and two children. Our surprise at this laughable denouement was only equalled by their own.
54 The country adjacent to the head branches of the Kansas river is but little known to the whites, who seldom visit it on account of its dangerous nature. That valuable minerals are contained in its soil is quite probable, and no doubt they will be brought to light upon due research.
They announced themselves in search of the Arapaho village, and expressed much pleasure at meeting with the whites. Our visitors having passed the night with us, the next morning we yielded to their solicitations, and set out with them to the village, some eighteen miles distant, in a northwest direction.
About noon we arrived at the place, and found six or seven hundred lodges of Arapahos, Chyennes, and Sioux, encamped in a large valley skirting a small affluent of Beaver creek.
The village, