirit, or Ninimbeb. Then, although he had sev¬ 
 eral children, he ran the risk of taking her into 
 his own home. The child lived to be about eight 
 years old. 
 
 The Sage Hen or Hoo-ja, is the Spirit of Medi¬ 
 cine, and Hoo-ja-nik-ar means Sage Hen or Sun 
 Dance. Once upon a time an Indian, who was 
 hunting, shot a sage hen. She did not move. He 
 shot again; then a third time; but she stood 
 stockstill. In a little while she turned around, 
 looked at him reproachfully, and said: “Do you 
 not know that it is impossible to kill me? I am 
 the Spirit of Medicine. Henceforth you will be 
 plagued with illnesses.” The young Indian 
 walked sorrowfully away. 
 
 Sage Hen was wandering about one day with 
 her little ones, when Coyote suddenly ap¬ 
 peared. 
 
 “Well, what are the names of all these little 
 sage chickens?” he inquired. 
 
30 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 “Really, it is none of your business,” replied 
 the Sage Hen. 
 
 Then she and her brood ran at Coyote, throw¬ 
 ing sand into his eyes and all over him; in fact 
 they teased him until he could endure it no 
 longer. Blinded with the sand he ran away, fell 
 into the river, and was drowned. 
 
 The Shoshones have a great fear of the ground 
 gopher, an animal which is very plentiful. They 
 think it may give them the spotted fever; and 
 say that if a malicious gopher meets one of them, 
 it stops and stares at him, and, so, bewitches him. 
 In a few days the Indian sickens and dies of the 
 disease. It kills the gophers as well, hundreds 
 dying from it in their colonies. 
 
 In the Bitter Root Valley, Montana, the 
 spotted fever was so fatal a few years ago that 
 the Board of Health in Washington sent scien¬ 
 tists there to investigate the causes of the dis¬ 
 ease. They discovered that the breeding place 
 of this fever was in the ground gopher; just as 
 the germ of the pneumonia plague was in the Si¬ 
 berian marmot or in the rat. Sheepherders and 
 others are inoculated with the fever through 
 woodticks. These have already bitten the dis¬ 
 eased gopher, and, in their turn, bite people who 
 happen to be exposed to them in walking through 
 the long grass. It was in this way that the Rev. 
 Mr. Roberts caught the disease and was very ill 
 for ten weeks. 
 
 The Shoshones, like all other tribes of Indians, 
 
BISHOP RANDALL HOSPITAL, LANDER, WYO. 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 
 
 31 
 
 are peculiarly susceptible to consumption or the 
 White Plague; also to eczema, scrofula, rheuma¬ 
 tism, and trachoma; but on the whole, their phy¬ 
 sical condition is good, and is much improved 
 under civilized living conditions, to what it was 
 when the experiment was first tried. In the ear¬ 
 lier days there was difficulty in keeping them 
 alive; it was much like locking up a wild rabbit, 
 as Mr. Roberts puts it. Among the school build¬ 
 ings is a small log house, sexagon in shape, but 
 closely resembling a large wooden tipi, for it has 
 an extremely sloping roof and the ends of poles 
 protruding at the top. In former days there was 
 a hole in the roof, the same as in the top of a 
 tipi; and for the preservation of health, a camp 
 fire was built in this log house. The little In¬ 
 dian boys and girls painted their faces and 
 danced around the fire. They greatly enjoyed 
 the sport, and it seemed to improve their health. 
 
 BURIALS 
 
 When a man was dead, he was painted and dec¬ 
 orated by his male friends, the face being colored 
 red. The squaws then wrapped the body in a 
 new blanket, laid it on a bier, and carried it to 
 the mountains or burying ground. His bead- 
 work, blankets, and other belongings were put 
 in the grave with him. The Shoshones used to 
 be buried among the rocks, in a sitting position; 
 and stones and brushwood were placed all over 
 and around them. Sometimes the bodies were 
 
32 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 thrown into deep canyons, over a sheer wall-like 
 precipice perhaps a thousand feet high. 
 
 The favorite horses of those who died were 
 always sacrificed. They were led, blindfolded, to 
 the top of the cliff and hurled into the depths 
 below. Until recently the horses of the dead were 
 led to the cemetery, strangled or choked to death, 
 then laid on the owner’s grave. These horses 
 knew instinctively that they were going to be 
 killed and would squeal and neigh in a piteous 
 manner. Mr. Roberts, in course of time, brought 
 this brutal custom to an end. 
 
 Mrs. Lodge, a full-blood Shoshone woman, 
 told me about her brother Edina, or Edward, 
 who died some years ago. He owned a beautiful 
 roan race horse. At the funeral this horse was 
 painted yellow and vermillion and decorated 
 with ribbons. After the ceremonies were over, 
 they led him to the grave, and as they were 
 throwing him, he gave a frightened, shrill, pierc¬ 
 ing scream; nevertheless, they tied him down 
 and strangled him with a rope. Mrs. Lodge said 
 the family did not want to lose such a fine ani¬ 
 mal ; but when her brother, with his dying 
 breath, whispered: “You will let me have my 
 horse, won’t you?” they felt obliged to make the 
 sacrifice. 
 
 After a death in the family, the near relatives, 
 both men and women, cut their hair short and 
 gashed themselves with knives, sometimes cut¬ 
 ting off the little finger at the first joint. This 
 
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS 
 
 33 
 
 mutilation of the finger was done to save the lives 
 of their own children or relatives. The men went 
 off to the mountains for days, or even weeks, to 
 mourn their loss. The brother of the man that 
 died generally appropriated the widow orwidows, 
 who became his wife or wives. The children 
 also were looked upon as his own. Relationship 
 among the Shoshones did not appear to be well- 
 defined. 
 
 OTHER SUPERSTITIONS 
 
 The Shoshone Indians believed that the cries of 
 the coyote when the moon was full, meant good 
 luck. Although he is such an important animal 
 among them, they do not mind killing one. When 
 a child was joyous at the first thunder in the 
 springtime, it was a sign that he would live to 
 old age and have great honors conferred upon 
 him. 
 
 These Indians are firm believers in ghosts, 
 fairies, and little devils. One of their supersti¬ 
 tions is in a personified bad luck or Ninimbeb. 
 According to them, he is an evil being who fol¬ 
 lows a man on his trail through life, until he 
 finally brings destruction upon him. Sometimes 
 in the night a Shoshone, in terrible fear of this 
 little creature, will get it into his head that Ni¬ 
 nimbeb is after him; so, leaving his tent, he 
 wanders off into the mountains, and, seeking out 
 lonely places in crevices and canyons, endeavors 
 to hide from the little devil. Then he sneaks back 
 
34 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 with light tread so that Ninimbeb will not hear 
 him. 
 
 The Shoshones have a vivid mental picture of 
 Ninimbeb. He has a red nose and is short and 
 stocky, moulded much after the figure of Santa 
 Claus. He dresses in mountain sheepskins dec¬ 
 orated with bright colors, and carries a quiver of 
 invisible arrows with which he wounds his vic¬ 
 tims. If a Shoshone Indian is taken sick, or his 
 horse goes lame, or his squaw develops a poor 
 heart and runs away with another Indian, it is 
 all the result of being smitten with an invisible 
 arrow from the quiver of Ninimbeb, the Little 
 Devil. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 DANCES AND RELIGIOUS BELIEFS 
 
 HE Shoshones are naturally religious. 
 
 Their ceremonies consist chiefly in dances, 
 
 of which the animal sun-dance was the 
 most important. Those who were to take part, 
 from thirty to fifty in number, abstained from 
 meat and drink for three or four days preceding 
 the ceremony. In it they propitiated and offered 
 thanks to the Great Spirit for any happiness or 
 prosperity they enjoyed. They also made an ap¬ 
 peal for these blessings to be continued and for 
 others to be granted. The sun-dance is not held 
 now, except perhaps for a few hours; being for¬ 
 bidden by the Government. 
 
 Besides the great animal sun dance, special 
 dances were often given. It was usually called 
 for by some member of the tribe who was said 
 to have had a vision from the Great Spirit. A 
 crier was sent out to proclaim to the people that 
 it was time for them to go to the mountains to 
 secure the center pole, as well as the evergreens, 
 for building the tipi in which the dance was to 
 take place. 
 
36 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 Then the great pole was planted in a central 
 position, and on it was fastened the head of a 
 buffalo. Shorter poles were placed around it, 
 and joined together, as well as to the center pole, 
 with rafters. The entire sides and roof, except 
 a part two or three feet wide towards the sun, 
 were covered with brush or evergreens. Inside 
 this great tipi were built small recesses or resting 
 places to which the dancers could retire when ex¬ 
 hausted. 
 
 The performers wore very little clothing. They 
 formed part of a circle around the center pole 
 and each dancer was provided with a whistle. 
 This was made of the bone of a crane’s leg, and 
 decorated at one end with eagle’s down. When 
 it was time for the ceremony to begin, the danc¬ 
 ers placed the whistles in their mouths; and 
 throwing their heads back, looked towards the 
 head of the buffalo on the top of the center pole. 
 Then they danced forward and backward to¬ 
 wards the pole, blowing their whistles continu¬ 
 ally. 
 
 The dance could begin at any hour of the day; 
 but all formalities ended with the rising of the 
 dog star. After it was over, those who took part 
 drank plentifully of warm water, which caused 
 vomiting, and enabled them to enjoy to the full 
 the feast which followed. 
 
 Among the Arapahoes a number of dogs were 
 killed, and their flesh was considered a great 
 delicacy. The Shoshones called them “Dog 
 
DANCES AND RELIGIOUS BELIEFS 
 
 37 
 
 Eaters”. They themselves did not touch dog 
 flesh; and if they had no other meat, substi¬ 
 tuted vegetables. It was the custom, also, among 
 the Shoshones to have the intervals during the 
 dance filled by addresses from one or more of the 
 chiefs, who proclaimed the great deeds and many 
 victories of these Indians over their enemies. 
 With the Shoshones, too, the dance was gener¬ 
 ally of a more lively character; but with both 
 tribes its main purpose was to call down a bless¬ 
 ing upon, and aid for, all the people. 
 
 THE THANKSGIVING DANCE 
 
 The Thanksgiving Dance used to take place 
 about the end of September or the beginning of 
 October each year. The whole tribe was brought 
 togther in some appointed locality, where a great 
 hemlock or cedar tree was set in the ground for 
 the occasion. The tribe, men, women, and chil¬ 
 dren, in close order, formed a circle about this 
 tree. They moved very slowly; some of them 
 keeping time in a low monotonous chant 
 
 Na-va-an-doy-ab! 
 
 Na-va-an-doy-ab! 
 
 Send rain on the mountains! 
 
 Send rain on the mountains! 
 
 repeated a thousand times, in which they 
 thanked the Great Father for his bounty and for 
 its continuance. Then they asked him to look 
 upon the mountains, the rivers, and the trees, 
 and besought him to send rain upon them and 
 
38 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 into the rivers. They also entreated him to bid 
 the earth to cease swallowing their fathers, 
 mothers, and children. 
 
 THE WOLF DANCE 
 
 The Wolf Dance was very formal, in fact, the 
 highest social function held among these Indians, 
 and used only on state occasions; no woman 
 could participate. The dancers decked them¬ 
 selves in feathers and paint and wore bustles. 
 The young men were especially gay in their dec¬ 
 orations, and even powdered their hair. It was 
 a round dance, in which performers hopped about 
 like birds, to the accompaniment of drums and 
 loud chanting. There were no words; it was all 
 soul! 
 
 THE GHOST DANCE 
 
 In the autumn of 1890, the mountains about 
 Wind River were thick with smoke; in fact every 
 place in the neighborhood was filled with it, on 
 account of the tremendous forest fires which 
 burned and raged for days and weeks at a time. 
 Mr. Roberts said that when the sun shone, it 
 turned this smoke into a blood-red glow. When 
 the moon rose, it, too, was a fiery red. The In¬ 
 dians out here were frightened; even their Chief, 
 Washakie, of whom, later on, you will read a 
 great deal, was troubled and afraid. Some of the 
 leaders of the Shoshones held a big meeting. 
 They declared that God, the Indian Messiah, 
 the Deliverer, was actually among them. He 
 
DANCES AND RELIGIOUS BELIEFS 
 
 39 
 
 was to accomplish three essential things; the 
 white people were, all at one time, to leave the 
 Indian land; the dead Indians were to come to 
 life again and repeople their old country; and the 
 buffalo, the Indians’ food, were to return in num¬ 
 bers as of old. 
 
 Washakie of the Shoshones, was a wise man 
 and consulted with Mr. Roberts. The latter told 
 the Chief that God was everywhere, if the people 
 would only see Him and believe. The cry went 
 forth, however, that the Messiah was come. As 
 the message spread from tribe to tribe, the ex¬ 
 citement was so great that a series of outbreaks 
 was threatened among the Arapahoes, the Sho¬ 
 shones, the Sioux, and, in fact, among all the In¬ 
 dians on the Western Reservations. This terrible 
 fear, nothing but a false alarm, was known 
 throughout the United States as the “Messiah 
 Craze”. The date was fixed by prophets or mes¬ 
 sengers. Certain of them went all the way to the 
 Pacific Ocean to meet Christ, for He was to ap¬ 
 pear from that direction. This great ceremony, 
 held in expectation of His coming, was called by 
 the Indians the Messiah Dance; by the white 
 people, the Ghost Dance. Women as well as 
 men participated. They formed two lines, the 
 women dancing on one side, the men on the 
 other. And to aid the coming of this Messiah, 
 the Indians were to dance night and day till He 
 appeared. It was not a war dance, then, but an 
 invocation to the Messiah for aid, comfort, and 
 
40 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 protection. The Indians continued for a long 
 time to carry on this orgie, but without result. 
 They finally consulted with the medicine men, 
 and were told that they did not dance hard 
 enough! An especially wise one also proclaimed 
 that they must kill off all their dogs or else the 
 spirits of the dead Indians would not return. 
 They immediately set to work and slew their 
 faithful animals, but, of course, all to no purpose. 
 After a time the craze died out with the longings 
 of the Indians unfulfilled. 
 
 RELIGIOUS BELIEFS 
 
 The Shoshones believe that the chickadee dis¬ 
 covered the world; and it is always the harbinger 
 of severe snow storms. To kill one is very bad 
 luck. 
 
 The Creator of the world is Dam-ap-wa, or 
 Our Father-God. God pulled out the upper teeth 
 of the elk because the elk were meant to be eaten 
 by the Indians, and not the Indians by the elk. 
 
 As the jackal is a sacred animal among the 
 Hindus, so was the great Coyote considered the 
 father of the Shoshones. He was shy, secretive, 
 troublesome; and was named Bea-idg-apwa, or 
 Great lies’ father, or Father of lies. He is very im¬ 
 portant now, though they do not mind kill¬ 
 ing one. In the early days of the world, he 
 was called to account for something by the 
 Creator. Instead of answering respectfully, 
 Coyote was insolent to him. He threw his 
 voice, as a ventriloquist does, from one place 
 
INDIAN CEMETERY, WIND RIVER, WYO. 
 
DANCES AND RELIGIOUS BELIEFS 
 
 41 
 
 to another. He continued being disrespectful, 
 so our Father reproved him again. He told Big 
 Coyote he would punish him for his insolence by 
 causing all his descendants to be mortal. On 
 hearing this, Great Coyote went yelping away. 
 
 The story of the Arapahoes about ancient 
 times is somewhat different. They said that the 
 whole world, except the topmost peak of a very 
 high mountain, was covered by the waters of a 
 great flood. On it sat the first Arapahoe, weep¬ 
 ing. Looking up, he saw the Unknown One on 
 High coming to him, and walking upon the face 
 of the waters. “Why do you weep?’ said he to 
 the Arapahoe. “Because I am lonely,” replied 
 the man, “I have no country to live in.” The 
 Unknown One on High commanded the dove to 
 go in search of a country for the Arapahoe, and 
 he went away immediately. After awhile the 
 dove returned and reported that the waters were 
 over all things. Just then a turtle swam by. The 
 Unknown One on High commanded the turtle to 
 go in search of a country for the Arapahoe. The 
 turtle at once dived down into the waters. After 
 some time it returned with a lump of mud in its 
 mouth, and reported that under the water could 
 be found a country. The Unknown One on High 
 then commanded the waters to roll away into 
 the distant seas, and told the dry land to arise. 
 Immediately, before the Arapahoe's view, a beau¬ 
 tiful country appeared, with wooded mountains 
 and green valleys and shining rivers. The Un- 
 
42 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 known One on High turned to the Arapahoe and 
 said: “This is your country; to you and your de¬ 
 scendants I give it forever.” 
 
 The Unknown One on High and the Arapahoe 
 then went walking together among the trees, un¬ 
 til they came to a deep lake beautifully shaded. 
 Near it, they sat and conversed. During the con¬ 
 versation, the Unknown One on High picked up 
 some pebbles and threw them into the lake. The 
 Arapahoe, seeing them sink down into the depths, 
 cried out in great distress. “O, must my children 
 die? Can they not be like this?” And he threw 
 a stick into the lake, which floated on the sur¬ 
 face of the water. The Unknown One on High 
 shook his head. “No,” he replied, “they would be 
 too numerous.” Seeing the anxiety of the Arap¬ 
 ahoe, he presented him with a pipe to comfort 
 him, and said: “This sacred pipe I give to you. 
 Guard it carefully. Your children gazing on this 
 pipe when they die will go straight to our home. 
 When this pipe, in time, wastes away, their bodies 
 will rise from the grave. Fight bravely your ene¬ 
 mies; be good to your friends. Very soon, I am 
 going away; but I will make other tribes around 
 you first. After that I will cross the ocean and 
 make white men, a great many of them. Fare¬ 
 well.” 
 
 According to the Arapahoes, this portion of the 
 world—Wyoming—is the center of the earth. 
 If it had not been for them there would have 
 been no world. The earth was made especially 
 
DANCES AND RELIGIOUS BELIEFS 
 
 43 
 
 for them. They call themselves the children of 
 God. 
 
 The Arapahoes are a Semitic people. Their 
 religion is very similar to that of the Old Testa¬ 
 ment. They believed in the flood, also in sacri¬ 
 fices which they offered in high places on these 
 Western hills. Like the Shoshones, they also 
 looked for a deliverer or Saviour. 
 
 The word in Arapahoe for the Unknown One 
 on High is He-ja-va-ne-athan, so the Saviour is 
 the same word, only with He-an, His Son, added. 
 Vedah-than-Vetan stands for Holy Spirit or 
 Shade, with the same meaning as in the Iliad. 
 Vetan means magic, something that has spiritual 
 power; but the proper term in the Arapahoe for 
 the Holy Ghost or Spirit is Vetan Nan-wan- 
 than-woo. 
 
 The Arapahoe says in his Lord’s Prayer: Thy 
 chieftainship come on earth as it is in Hi-ya-in; 
 or, Heaven and our home.” Then he goes on to 
 say: “Put our faults behind Thee, as we put, or 
 throw away, the faults of others from us.” 
 
 The Shoshones believe in the transmigration of 
 souls, and practise suttee. Among them the 
 spirit, or personality (moo-goo-wa) is supposed 
 to be lodged between the eyes. When a Sho¬ 
 shone dies, his spirit or moo-goo-wa still exists 
 in something on earth which is wandering about 
 outside the Father’s home (Dam-Apwa han-gan, 
 our Father, His Abode, or Heaven), crying for 
 pity until he is let in. (Their term for the Saviour 
 
44 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 is Dam-Ap-wa Andwa, Our Father’s Son.) In 
 his Lord’s Prayer, the Shoshone says: “Do not 
 think meanly about, or entertain malicious 
 thoughts of us, as we do not think meanly about, 
 or entertain malicious thoughts of those who hurt 
 us.” 
 
 Besides Sacajawea, of whose heroism we have 
 already learned, another outstanding Shoshone is 
 the catechist Moo-yah-vo, who is now about 
 sixty-five years of age. Being thoroughly trained 
 by Mr. Roberts, he preaches orthodox Christian 
 doctrine. Last Decoration Day he made an ad¬ 
 dress in his own language, to the Indians assem¬ 
 bled in the burying ground at Wind River. “You 
 think”, said he, “that a Pai-Ute Indian is coming 
 who calls himself the Messiah. He says he can 
 heal the sick and raise the dead. He is the same 
 man who started the Messiah craze nearly thirty- 
 five years ago. No Indian can raise the dead. 
 Our Father’s Son, only, can raise the dead: and 
 He will, at the last Great Day, when He comes 
 again to judge the world.” 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE CEMETERY AT WIND RIVER 
 
 O NE morning six of the Indian girls joined 
 me in my walk, and we visited the Bury¬ 
 ing Ground. The sun was glorious, fairly^ 
 dancing in the turquoise sky; the mountains were 
 purple and brown as they faded into the green 
 and yellow of the fields. But how bare and bleak 
 and chill was the cemetery! It is a tract of sev¬ 
 eral acres fenced in with strong cedar posts and 
 twisted barb wire. The innumerable graves were 
 piled high with light brown earth and stones. 
 Poles hung with bunches of feathers marked the 
 graves of two Indian Chiefs. Many of the graves 
 were indicated by large weather-stained wooden 
 crosses. Others were hemmed in completely 
 with iron bedsteads or by wicket fences. 
 
 Just outside of one of these, and beyond the 
 pale of her family, was the grave of a poor young 
 woman a little over twenty, who was recently 
 murdered. Some think that her husband com¬ 
 mitted the fatal deed, for the same night he shot 
 and killed himself. The record of his dying by 
 his own hand is engraven on the headstone. But 
 a young man is now in jail suspected of the mur- 
 
46 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 der of the woman. The three little children are 
 cared for by the poor old grandmother. 
 
 Here was the grave of an Indian policeman 
 who went off to the mountains recently never 
 to return. Some say he lost his life in fighting 
 fires; but it was evident, when his body was re¬ 
 covered four days afterwards, that he shot him¬ 
 self for some unknown reason. 
 
 This cemetery is especially interesting on ac¬ 
 count of being the resting place of Sacajawea; 
 but only a slight slab marks her grave. She was 
 buried by Mr. Roberts on April 9, 1884. While 
 attending the funeral of one of Chief Washakie’s 
 grandsons, during the winter of 1906, Mr. Rob¬ 
 erts heard a loud wailing, as is the Shoshone 
 custom, for “they mourn with a very great and 
 sore lamentation.” He looked up and saw one 
 of Sacajawea’s grand-daughters standing over 
 her grave, giving way to her grief in this man¬ 
 ner. 
 
 And here, too, are buried Mrs. Maggie Rich¬ 
 ards and Mrs. Hall, her niece, two very fine 
 women and pioneer white settlers. They lived 
 in a log cabin and cooked for the soldiers at Fort 
 Washakie. During the uprising of the enemies 
 of the Shoshones they were brutally murdered in 
 their home by a raiding band of Sioux Indians. 
 Bishop Thomas, in his thoughtfulness, has this 
 year erected a granite monument to their 
 memory. 
 
 The children who accompanied me were most 
 
THE CEMETERY AT WIND RIVER 
 
 47 
 
 valuable companions, owing to their interest and 
 the amount of information they furnished. I 
 learned from them that all the Shoshone tribe 
 were related and connected, the latter many times 
 over. Each one could point out either her father’s 
 stepson’s aunt’s grave, or that of her sister’s 
 daughter’s son, or her grandfather’s aunt’s hus¬ 
 band’s nephew, or her uncle’s widow’s nephew’s 
 wife’s son, or her great aunt’s sister’s counsin’s 
 brother’s half-sister, or his mother’s first hus¬ 
 band’s brother’s second wife’s son’s daughter’s 
 child. This may sound foolish and exaggerated, 
 but it is neither. I endeavored for a while to keep 
 track of the relationships, but as they accumula¬ 
 ted, they seemed to get a little beyond me. I was 
 never at all keen at working out or unraveling 
 such combinations, and was filled with astonish¬ 
 ment upon finding how glibly these Shoshone 
 girls could roll them off. I was proud of their 
 capacity in this direction and pronounced them 
 to have brains of a remarkable calibre. 
 
 On Decoration Day, the whole of the dreary 
 cemetery, a tangle of rank grass and briers wher¬ 
 ever they can gain a rooting, blossoms out into 
 a flower garden. This holiday is the Easter, the 
 gala day, of the Shoshones. Not a grave is neg¬ 
 lected ; and the crude, harsh aspect of it all is 
 softened, for once during the year, into a thing of 
 beauty—a veritable God’s acre. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SHOSHONES 
 
 HE Shoshones are short and stocky, with 
 
 dark complexion, large mouths, square 
 
 jaws, prominent cheek bones, and heavy 
 
 noses. 
 
 They are a simple people, very near to nature. 
 They often start out on horseback for a long 
 journey in the pouring rain, when there is no sign 
 of the storm abating. Mr. Roberts said he once 
 saw a large party of them start en route for 
 Utah in a deluge of rain. (They can forecast the 
 weather with great accuracy.) Ten minutes later 
 the sun was shining. They are a happy-go-lucky 
 people, more particularly the men, with no 
 thought for the morrow, and will even take death 
 with a laugh. 
 
 These Indians are easily offended, and years 
 after suffering an injury or a slight, even a fan¬ 
 cied one, will resent it in some way. If they 
 do not trouble the actual offender himself, they 
 will take vengeance on his horse or dog or on 
 something that belongs to him. 
 
 Among the women, calm resignation is usually 
 found, a stoical obedience to their condition of 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SHOSHONES 49 
 
 servitude. This was evident when Captain Meri¬ 
 wether Lewis, with a few other white men, while 
 making a little exploring detour on his great 
 western journey, surprised the Shoshones as he 
 came through the pass approaching their valley.* 
 No cry nor sound passed the lips of the women; 
 they sat with bowed heads, expecting death, and 
 waiting for the fatal blow. Beside her great 
 depth of feeling, and her almost wild demonstra¬ 
 tiveness exhibited on several occasions, all this 
 stoicism was evident in Sacajawea, too, in times 
 of danger and distress. 
 
 When Mr. Roberts superintended the Agency 
 School, he found that one of the boys was espe¬ 
 cially mischievous. He took great delight in 
 shooting the little pigs about the place, and also 
 went so far as to steal some money from the 
 matron. One day it was reported to the Super¬ 
 intendent that the same little fellow had saturated 
 a quantity of material with coal oil with the in¬ 
 tention of setting fire to the school. Mr. Roberts 
 naturally kept him in for some time under the 
 guard of another boy detailed for that purpose 
 and by whom he was marched to meals. The 
 lad’s father was in a fury, and came to the school 
 with a rifle to shoot Mr. Roberts. The latter 
 walked up to the irate Indian and said: “You 
 are very angry. Go back home.” Without a word 
 he immediately left the building. The lad turned 
 out well and is now a communicant of the Church. 
 
 ♦Journals, Vol. I, p. 387. 
 
50 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 One of the girls in the same school, a fine, 
 genuine, bouncing creature, was disobedient to 
 the matron. The latter sent at once for the police¬ 
 man to watch the children a half day from her 
 seat. While he was at his post, the offender, who 
 was not allowed to go out during recess, started 
 for the door, but was intercepted by the tempo¬ 
 rary guard. This policeman was stout, could 
 boast of six feet in height, and was heavily de¬ 
 veloped as to brawn and muscle. The culprit, be¬ 
 ing very angry at his interference, seized this ob¬ 
 jectionable (to her) individual around the waist, 
 threw him down, and sat on him! When Mr. 
 Roberts was walking through the hall a long 
 time afterward, he found the policeman still 
 prostrate, and the girl seated on his chest! He 
 told her to get up without delay, and after some 
 reproving, rebuking, and exhorting, bade her go 
 home, for she was too unmanageable. Mr. Rob¬ 
 erts said he admired this girl in spite of her 
 forwardness and impulsiveness. She married at 
 fifteen, and died very young, while on a visit to 
 Montana. She left a baby daughter who grew 
 up to be fine, handsome young woman, but only 
 to succumb to tuberculosis. 
 
 It is evident, then, that above everything else, 
 the Shoshones love their freedom. They do not 
 like to be caught in the Church, or in any other 
 way. Someone will say to one of them: “You 
 are baptized?” “Yes.” “You go to the Holy 
 Communion?” “Yes.” “Why, then, you belong 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SHOSHONES 51 
 
 to the Church?” “No, I don’t! I wander about 
 free. I don’t belong to anything. I am just a 
 Shoshone!” 
 
 Ka-shoon-banah, I don’t know; or ka-hinne 
 shoon banah, He knows nothing, are typical 
 phrases of the Shoshones. Sometimes if you ask 
 one his name, he would be apt to reply: “I don’t 
 know; ask them!” It is characteristic of these 
 Indians to inquire: “Where are you going?” 
 
 As far as the white people are concerned, the 
 reputation of the Shoshones for morality is 
 good; but there are several polygamists with 
 two or three wives each. The squaw does not 
 readily give up the former modes of living. She 
 is determined to travel in the trodden paths as 
 long as possible. The old people have little in¬ 
 terest in the education of their children. 
 
 Many of the tribe are able to talk well when 
 they can be induced to speak English, to which 
 they all show a great aversion. Their pro¬ 
 nunciation is excellent. They are fair pupils, for 
 their general mental capacity is good. The little 
 ones at first did not like school at all, and ab¬ 
 sented themselves whenever they had a chance. 
 
 When their school life is finished, they paint 
 their faces and wear the blanket and act in the 
 same way as the other members of their tribe. 
 But the principal reason that so many of the In¬ 
 dians go back to their paint and blanket after 
 they become civilized, is that they are almost 
 compelled to do it. They remain on the prairies 
 
52 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 and among the mountains; and when they fall in 
 again with their relations and former friends, they 
 feel obliged to resume their old customs or else 
 be subjected to ridicule; and being a proud 
 people, they are easily humiliated. 
 
 The Shoshones, in this beautiful land which 
 they made their own, were blessed in having 
 rich soil; but with it were the evils of early and 
 late frosts, and locust plagues. Then their heredi¬ 
 tary enemies, the Sioux, the Cheyennes, the Arap- 
 ahoes, and the Crows, were ever on the watch 
 for them. They dared not wander over the plains, 
 as they were wont, to hunt for buffalo, for fear of 
 an attack from any or all of these tribes, and they 
 had great difficulty in maintaining a foothold 
 against them. These formidable enemies, and 
 the locusts or grasshoppers which, year after 
 year, destroyed their crops, kept them, which is 
 not surprising, from making much progress 
 towards civilization. Sometimes all they had to 
 subsist upon for weeks were these grasshoppers 
 which they caught and dried. 
 
 Still the Shoshones exhibit considerable pro¬ 
 gress in agriculture, especially considering the 
 short time since they were in an absolute state of 
 barbarism. The local Church schools and Gov¬ 
 ernment schools have taught them to farm well. 
 Many of those who return from eastern schools 
 are as unprepared to make a living as those who 
 have never been educated; and they, too, gener¬ 
 ally have returned to their blanket and paint. 
 
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SHOSHONES 53 
 
 One reason for it was that they were taught 
 trades. An Arapahoe came back to his tribe as 
 a tailor. Of what use was a tailor among the 
 blanketed Arapahoes? Another was a tinsmith. 
 In their small, low houses of logs chinked with 
 adobe, there is no occasion for tinsmithing. Read¬ 
 ing, writing, arithmetic, and farming, are all they 
 need. Sheep herders require no special training. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 CHIEF WASHAKIE 
 
 HE friends of the Shoshone Indians are the 
 
 Utes, the Comanches, and the Flatheads. 
 
 With the last tribe they have intermar¬ 
 ried. Washakie, their renowned chief, was in part 
 a Flathead, on his father’s side. His mother was 
 a Shoshone. 
 
 Washakie, who was born in 1798 and died in 
 1900, was the chief of the eastern band of the 
 Shoshones. He was one of the most intelligent 
 of all the North American Chiefs, and the sworn 
 friend of the white people. His name is derived 
 from wus-sik-he, a raw-hide rattle. The army 
 officers stationed at the Agency during his time 
 were unable to pronounce this word correctly, the 
 nearest they could come to it being Washakie. 
 He rose to the chieftainship of his tribe through 
 his natural qualities as a leader. He was always 
 loyal to the Government, and, with his warriors, 
 often rendered valuable aid to the United States 
 troops in repelling the attacks of hostile tribes. 
 Fort Washakie, the headquarters of the Govern¬ 
 ment troops stationed on Wind River Reserva¬ 
 tion, in what was then Wyoming Territory, to 
 quell the uprising of hostile tribes, was named in 
 
Photograph by 
 
 Sproul, Lander, Wyo. 
 
 CHIEF WASHAKIE 
 
CHIEF WASHAKIE 
 
 55 
 
 honor of the Shoshone Chief; also the high peaks 
 of the Rocky Mountains near the Agency, and 
 the Sulphur Springs, a part of the Reservation. 
 These springs are entirely under the jurisdiction 
 of the Indian Department, and managed by In¬ 
 dians. Washakie was once asked if he wanted 
 these Springs under the management of the War 
 Department. “No,” replied the Chief very de¬ 
 cidedly. “They are for the poor as well as the 
 rich, for the humble as well as the influential.” 
 
 It was during the latter part of Washakie’s 
 chieftainship that the hereditary enemies of the 
 Shoshones, the Sioux, the Comanches, and the 
 Crows were wandering about in this region seek¬ 
 ing whom they might devour. The garrison at 
 the fort consisted of a troop of the First Cavalry 
 and a company of the Seventh Infantry. The 
 soldiers were busy protecting the interests of the 
 Government and of the settlers attracted to the 
 opening of a new country. Among these settlers, 
 but rather involuntary ones, were two eastern 
 women, a Mrs. Maggie Richards and her niece, 
 Mrs. Hall, both of whom have been mentioned 
 before. They were on their way across the Con¬ 
 tinent to join Mr. Richards in California, but be¬ 
 came stranded in Wyoming Territory by the ap¬ 
 proaching winter and lack of facilities for their 
 further transportation. Being very adaptable 
 they made themselves at home in a log cabin, and 
 cooked for the soldiers. A raiding band of Sioux 
 were camping in the neighborhood and bent on 
 
56 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 mischief. One morning a party of them moun¬ 
 ted their horses, but in a peculiar manner, as was 
 sometimes their wont. With their arms around 
 the necks of the animals, and their toes clinging 
 to the horses’ backs, such a troop of cavalry in 
 a rapid approach on a house or village presented 
 the appearance of a herd of riderless horses on 
 a gallop. In this manner did the Indians draw 
 near and surround the cabin of the two unprotec¬ 
 ted women. With wild war-whoops they rushed 
 upon it. The cabin had no windows, only a 
 door. This was soon demolished, and the enemy 
 poured in. The younger woman, paralyzed with 
 terror at the blood curdling sounds and the hor¬ 
 ror of the invasion, crouched in a corner and died. 
 Mrs. Richards, when she realized what it meant, 
 seized a weapon and went forward bravely to 
 meet the foe. She was shot through and through 
 with bullets and arrows, and hacked with a toma¬ 
 hawk. A suitable and substantial monument 
 now marks their place of burial in the Indian 
 cemetery near the Shoshone School, with the 
 following inscription on an inserted brass tablet: 
 
 Sacred to the Memory of 
 Mrs. Maggie Richards 
 and 
 
 Mrs. Hall. 
 
 Pioneer White Settlers, 
 
 Killed July 23rd, A.D. 1873. 
 
 By a Raiding Band of Hostile Sioux Indians, 
 
 In Their Ranch House on the Site of 
 The Present City of Lander. 
 
 This memorial is placed here by 
 Bishop Thomas of Wyoming and 
 Other Friends, A.D. 1922. 
 
CROWHEART BUTTE, SHOSHONE RESERVATION 
 
 (Where Chief Washakie killed the Crow chief in battle and 
 
 afterward ate his heart.) 
 
CHIEF WASHAKIE 
 
 57 
 
 It is said that Washakie and his men had a 
 fierce battle with invading Crow Indians on a hill 
 on the Wind River Reservation, which has ever 
 since been called Crow Butte. Here he killed 
 the chief of the Crows, cut out his heart, ate part 
 of it, and skewered the other portion on the end of 
 a pole which he stuck in the ground. The Crows 
 are said to have had fortifications around their 
 camping places; and it is reported of Washakie 
 that as he was looking through an aperture in one 
 of these fortifications, an arrow came through 
 and struck him on the face. The mark always re¬ 
 mained ; and he was afterward called by the 
 enemy the Snake Chief with the scar on his face. 
 
 During these troublous times on the Reserva¬ 
 tion, Mr. Roberts well remembers the narrow 
 escape of an Indian boy, who is now Canon Sher¬ 
 man Coolidge, of St. John’s Cathedral, Denver. 
 His father was an Arapahoe named Vashait, or 
 Big Heart. Big Heart was living in the camp of 
 his own people, but rashly moved his tent one 
 night to a place by itself. He was killed by an 
 unknown enemy. The Indian name of his boy 
 was He-des-tu-ah, which means Over-the-Top, 
 or Surface. When he was nine years old, he, 
 with other Arapahoes, was captured by the Sho¬ 
 shones. They wanted to kill him. They said: 
 “He is big enough; he has a scalp lock; shoot 
 him!” Lieutenant Larabie, afterwards General 
 Larabie, suddenly appeared on the scene. He 
 prevented the Shoshones from killing the boy, 
 
58 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 and carried him away to a place of safety. He 
 was adopted by a Captain Coolidge and educated 
 at Shattuck School, Faribault. Captain Cool¬ 
 idge, while talking one day with young Sherman, 
 told him that his ancestors came over in the 
 Mayflower. ‘‘Oh, that’s nothing,” replied the 
 Indian; ‘‘mine were on the reception committee!” 
 
 A woman in the East once asked Sherman 
 Coolidge whether the Indians to whom he be¬ 
 longed were cultured or well read. “My peo¬ 
 ple !” replied he, “Why, they are the best red men 
 in the world!” 
 
 Long years after he left the Reservation, Mr. 
 Coolidge returned to visit his mother. She had 
 not seen him since he was a little boy. She was 
 lame and nearly blind, but seemed to know in¬ 
 tuitively that he was somewhere near. She put 
 up her hand to shade her eyes, and saw him ap¬ 
 proaching. He was then in clerical clothes, but 
 she recognized him as her son and rushed into 
 his arms. 
 
 There were long days, too, when the life of 
 Mr. Roberts was threatened. In 1890, when 
 parts of the Wind River Reservation were 
 thrown open for sale to white men, some of the 
 Indians resented it, and laid in wait for him 
 on his return from officiating at a country fu¬ 
 neral. His knowledge of their ways caused him 
 intuitively to take another route home, and by 
 so doing he escaped being murdered. Like the 
 
CHIEF WASHAKIE 
 
 59 
 
 Wise Men of old, he returned to his own country 
 another way. 
 
 He said that he and others would look out of 
 their doors of a morning, fully expecting to see 
 a band of Indians coming to kill them. 
 
 Mr. Roberts was a personal friend of Chief 
 Washakie, and had many visits and conversa¬ 
 tions with him. He recalls the Chief as an in¬ 
 telligent, honest man, with a good command of 
 English, which language he generally refused 
 to speak as he felt conscious of too many errors 
 in his attempts. It was through Mr. Roberts 
 that Washakie gave one hundred and sixty acres 
 of farm land to the school. 
 
 But he inherited the traits of his ancestors on 
 both sides; the murderous tendencies of the Arap- 
 ahoes and the impulsiveness, impatience, and 
 resentfulness of the Shoshones. 
 
 One morning he went off early, and when he 
 returned at evening time he found that his wife 
 had removed her tent. Washakie was furious. 
 “Don't you know how fatal it is to separate 
 tents these days?" said he. “Why, there is an 
 enemy lurking behind every tree and bush and 
 rock. On no account do it again." “My mother 
 persuaded me to move the tent,” replied the 
 woman, “she said I would be in a safer place." 
 
 The next day he was gone again. When he 
 came back he discovered that his wife had re¬ 
 moved her tent a second time. Without hesita¬ 
 tion Washakie picked up a rifle, rushed over to 
 
60 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 the tent of his mother-in-law, and shot her dead! 
 This act never seemed to trouble him in the 
 least. 
 
 In my former book, The People of Tipi Sapa, 
 
 nearly two chapters are devoted to mothers-in- 
 law, dwelling upon the respect and deference 
 paid this class of people by the Sioux or Dako- 
 tahs. 
 
 Washakie, even at that time, was a communi¬ 
 cant of the Church. Like most of the Indians, 
 especially the Shoshones, and like innumerable 
 white people, he did not always succeed in carry¬ 
 ing his religion into his daily life. It was quite a 
 separate thing. Washakie was merely a type of 
 the Sunday Christian, but in his case deserving 
 of great leniency not only on account of his ori¬ 
 gin but the constant state of fretfulness and irri¬ 
 tation in which he lived, caused by the haras¬ 
 sing enemies of his people. He was eager to 
 progress, but was obliged, as well, to battle the 
 undercurrent created by an influential Indian, 
 the counterpart of the man who sent a party to 
 kill Bishop Hannington, the African hero. This 
 disturber of the peace opposed Washakie, the 
 Government, the missions, and everything that 
 tended to good, but was always clever enough 
 not to be caught. 
 
 Chief Washakie responded to the Government 
 whenever he could, with auxiliary troops, and 
 often gathered together two or three hundred 
 
CHIEF WASHAKIE 
 
 61 
 
 men to assist the authorities in waging war on 
 hostile tribes. 
 
 President Grant held Washakie in high es¬ 
 teem ; and as a token of his regard, sent him, 
 with his compliments, a handsome saddle, beau¬ 
 tifully mounted. One, Dr. Irwin was commis¬ 
 sioned to present the saddle to Washakie. On 
 receiving it, the Chief never uttered a word. 
 
 “Well, Washakie,” queried Dr. Irwin, after a 
 long silence, “have you nothing to say? I must 
 write to the President.” 
 
 Washakie walked to the window and looked 
 over the prairies for some time. Then he turned 
 around and replied: “When a favor is shown to 
 a Frenchman, he feels it in his head, and his 
 tongue speaks. When a kindness is shown to 
 an Indian, he feels it in his heart; and the heart 
 has no tongue.” 
 
 “That is just the reply I want for President 
 Grant,” said Dr. Irwin; “something out of the 
 ordinary.” 
 
 Washakie was once asked if he approved of 
 his people marrying the whites, to which he re¬ 
 plied very abruptly in the negative. When urged 
 for a reason to his objection, the Chief answered: 
 “No good white man would marry an Indian; 
 and we do not want any others.” 
 
 Once upon a time, when this Chief of the Sho¬ 
 shones was very ill, his spirit wandered away 
 off, to the land beyond the setting sun. It was 
 a beautiful land, the abode of our Father, with no 
 
62 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 lack of anything that was good. But suddenly 
 a great longing seized him to return to his peo¬ 
 ple. There were no means by which he could 
 do this; and he was in great distress. After a 
 little while, to his relief and delight, he saw one 
 of the large pictures, a colored print given him 
 by Mr. Roberts, which he had fastened on the 
 wall of his home, being wafted towards him. 
 When the picture reached the troubled Chief, it 
 lifted him up and floated him safely home again. 
 He found himself in bed in his cabin with his 
 people standing all around him. When told that 
 he was delirious and imagined all this, he 
 strongly asserted it was a fact that the picture 
 had brought him straight home from the far-off 
 land to which he wandered. 
 
 The Shoshones believed the old man, for they 
 always trusted his word. As a result, for many 
 years, and even to this day, there is a demand 
 among his people for these large, colored, Sun¬ 
 day school pictures. And one thing always is 
 insisted upon concerning the pictures. To be 
 of any value no matter what the scenes represent, 
 they must contain the figure of Christ; or, as 
 they say, the picture of Our-Father-His Son. 
 
 Some years before he died, Washakie became 
 very ill. One of the Government officials went 
 to see him and asked him where he would like 
 to be buried. The old Chief was both hurt and 
 offended. “I am going to get well,” he replied. 
 “I want to see these children grow up around 
 
CHIEF WASHAKIE 
 
 63 
 
 me.” He recovered completely and lived four 
 years longer. 
 
 In his last days he wrote a letter to the white 
 people; and the messenger to whom he dictated 
 this epistle prefaced it by the following remarks: 
 
 “So many of our soldiers have heard about Wash¬ 
 akie, Chief of the Shoshones in Wyoming Territory, 
 that they will be glad to read the letter he has sent 
 them. 
 
 “Washakie does not know his age, but thinks that he 
 is about eighty years old. His hair is white, but his 
 step is firm, and he is as erect as ever. His personal 
 bravery is noted by both whites and Indians, and his 
 tribe have the greatest love for him. He is a good 
 man, and he rose to the chieftainship through his na¬ 
 tural qualities as a leader. He has always been loyal 
 to the Government, and with his warriors has often 
 rendered valuable aid to the United States troops in re¬ 
 pelling the attacks of hostile tribes.” 
 
 THE CHIEF’S LETTER 
 
 “Washakie, Chief of the Shoshones, 
 
 “To all white people hearty greeting. 
 
 “My true friends the whites: 
 
 “I shake hands with you from afar. 
 
 “I should like to see you, but I have never 
 left my hunting grounds, and never shall. 
 
 “I live here among my people alone. All my old war¬ 
 riors are gone. I alone am left. I am old; my hair 
 is white; I cannot live long. I do not know which of 
 my sons will be chief after me. The young people are 
 growing up around me. One thing I tell them and 
 tell them: ‘The whites are your true friends. Be true 
 to them.’ Not long ago the Indians from all sides came 
 down on my tribe to rob and to kill. I asked the 
 ‘Great Father’ at Washington to give me fifty rifles. He 
 
64 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 gave them to me. With them I armed my bravest war¬ 
 riors, and with the soldiers we drove back our enemies, 
 many in number, on all sides. They were the Great Fa¬ 
 ther’s enemies, too. And now we have peace. The In¬ 
 dians who used to fight and kill my people now come 
 to see me, all of them. I give them a welcome, and they 
 return home in friendship. I am glad that mine eyes 
 have seen this before I die. We are all friends now. 
 
 “One thing more I want to see, and my heart will be 
 at peace. I want to see the school and church built 
 for my tribe by the ‘White Robes’ (the Episcopal 
 Clergy). 
 
 “My heart goes out to you, my friends, I shake 
 hands with you again.” 
 
 One bright Sunday morning, after service at 
 the Government school, Mr. Roberts took me in 
 his surrey to the cemetery near the Agency 
 where Chief Washakie is buried. His grave is 
 marked by a massive monument of light colored 
 granite with four polished surfaces, each one 
 bearing an inscription: 
 
 1. Washakie, 1804-1900. 
 
 2. Chief of the Shoshones. 
 
 3. A Wise Ruler. 
 
 4. Always loyal to the Government and to 
 His White Brothers. 
 
 The date of Washakie’s birth on this monu¬ 
 ment should be 1798 instead of 1804. 
 
 May he rest in peace! 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE REV. JOHN ROBERTS 
 
 I T was during the autumn evenings on my 
 visit to the Shoshone Indian School that Mr. 
 Roberts told me not only the things I have 
 already related, but other facts concerning his 
 own life. 
 
 He was born in Wales, baptized in his home 
 parish, and ordained to the ministry in Lichfield 
 Cathedral by Bishop Selwyn. 
 
 Mr. Roberts came from Southern Colorado to 
 the Shoshone Indian Reservation in 1883, arriv¬ 
 ing at Green River, Wyoming, in the midst of 
 one of the coldest winters in the history of the 
 state. The Government weather bureau for this 
 part of the country was at Fort Washakie, and 
 the official record was 60 degrees below zero. 
 He was sent by the Rt. Rev. J. F. Spalding, then 
 Bishop of Colorado and Wyoming, to establish 
 a mission of the Church, among the Shoshones 
 and the Arapahoes. The route by which he was 
 obliged to make the journey traversed the Wind 
 River Mountains or a part of the main range of 
 the Rockies. It required eight days to make the 
 trip from Green River to Lander and thence to 
 
66 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 Fort Washakie, a distance of one hundred and 
 fifty miles. The conveyances were wagons or 
 improvised sleighs hauled by horses, which had 
 great trouble in dealing with the heavy drifts 
 and enduring the bitter weather. 
 
 On reaching Green River, Mr. Roberts found 
 that the stage line was eliminated for the time 
 being by a devastating storm in the mountains, 
 a heavy fall of snow, and the unprecedented low 
 temperature already mentioned. The stage 
 agent informed him it would be impossible to 
 reach the Reservation for some time; but he had 
 that day, made arrangements to forward the mail 
 as far as was practicable. This was in accor¬ 
 dance with the requirements of the United States 
 Government, which exacted a heavy penalty from 
 the stage line contractors if the mails were de¬ 
 tained. If Mr. Roberts so desired he could ac¬ 
 company the mail, but he must undertake such a 
 journey entirely at his own risk and responsibil¬ 
 ity. 
 
 He was quite determined to go forward with 
 the business upon which he was sent. In start¬ 
 ing, he found a wagon body on runners, with 
 the driver wrapped in blankets and a shawl 
 about his head. His appearance caused Mr. 
 Roberts to think that he himself ought to take 
 special precautions against the severity of the 
 weather. So he returned to the office and put on 
 an extra suit of underclothing. Then the journey 
 began. The driver, an experienced plainsman, 
 
BUILDINGS OF CHURCH OF THE REDEEMER, WIND RIVER, WYO. 
 
THE REV. JOHN ROBERTS 
 
 67 
 
 plunged his horses into the deep snow of the 
 prairies as there was no semblance of a road. 
 At the end of fifteen miles of this bitter travel¬ 
 ing, a way station of the company, named Alkali, 
 was reached. There they changed horses; and 
 with a fresh driver as well, made by nightfall an¬ 
 other fifteen miles. 
 
 The next morning they continued their travels 
 in the face of a blinding snow storm, and soon 
 began to climb the foothills of the Rockies. 
 After plunging about for seventeen miles they 
 reached a place called Starvation. And most 
 appropriately named it was; for not only did it 
 lack food and water, but fuel as well. The 
 horse-tender who existed there was obliged to 
 burn sagebrush for melting some snow in order 
 to furnish drink for the horses; as the alkali 
 spring was frozen en masse. He was somewhat 
 of a wag, and perhaps a little on the order of 
 Mark Tapley; for above the door of his cabin 
 hung a board with the inscription: “God Bless 
 Our Home!” 
 
 Without food, the travellers and their horses 
 forged ahead on their terrible way. As they 
 drove further into the mountains the snow be¬ 
 came deeper and deeper, and it was with the 
 greatest difficulty that they could discern and 
 keep to the road. The cold was so intense Mr. 
 Roberts thought he would surely freeze solid. 
 Over his rubbers he wrapped heavy grain sacks, 
 so as to prevent his feet from being frost bit- 
 
68 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 ten. That night, of the second day, they man¬ 
 aged to arrive at a station called Big Sandy. It 
 was occupied by an estimable family, who gave 
 them a warm welcome, for theirs was the first 
 team to reach them through the snow. After 
 a good supper and a pleasant evening spent in 
 the warm kitchen, Mr. Roberts was shown to 
 his room. There was a roaring wood fire in the 
 stove. He noticed that the walls and ceiling of 
 the apartment were lined with unbleached mus¬ 
 lin, and had the appearance of being heavily 
 padded, especially the ceiling. He was advised 
 to jump into bed as quickly as possible and let 
 the fire go out. He soon realized the wisdom in 
 this advice, for the snow—and it was that which 
 formed the padding of the muslin lining of the 
 apartment—began to melt with the heat! The 
 fire having burned out, the cold very quickly as¬ 
 serted itself. Everything froze as hard as iron, 
 and the snow out-of-doors, which was very fine, 
 blew into all the available cracks and crevices. 
 
 The next morning, it was impossible to pro¬ 
 ceed on the journey, so the day was spent at the 
 station. Their good landlady asked Mr. Roberts 
 and the stage driver if they would be good enough 
 to visit for her the camp of an old trapper, a 
 veteran of the Civil War. She feared he might 
 be frozen to death. They immediately set out, 
 and walked over the hill on the solid snow, a 
 distance of some miles, to the trapper’s home. 
 They found a man about sixty years old, hale 
 
THE REV. JOHN ROBERTS 
 
 69 
 
 and hearty, and apparently very comfortable, in 
 his tent. When they told him they expected to 
 find him frozen to death, he quietly shook his 
 head. “No,” he replied, “I am too old a trapper 
 to freeze to death. When it’s very cold, I slide 
 under them kivers”—pointing to a heap of quilts 
 and blankets—“and stay there !” Their land¬ 
 lady was much relieved after hearing the favor¬ 
 able report of their visit. 
 
 Next morning, with a dry goods box nailed 
 on a bob sleigh, and four stout horses, Mr. Ro¬ 
 berts and the driver continued their climb up 
 the mountains and ploughed through the snow 
 for fifteen miles until they came to another way 
 station. Here they found a jovial keeper who 
 took great pride in his horses, and occupied a 
 room in the stable. This station was in the 
 midst of the most trying part of the journey for 
 the horses, owing to the rough and steep roads; 
 and an effort was made to retain the fine old 
 keeper there by giving him extra pay as a re¬ 
 ward for his good care of the animals. 
 
 After being furnished with four fresh horses, 
 they reached in the evening a station called Dry 
 Sandy, occupied by a stage-tender and his wife. 
 There they found a young woman passenger 
 fatally frost-bitten. The driver with whom she 
 had travelled was frozen to death; and they bur¬ 
 ied him in the snow. Mr. Roberts remained up 
 all night trying to relieve the sufferings of the 
 unfortunate young woman; and spent the next 
 
70 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 evening (Sunday) in chopping wood in order 
 that the cabin should be as well heated as pos¬ 
 sible. 
 
 The next day, he and the driver again set out 
 to brave the elements. In many places the road 
 was impassable on account of the drifts; so they 
 travelled along ridges from which the wind had 
 blown off the snow. This driving on the danger¬ 
 ous edge of things was rather exciting, as they 
 were tipped over several times; but they always 
 gathered themselves and their horses together 
 and went on their way, even if too congealed to 
 rejoice. Neither was it altogether cheerful to find, 
 a few miles further along, another stage driver 
 frozen to death. 
 
 In the face of all difficulties and disheartening 
 episodes, they held to their course and steered 
 right onward. Soon they began the descent of 
 the eastern slope of the mountains, stopping, as 
 usual, at the way stations, and were told of an¬ 
 other passenger just preceding them who had 
 succumbed to the cold. Mr. Roberts and his 
 driver burrowed far into the snow, but could not 
 find the body. The superintendent of the line 
 was also lost sight of for a time. He was after¬ 
 wards picked up and recovered from his sicken¬ 
 ing experience, but not without losing his hands 
 and feet. Another driver was equally unfortu¬ 
 nate. 
 
 One black, piercing night, as they drove along 
 the ridge of a hill overlooking the valley, Mr. 
 
THE REV. JOHN ROBERTS 
 
 71 
 
 Roberts began to realize that he had reached the 
 last stage of this hard, bitter journey. Directly 
 before them, as they made their descent in a 
 darkness that could be felt, were hundreds of 
 tepees glowing like great Chinese lanterns. The 
 illumination was caused by sagebrush fires burn¬ 
 ing in the center of each tepee. It was a veri¬ 
 table feast of lanterns. As they drove into camp, 
 their arrival was heralded by the barking and 
 yelping of a host of Indian dogs; in fact the 
 whole valley reechoed with the uproar made by 
 these animals. So, after a journey of eight days, 
 they had actually reached what was then called 
 the Shoshone and Bannock Agency. It was on 
 a Friday evening, when the Arapahoe and Sho¬ 
 shone Indians from all over the Wind River Res¬ 
 ervation were wont to camp near the Govern¬ 
 ment agency in order to be on hand for their 
 rations. Some of them had travelled more than 
 thirty miles. Their tepees were pitched on the 
 frozen ground, or on the ice coated snow, by the 
 women, who also gathered sage brush for fuel, 
 where they could extricate it. Every Saturday 
 there was distributed to each family five pounds 
 of flour and ten pounds of beef; besides bacon, 
 coffee, tea, sugar, beans, dried fruit, baking pow¬ 
 der, and tobacco. 
 
 Mr. Roberts indeed experienced the perils of 
 the wilderness, and hunger and thirst and weari¬ 
 ness and painfulness, owing to being unprepared 
 for the cruelty of the climate, all of which 
 
72 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 he endured with the heroism of the saints of old. 
 
 Besides those things that were without, there 
 came daily upon Mr. Roberts, in his new field, 
 the care of all the churches. For some time he 
 was in charge of the entire work among Arapa- 
 hoes, Shoshones, and white settlers, within a 
 radius of one hundred and fifty miles. This in¬ 
 cluded Fort Washakie, Wind River, Milford, 
 Lander, Hudson, Riverton, Shoshone, Thermop- 
 olis, and Dubois. 
 
 He established the Government school, and 
 lived there four years. In December, 1884, 
 nearly two years after his first perilous journey, 
 Mr. Roberts made the same trip over the moun¬ 
 tains to and from the railroad. This time it was 
 to meet a little girl from the West Indies, with 
 whom he had become acquainted when visiting 
 in those Islands. The bride-to-be, enveloped in 
 a buffalo coat and wrapped in a buffalo robe, 
 thought the journey was great fun. When they 
 reached Fort Washakie, the thermometer regis¬ 
 tered 35 degrees below zero. They were married 
 on Christmas Day, 1884. 
 
 The winters of the early eighties seemed to be 
 unusually severe. It was at this time that Mr. 
 Roberts went to Lander for evening services. 
 While visiting in one of the houses there, he 
 found a man with his foot severely frost-bitten. 
 He told Mr. Roberts that he was going to have it 
 amputated that evening by a certain so-called 
 doctor or surgeon. An hour or so later, at a 
 
THE REV. JOHN ROBERTS 
 
 73 
 
 boarding house where Mr. Roberts went for sup¬ 
 per, he heard this same doctor elaborating to a 
 very interested group of boarders, as to the man¬ 
 ner in which he intended to cut off the man's 
 foot. From what he gathered of the doctor’s 
 talk, or harangue, he mistrusted his ability to 
 perform the operation successfully. After ser¬ 
 vice that evening, Mr. Roberts went again to see 
 the frost-bitten stranger and advised him to have 
 the army surgeon at Fort Washakie, present, to 
 assist at the operation. The man did not con¬ 
 sider that necessary; whereupon Mr. Roberts 
 told him that he would not return to his home 
 on the Indian Reservation that evening until the 
 operation was performed. He waited for some 
 little time, then inquired of an attendant of the 
 sick man how things were progressing; and was 
 told that the bleeding could not be stopped. He 
 then summoned the so-called surgeon, and told 
 him that he would have him indicted for man¬ 
 slaughter unless he sent at once for the Army 
 surgeon at Fort Washakie, a distance of sixteen 
 miles. It was in the dead of winter, with deep 
 snow on the ground. The ice on the creek be¬ 
 tween Lander and the Fort was probably about 
 three inches thick. “How can I get word to 
 him?” said the doctor, rather alarmed. “I will 
 go after him and bring him here,” replied Mr. 
 Roberts. He immediately went to the livery 
 stable and aroused the keeper, asking him for a 
 team to drive to Fort Washakie. “I have noth- 
 
74 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 ing but a pair of wild, young western broncos,” 
 the man replied, “and they are scared of In¬ 
 dians. You know some broncos are as much 
 scared of Indians as of a bear.” Mr. Roberts 
 felt sure there would be no Indians abroad on 
 such a cold night, and that broncos were good 
 travellers. So he started out with them, cover¬ 
 ing the ground at a rapid rate. After he had trav¬ 
 elled about ten miles of the distance, owing to 
 the deep snow and the darkness he lost his way. 
 The cold was intense. Mr. Roberts continued 
 across the prairie, being guided there by the 
 lights of the Fort. All of a sudden his spanking 
 little team pulled up on the bank of Trout Creek 
 —a stream running through the valley about 
 two miles from Fort Washakie. There was no 
 time to hunt for a bridge; that poor, suffering 
 man in Lander was bleeding to death. Mr. Rob¬ 
 erts had a good whip in his hands and severe bits 
 in the horses’ mouths. With all his strength he 
 applied the whip to their backs. The broncos 
 reared high in the air, then made a desperate 
 plunge down the bank into the creek. The ice 
 being only three inches thick, they broke through 
 with a crash that reechoed up and down the 
 valley that still night, but they ploughed around 
 in the broken ice and water until, with steady 
 guidance and considerable urging, they brought 
 up on the other bank of the creek, and in a few 
 moments were in front of the Fort. Mr. Rob¬ 
 erts, with great expedition, secured the Army 
 
THE REV. JOHN ROBERTS 
 
 75 
 
 surgeon, and returned with him post haste to 
 Lander, this time by the bridge over the creek. 
 They arrived just in time to save the man’s life. 
 The Army surgeon prosecuted the fake-doctor, 
 who soon fled the country. 
 
 One morning, Mr. Roberts set out on a jour¬ 
 ney, driving a spirited pony to a single buggy. 
 He crossed over a creek on a bridge that spanned 
 a high gulch. When he returned late in the 
 afternoon it was raining heavily; in fact, there 
 had been a cloud-burst near the bridge, and the 
 gulch was filled with a torrent of muddy waves. 
 The water-course was a narrow one, a little over 
 twenty feet in width. Mr. Roberts thought the 
 water was probably covering the bridge to a 
 depth of a foot or eighteen inches; but the bridge 
 was not in sight. It was raining too hard for 
 him to get down from his buggy and investigate. 
 He took it for granted, however, that the bridge 
 was still there, although his pony, really an In¬ 
 dian buffalo horse, refused to step on it. This 
 time, too, he was armed with a good whip and 
 made use of it. The little animal reared high in 
 air, but instead of alighting on the bridge he dis¬ 
 appeared into the torrent of muddy water! The 
 bridge was gone. He swam with energy and all 
 the speed he could muster, and after battling 
 bravely with the force and rush of the stream, 
 drew the buggy, with Mr. Roberts calmly seated 
 in it, safely up the opposite bank. No damage 
 was done excepting a broken king bolt and a 
 
76 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 muddy soaking. He was a tough little horse, 
 this swimmer, and vicious too. He would bite 
 at anything that came his way, and often reared 
 up and struck at his master. He died on the 
 School Farm, at the age of thirty-three. 
 
 Mr. Roberts once owned a horse which 
 was at home on the prairies and would never 
 seek the shelter of a stable. He possessed only 
 one great drawback. When being driven to a 
 buggy, if by any chance a storm came up, he 
 would turn his back to it, and could not be made 
 to budge. This at times, especially if the storm 
 occurred and the horse stampeded several miles 
 from any place of refuge, caused the driver and 
 other occupants of the vehicle considerable in¬ 
 convenience and discomfort. He now owns a 
 spirited team, one of the horses being twenty- 
 five and the other twenty-eight years old. These, 
 and the other School horses as well, live in the 
 pasture all the year around. Whenever they are 
 wanted for driving or riding they must be caught 
 each time. His daughters catch and harness or 
 saddle them, according as they are to be em¬ 
 ployed for driving or riding. 
 
 Mr. Roberts related some interesting experi¬ 
 ences, also, of the people he had met in different 
 parts of his jurisdiction. During a bitter cold 
 spell, while he was in Milford, holding a service, 
 one of his feet became dreadfully frost bitten. 
 A man whom he knew in the village, on hearing 
 of it, came out from a saloon and gave him a 
 
THE REV. JOHN ROBERTS 
 
 77 
 
 glass of wine, which he drank with enjoyment. 
 A rabid prohibitionist saw him take the liquor, 
 and on meeting him afterwards, said: “No won¬ 
 der your foot was frozen.” “Both of them would 
 have been if I had not drunk the wine,” replied 
 Mr. Roberts. 
 
 One evening, when he was returning from a 
 service in Lander, he was “held up”. As he was 
 fastening his overcoat, the Mexican pony on 
 which he was riding came to a full stop. Then 
 two young men planted their guns on his (Mr. 
 Roberts’) chest. He made a grab for their wea¬ 
 pons. One of the fellows went through his poc¬ 
 kets and got a dollar and twenty-five cents for 
 his trouble. If Mr. Roberts had been armed 
 himself, he would have been killed. Both the 
 thieves were desperate characters. The man who 
 did the stealing came from Texas and was living 
 on a ranch of his own near Rawlins, Wyoming. 
 He told the people in his neighborhood that he 
 had “held up” the minister. While living in 
 Texas later he committed a murder. As he was 
 starting for his Wyoming ranch with a herd of 
 cattle, he was pursued by the sheriff and his 
 posse. He fought them desperately and drove 
 them back. On his return to Texas he was shot 
 and killed at sight by the sheriff. 
 
 Living in Lander at this time was a young fel¬ 
 low from Philadelphia. His mother, being 
 greatly distressed about her boy, wrote to Mr. 
 Roberts to “keep an eye on him.” Mr. Roberts 
 
78 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 made inquiries at the man’s lodging. The land¬ 
 lord stated that he was often out all night, and 
 that he owned a silver mounted gun; but when 
 he looked for this weapon in the young man’s 
 room, he could not find it. Mr. Roberts then 
 felt convinced, when he was attacked, that it 
 was the work of the young Philadelphian and 
 a desperado companion. In grabbing for their 
 guns he thought he might secure the silver 
 mounted one, thereby having full proof. Then 
 right on the spot he told him to stop that kind of 
 thing, or he would get into trouble. “Both of 
 you promise me!” said Mr. Roberts, and one of 
 them did. He thought he met the same fellow 
 a few weeks afterward, but it was the ruffian 
 from Texas. Mr. Roberts said that not only on 
 that evening, but long afterwards, he felt sure it 
 was the young man from Philadelphia. Since 
 that time, he told me, he has been very careful 
 never to accuse anyone without good proof. He 
 never could trace the Eastern boy; neither was 
 the other desperado heard of again. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 SOME SHOSHONES 
 
 HE Shoshone Indians have a sense of 
 
 humor all their own. O-wah-ta, their 
 
 second chief, lieutenant of Washakie’s 
 and his firm friend, had a narrow escape while 
 hunting in the mountains. He was riding calmly 
 along the trail, when he heard a soft scuffling; 
 and on looking around saw a huge female grizzly 
 bear making towards him. O-wah-ta said he 
 put spurs to his horse and galloped for dear life. 
 Now this bear was the proud mother of three 
 cubs, which persisted in running after her. She 
 would almost reach the Indian and be ready to 
 spring upon him, but by that time the little ones 
 had caught up with her. Then she would turn 
 around, give each of them a sound slap, and roll 
 them over in the dust. This happened three 
 times; and that was how O-wah-ta escaped. The 
 last time he looked back, he saw that the grizzly 
 had given up the chase and was licking and fond¬ 
 ling her cubs as though deeply repentant for 
 having been rough with them. 
 
 “Where was your gun?” inquired one of O- 
 wah-ta’s friends. “Oh, I had it with me,” he re¬ 
 plied; “but I forgot all about it!” 
 
80 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 Mr. Roberts was talking one evening about a 
 friend of his named Pansi-Tangi. He was short 
 of stature and small of frame. Now this Indian 
 owned a big white horse which took it into his 
 head to run away. After a diligent search Pansi- 
 Tangi discovered his trail. It led on to a log 
 which crossed a stream. The horse had evi¬ 
 dently walked over on the log, for the trail soon 
 ceased. “I looked for that old beast day in and 
 day out,” said Pansi-Tangi. “One morning I 
 went over to a lot to gather some wood. There 
 was an empty tipi nearby; and poking his head 
 out of the flap was my white horse!” 
 
 Pansi-Tangi tells the story that he was off in 
 the mountains one time and shot a woodchuck. 
 He hung it on the horn of his saddle, then con¬ 
 tinued his hunting. Before he started, thinking 
 his old horse must be hungry, he unsaddled him 
 and let him run. When he returned with the 
 second woodchuck, the horse was on hand, but 
 the saddle was gone. The woodchuck had run 
 away with it! 
 
 The Shoshones all laugh heartily at these little 
 tales. 
 
 He was a good man, this Pansi-Tangi. Once 
 upon a time he went far away to the west of the 
 Rocky Mountains, and camped alone. He pick¬ 
 eted his horse, and rolled himself in his blanket 
 for the night. While he slept, he said, he heard 
 good things. 
 
SOME SHOSHONES 
 
 81 
 
 “From whom did you hear them?” asked Mr. 
 Roberts. 
 
 “Why, I heard a voice cry: ‘Pansi-Tangi, 
 
 Pansi-Tangi, Pansi-Tangi! Live a good life, or 
 a godly, righteous, and sober life’.” Literally, 
 “Let your conversation be good or your de¬ 
 meanour (tant-e-me-ah) good; then you will find 
 the entrance to our Father’s home close at hand; 
 then when you come to die, you will not have 
 to go hunting far and wide for the entrance to 
 our Father’s home. It will be very near.” 
 “Those,” said Pansi-Tangi, “are the good things 
 I heard on the other side of the mountains.” 
 
 “You are quite right,” replied Mr. Roberts. 
 
 Pansi-Tangi died a year or two after this ex¬ 
 pedition. 
 
 A Shoshone named Gweenatsie, or Eagle, was 
 the first Indian to farm for Mr. Roberts. (This 
 man had a daughter called Quiet Taylor.) He 
 ploughed up the sage brush on the property 
 given by Washakie for a school farm. Now the 
 school is there in the midst of pretty cottonwood 
 trees. One morning, Mr. Roberts, while super¬ 
 intending the work, told Gweenatsie to go 
 after another plough. This implement was about 
 a quarter of a mile away, and he supposed the 
 Indian would drive over for it with the team. 
 Instead of that, he jumped on the back of one of 
 the team horses, rode over for the plough, lifted 
 it to one of his shoulders, mounted the horse 
 again, and came galloping back. When he 
 
82 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 reached Mr. Roberts he threw the plough down 
 at his feet and broke it. “Such was my first In¬ 
 dian farmer/’ said Mr. Roberts. “But now the 
 tribe abounds in excellent ones, who vie with 
 the whites in raising splendid crops.” 
 
 Gweenatsie continued his work with the 
 broken plough. Suddenly he called Mr. Roberts’ 
 attention to a rocky hill about a mile away. 
 
 “Do you see some women (Shoshones) up 
 there among the rocks?” he inquired. 
 
 “Yes,” replied Mr. Roberts; “what are they 
 doing?” 
 
 “Oh, laying by (burying) a child.” 
 
 “Whose child is it?” 
 
 “Mine!” answered Gweenatsie; “it is just a 
 girl!” 
 
 The Shoshones have changed very much since 
 then, in their estimate of a daughter; and they 
 always seek Christian burial in a cemetery now. 
 
 Mr. Roberts went on to tell of Friday, a little 
 Arapahoe boy. When quite small, he was cap¬ 
 tured by the whites and taken to St. Louis, where 
 he was well brought up and educated. When he 
 became a man, he had a great desire to return to 
 his people. With the help of the Government, 
 he reached one of the distant western forts. 
 Learning at this point of the whereabouts of the 
 Arapahoes, he procured a horse, and by the aid of 
 a friendly Indian, after many days of wandering, 
 he found his people. Friday’s relatives recog¬ 
 nized him and gave him a great welcome. He 
 
SOME SHOSHONES 
 
 83 
 
 was shocked at their condition. When they of¬ 
 fered him food, he could not eat it, so dirty and 
 untidy were the surroundings. He decided to 
 return to the whites, but as his guides left him, 
 he found it impracticable. For two or three 
 days he could eat nothing offered to him; but 
 being a husky, strong young fellow, his appetite 
 at last returned and overcame all scruples. He 
 ate everything that was set before him. One day 
 he was taking a ride with Dr. Irwin. All of a 
 sudden Friday spied a piece of bread along the 
 road. He jumped from his horse, and picking 
 it up, began to eat it. He was reproved by the 
 agent, who said he did not know whether that 
 bread was fit to eat or not. “Doctor/’ answered 
 Friday philosophically, “we miss a great many 
 of the good things of life by being too particu¬ 
 lar!” And he told him of his return to his tribe. 
 Sam Friday, his grandson, has a fine farm just 
 below the Washakie Sulphur Springs. 
 
 My visit to the school for Shoshone Indian 
 girls was most delightful and interesting. To 
 those not especially interested, the routine may 
 seem humdrum. Breakfast is at seven for every¬ 
 one, after which the kitchen work is attended to 
 and the dormitories put in order; then, prayers 
 at nine. The children have special days for 
 washing and ironing and churning and sweeping 
 and mopping and sewing. Certain ones are se¬ 
 lected to prepare vegetables for the noon dinner. 
 The afternoon is devoted to school work in the 
 
84 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 combination chapel and school house, built of 
 logs; then there is time for romping out-of-doors 
 until the supper bell rings. 
 
 At evening prayer, the children sing six hymns 
 of their own choosing, sometimes seven and 
 eight, and they love to sing. The older ones put 
 their whole soul into it. Rose Wagner, lamed 
 for life by an accident, but a girl of beautiful 
 character and very capable, has a fine soprano 
 voice. If cultivated, it would stand comparison 
 with the best in our city choirs. Rose does the 
 genuine Shoshone bead work—flower designs in 
 all colors. During the course of some conversa¬ 
 tions with her, she told me something of the 
 Peyote meetings now held among her people. 
 
 Every Saturday night, the Shoshones, as well 
 as the Arapahoes, hold a big meeting in a tent. 
 The young people flock to them, especially the 
 young men; and they, as well as the girls, are 
 attired in their best clothes. When all are as¬ 
 sembled, a chapter from the Bible is read by the 
 leader, and the Lord’s Prayer is recited. Then 
 some one chooses a Shoshone song, to which an 
 accompaniment is beaten on the individual drums, 
 and this continues for 1 some time, as the songs are 
 selected by different members of the congrega¬ 
 tion. After the musical programme is completed, 
 they sit on their feet with knees bent, praying to 
 the Father and receiving the peyote beans, which 
 are handed to them. These beans are small and 
 taste like dirt. Four, the usual number taken 
 
SOME SHOSHONES 
 
 85 
 
 by each one, have quite an effect on the recipi¬ 
 ents, very similar to that of opium. When 
 morning comes they go outside and talk, but 
 their speech is thick. Some who have partaken 
 too freely of the pernicious drug are obliged to 
 be taken to their homes in buggies. They feel 
 strange and are liable to have all sorts of visions. 
 One or two declared they have seen lights on the 
 heads of good Shoshones, like the cloven tongues 
 of fire at Pentecost. Others, perhaps, see snakes 
 appearing in and about their food. If children 
 are ill, they are taken to these meetings, prayed 
 for, and allowed to eat the beans. The poor 
 little creatures nearly always die. The white 
 doctors have told the Indians that if they con¬ 
 tinue to take the peyote bean, a certain kind of 
 worm will form in them and eat into their sys¬ 
 tems; but the majority do not believe it. Some 
 of the better class of Indians are very much op¬ 
 posed to these meetings and could not be in¬ 
 duced to attend them. Rose is very sceptical 
 about the morals of her people. She told me she 
 knew only two pure women in the whole tribe. 
 She herself is part white, and not very loyal to 
 her Indian blood. 
 
 One afternoon, as I was sitting on the front 
 lawn, two Indian girls, Iva Sinclair and Mollie 
 Snyder, came over and threw themselves on the 
 grass beside me. “Each one of you must tell 
 me a story,” I said, and they related the follow¬ 
 ing brief tales: 
 
86 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 Some Shoshones, who were moving from one 
 camping place to another, had a pet bear. The 
 woman of the family was left behind with her 
 horse and the bear, and the horse on which the 
 bear was to ride. The others went on ahead to 
 make the new place ready. She tried her best to 
 help the bear on the horse, but he was too heavy 
 and clumsy. Finally she gave him a good slap, 
 and he turned on her and killed her! Iva de¬ 
 clares this is a true story. She knows the 
 woman’s grand-daughter! 
 
 Once upon a time a boy was right in the midst 
 of the fighting when the Shoshones were having 
 a battle with the Cheyennes. He forgot his dan¬ 
 ger while he was watching the fighting and scalp¬ 
 ing. Although he was told not to go, he ran 
 down to the Cheyennes’ camp; but got back 
 safely. His brother scolded him. This made 
 him very angry, and he started off with a lot of 
 clubs to kill his brother’s horse. The latter 
 thought he was in earnest and went in search 
 of him; but he was only teasing his brother, so 
 did not kill the horse. Instead, he brought back 
 with him a quantity of otters and beavers and 
 rabbits and ducks. This boy turned out to be 
 a great hunter and a brave warrior. 
 
 Once upon a time a little boy, about four years 
 old, was lost from the camp. The people looked 
 for him everywhere but could not find him. One 
 day his brother was hunting in the mountains and 
 ran across a number of coyotes. There was the 
 
SOME SHOSHONES 
 
 87 
 
 long lost boy, living with them! The coyotes 
 brought him rabbits and chickens, and gave him, 
 too, the liver and sweetbreads of the calves and 
 lambs they killed. After he ate, they licked the 
 blood from his mouth and face. They kept him 
 warm by letting him sleep cuddled among them; 
 and they covered him up with their tails. The 
 boy had been gone two years. He was very wild. 
 His hair was matted, his nails were grown very 
 long; and he was quite naked and terribly dirty. 
 
 The Shoshones tell a story of one of their 
 people who, while hunting in the mountains, 
 was overtaken by a storm and found refuge in a 
 bear’s den. This he discovered to his horror af¬ 
 ter he had been in the den for a little while; fur¬ 
 thermore, he saw that the bears had prepared a 
 huge ball of grass like a bale of hay. During the 
 winter this grass protected the opening to their 
 cave, but since some mild days had come, the 
 bears had removed it; that was why the den was 
 open. Thinking the storm was abating, the man 
 thought he would crawl out by the way he en¬ 
 tered. To his consternation and amazement he 
 found that the bears were sealing it up tight with 
 the ball of grass! He was afraid they might 
 attack him if he tried to tear down the protection 
 to the entrance; he thought he would just wait 
 and see how things would turn out, keep very 
 quiet, and show as little fear as possible. The 
 bears were very kind to him. He managed to 
 pick up bits of meat or honey, and so kept him- 
 
88 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 self alive. After waking from a sound sleep, he 
 saw the bears hard at work opening their winter 
 quarters. They were rolling away the great ball 
 of grass which had closed up the den so tight all 
 winter. The man came out quietly and was 
 scarcely noticed by the bears. He was delighted 
 with the sunshine; and when he found he was far 
 enough away to be quite safe from attack, even if 
 the bears were planning it, he danced and sang 
 for joy. He never went near these animals 
 again. 
 
SHOSHONE MISSION SCHOOL 
 
 WASHAKIE’S CHAPEL 
 Shoshone Mission School 
 
 GIRLS OF SHOSHONE 
 MISSION SCHOOL 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 IN CONCLUSION 
 
 FTER forty years of service in the field, 
 
 the “hidden hero” of our Church, the Rev. 
 
 ^ John Roberts, has retired. At least, he 
 says he has, and Mrs. Roberts is now the warden 
 of the Shoshone Indian School. The problem 
 of educating their children has been to them a 
 most difficult and serious one. At the time that 
 their family were growing up, worth-while 
 schools for white people in the West were few 
 and far between. The children had to be sent 
 long distances away, at great expense, and then 
 only for a year or two years. This demanded 
 manifold sacrifices on the part of the parents; 
 long periods of privation and anxiety. 
 
 They must fell well repaid now, in having 
 about them a group of interesting, well-trained 
 highly useful members of society, and of untold 
 influence for good wherever they may be sit¬ 
 uated. But this is owing chiefly to the heroism 
 of their parents; and the beautiful atmosphere 
 of their home, in which it was provided that 
 they should learn, from their earliest years, all 
 
90 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 things that Christians ought to know and be¬ 
 lieve to their souls’ health. 
 
 Mr. Roberts and his family are as much be¬ 
 loved by all the white people in the region as by 
 the Indians. The latter have a favorite, signifi¬ 
 cant name for him, and other names for Mrs. 
 Roberts, their son, and four daughters. 
 
 Mr. Roberts they call Dambavie or Elder 
 Brother. Mrs. Roberts is Dambavie-un-gwe, 
 Elder Brother’s wife. Their son is Wuchnaja, or 
 Bear Chief; Mrs. Graham is Muzumbeatsie or 
 Mountain Chief; as she was such a fine climber 
 when she lived at the school. Mrs. Markley is 
 Baritsie or Elk; Miss Marian, Gwaratsie or Ante¬ 
 lope ; Miss Gwen, Sogoratsie or Deer. The people 
 of our Church (the Episcopalians) are named 
 Tosagwaso, or White Robes. 
 
 Mr. Roberts sees a great change in the lives of 
 the Indians during the forty years he has lived on 
 the Reservation. During the first year he was 
 there, these people sold some three thousand 
 buffalo hides, and many skins of elk and other 
 animals. When he was a boy, living at his own 
 home in Wales, he remembers that great quanti¬ 
 ties of buffalo meat were shipped to England. 
 Hunting for a living is now unknown, and 
 the Indians are employed in agriculture and stock 
 raising; many of them are making good, some are 
 moderately well-to-do, others really prosperous, 
 and the majority of both the Arapahoes and Sho- 
 
IN CONCLUSION 
 
 91 
 
 shones on this reservation owe their success to 
 the efforts of Mr. Roberts. 
 
 The object of the Indian schools and of all Mr. 
 Roberts’ long, faithful service among them, has 
 been, and is, to make the Indians self-supporting 
 and self-respecting. The education given them is 
 very practical, and special attention is devoted to 
 industrial pursuits. The girls are taught every¬ 
 thing a ranchman’s daughter ought to know. 
 They are also required to learn English, which 
 they do fairly well. Their religious instruction is 
 carefully attended to by Mr. Roberts. They have 
 been well instructed in regard to the importance 
 of helping those more needy than themselves. 
 During and after the War, the children at the 
 Government school, as well as those at the Sho¬ 
 shone school, contributed largely to the Arme¬ 
 nians for their suffering children. “God remem¬ 
 bers all this,” said Mr. Roberts, in one of his ad¬ 
 dresses to them. “You will find it in heaven. 
 What you spend on your hair ribbons and on 
 things for yourself you will lose. You can do 
 things that God cannot. You can break a prom¬ 
 ise ; God cannot.” 
 
 Every Sunday morning Mr. Roberts talks to 
 the children at the Government school, and on 
 Sunday afternoons addresses the girls at his 
 own Shoshone school. It was the greatest privi¬ 
 lege and pleasure to hear such a lucid, pure, sim¬ 
 ple, and beautiful exposition of the Creed, the 
 Ten Commandments, the Lord’s Prayer, and 
 
92 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 other parts of the Gospel. It was the actual sim¬ 
 plicity, and manifested the faith, of the disciples 
 and of the early Christians; any little child could 
 understand. How much we need more purity 
 and simplicity of heart and conduct in all the 
 exercises of our daily lives! 
 
 On one of these occasions, the appointed lesson 
 was the narrative of Christ accompanying His 
 parents to Jerusalem. Mr. Roberts emphasized 
 most strongly the foster-fatherhood of Joseph, 
 and the God-nature of our Saviour. Jesus was 
 not half God, half man. He was all God, all man. 
 We know He was man, human, because He got 
 tired, hungry, thirsty. God could not be any of 
 these. Then, Jesus Christ died. God cannot 
 die. He was God, because there was darkness, 
 night, over the earth in the middle of the day; and 
 the earth shook, and the rocks broke. When an 
 ordinary man dies, nothing like that happens. 
 Christ could heal the sick; raise the dead. One 
 day a girl twelve years old was dying, and dead 
 when He reached the house. He took her by the 
 hand and raised her up. Once there was a 
 funeral procession on its slow march along the 
 road. Christ came forward and touched the bier. 
 They that carried the body of the young man who 
 had died, stood still. He told the dead body to 
 arise. The young man immediately sat up, alive, 
 and our Lord delivered him to his mother. No 
 mere man could do that. Once a man had been 
 in the grave four days. When the Shoshones 
 
IN CONCLUSION 
 
 93 
 
 die, they are wrapt in blankets and skins. This 
 man, as the Jews prepare their dead, was wrapt 
 in sheets. Jesus said to him: “Come forth!” and 
 he did at once. The man could not walk very 
 well, wrapt in these sheets. Jesus told him to 
 take them off. He did; and walked and lived, and 
 was well. No man could do all this. At the 
 Judgment Day He will raise all of us, and we will 
 put on our bodies again as we do our clothes and 
 will live in heaven with Him. He is now seated 
 at God’s right hand praying for us. 
 
 On another occasion, Mr. Roberts spoke to the 
 children on the Temptation in the Wilderness. 
 Christ was forty days and forty nights in the wil¬ 
 derness, out on the prairies and in the moun¬ 
 tains, with the wild beasts, as St. Mark tells us, 
 and tempted of the Devil. There is no word in 
 Shoshone for tempt; the nearest to it is tease. 
 Our Lord was teased by Satan. Satan said to 
 Him: “Turn that stone into bread.” Now Christ 
 was perfectly able to turn the stone into bread; 
 but that is not the way He does things. He has 
 the ground prepared and the wheat sowed, and it 
 grows and ripens, and is turned into flour for 
 bread. Then the Devil took Him up into the 
 great city of Jerusalem, on a high place of the 
 Temple, the largest and most magnificent church 
 in the world, where all the Jews worshipped; and 
 way down below, all around, it was very steep. 
 The Devil said to Him: “Cast Thyself down! 
 You won’t hurt Yourself! God will hold You up; 
 
94 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 He under You will protect You!” It is the same 
 as when little eagles fly; the large eagle hovers 
 underneath, so they can fall on her and not hurt 
 themselves. “God's angels will be watching, so 
 that You will not fall!" The teasing, the teasing 
 of this Evil One! 
 
 Then the Devil took our Lord up to an exceed¬ 
 ingly high mountain, and showed Him all the 
 kingdoms of the world and the glory of them; 
 as though they had been brought together into a 
 great picture. The Devil said: “These are mine. 
 I will give them to you if you will worship me.” 
 Jesus answered: “I will worship God only. He 
 alone is to be served." Then the angels came 
 and ministered to Christ. They are beautiful 
 beings, very strong, and they fly. But our Lord 
 did not fly. When He ascended, He went up; 
 right up into heaven. They are the messengers 
 of God; they wait on Him, and go to help those 
 who need defense on earth. 
 
 If we keep God’s Commandments, we shall find 
 ourselves, when we die, right near the open door 
 of our Father’s home, and directly with the 
 angels. But we must keep God’s commandments, 
 and we must take care of our bodies. Some 
 people commit suicide. God has given us our 
 lives; they are to go back to Him in His good ap¬ 
 pointed time. Suppose a friend has given you a 
 present and you throw it in his face! So people 
 do when they take their own lives; they throw 
 the beautiful gift of life back into God’s face. 
 
IN CONCLUSION 
 
 95 
 
 In addition to all the strenuous, active work 
 that Mr. Roberts has accomplished in his sojourn 
 on this Indian Reservation in charge of the Ara¬ 
 pahoe, Shoshone, and white missions, he has 
 translated St. Luke’s Gospel into Arapahoe, and 
 also the Prayer Book, except the Psalms, and 
 some of the minor offices. This language is sim¬ 
 ilar to the Hebrew; well constructed and beauti¬ 
 ful. For the beginner it is more difficult than 
 the Shoshone; but becomes much easier as one 
 advances in it. He has translated Morning 
 Prayer and part of the Communion Service into 
 the Shoshone, also a Catechism, which is mostly 
 negative, denying the beliefs of these Indians, 
 and at the same time giving them the truths of 
 the Gospel. It was an extremely difficult task, 
 as neither language had ever before been re¬ 
 duced to writing. 
 
 The story of the early life of the Rev. Sherman 
 Coolidge, under the title of “Desthewa, the 
 Young Arapahoe”, has also been most entertain¬ 
 ingly and comprehensively written by Mr. 
 Roberts. 
 
 Through the important position he has held 
 and still occupies, Mr. Roberts is evidently 
 looked upon as an overseer with insight, accur¬ 
 ate, trustworthy, arriving at correct results with¬ 
 out jumping at hasty conclusions, of which an 
 ordinary traveller might be accused. He has 
 lived among these Indians for more than a gen¬ 
 eration, working with them in the endeavor for 
 
96 
 
 SHOSHONE FOLK LORE 
 
 their betterment, spiritually, mentally, and do¬ 
 mestically. He thinks that the tribes are now on 
 the highway to Christianity. They are honest, as 
 a rule, or not given to petty stealing. There are 
 scarcely any cases of violence. There is little 
 inter-marrying with the whites. They are taught 
 to be, and should be, self-supporting and gentle¬ 
 men. 
 
 In the midst of these dark and sometimes al¬ 
 most forbidding people, Mr. Roberts’ face seems 
 animated with the spirit of Christ. Old squaws, 
 withered and wrinkled, in their moccasins and 
 blankets, come to him for advice and help. He 
 is ever in demand for baptisms, marriages, and 
 burials. He is like a father going about among 
 them and calling each by name ; sometimes speak¬ 
 ing the Shoshone language, while with those who 
 know it, all the younger ones, he converses in 
 English. He has given his whole life’s energy 
 for the benefit of a race, once as wild as the bears 
 and coyotes which infest these mountains; and 
 has succeeded in uplifting them, and in leading 
 them on the heavenward path. Furthermore, 
 he has seen the transition of this virgin wilder¬ 
 ness into a land of settlement and populous 
 towns, and has made himself useful and promi¬ 
 nent in this advance. 
 
 In spite of the fact of his having said he has 
 retired, Mr. Roberts is busy from early morning 
 to late evening. The environment has become a 
 part of his life; his heart is still in the work, and 
 
IN CONCLUSION 
 
 97 
 
 he is just as earnestly concerned as ever about 
 the welfare of the red men among whom he lives. 
 He could never be happy for any length of time 
 away from them, or from the mountains and pas¬ 
 tures he loves so well. 
 
NOTES 
 
 Some Shoshone Sacred Words 
 
 God—dam Api^ 
 
 Son of God—dam Apua Andua. 
 
 Holy Ghost—dam Apua Swap Sant. 
 
 Soul—Moogwa. 
 
 Bible, God’s Book—dam Apua undewop. 
 
 Jesus Christ, our Saviour—Dzees Crist dame Magwid- 
 jwniwap. 
 
 The Lord’s Prayer. Dam Apua Nashwuhi 
 
 Nim Apur nimevant, U nane ha sant, 
 
 Des nim oud Un nangarogwshwugai, 
 
 Nonza dam sogovant undzaewhe, 
 
 Damuvant wahaews. Sikan dave nim 
 Yudigapa nime mag. Non hinan ditc 
 Nime igwekapant ka ditc nime swan-gint, 
 
 Nime dadzno nime ditc dieigwekapant ka ditc nime 
 swangun. 
 
 Kadino didjindimbed nime jamur, 
 
 Kadzan no ditcint nime dawri; 
 
 Un, Unt ish oit da Apua, 
 
 Des Nin oiok mavanarwchant, desint swmank 
 Un ish nime mavejeachant, 
 
 Amen. 
 
SOME SHOSHONE WORDS AND 
 PROPER NAMES 
 
 Husband—go-opwa. 
 
 Wife—gwe. 
 
 Father—apwa. 
 
 Mother—beah 
 Children—dirapira. 
 
 Boy—doainipwa. 
 
 Grandmother—ga-goo. 
 
 Phrases 
 
 I don’t know—Ka-shoon-banah. 
 
 He knows nothing—Ka-hinne-shoon-banah. 
 
 Names for Men 
 
 Wolf’s Brother—Idgapwaumbave. 
 
 Rabbit Tail—Taboomgwash. 
 
 Yellow or White Beaver—Ondombit. 
 
 Hairy Leggings—Bugoosa. 
 
 Red Cloud—Engadomop. 
 
 Red Sun—Engadab. 
 
 Names for Women 
 
 Elk Calling (Good name for a woman)—Bareyagat. 
 Mountain Woman—Dotawipe. 
 
 Good Woman—Zawipe. 
 
 Slender Woman—Ganavish. 
 
Population of the Shoshone Indian Reservation 
 
 There are about seventeen hundred Indians on the 
 
 Reservation, including the Arapahoes. 
 
 Total number of Shoshones Males (1921) 478 
 
 “ “ “ “ Females 421 
 
 “ “ “ “ Births 40 
 
 “ “ “ “ Deaths 25 
 
 “ “ “ “ Minors, (Male to 20 yr ) 197 
 
 “ “ “ “ “ Female to 18 yr.) 201 
 
 “ “ “ Male Adults, 21 yrs. and over 281 
 
 “ “ “ Female “ 18 yrs. and over 220 
 
 “ “ “ Families 412 
 
 “ “ “ Shoshone Population 899 
 
PRINTED IN 
 
 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 
 BY 
 
 MOREHOUSE PUBLISHING CO. 
 MILWAUKEE, WIS. 
 
E99 .S404 
 
 Shoshone folk lore, as discovered from 
 Princeton Theological Seminary-Speer Library 
 
 1 1012 00024 0798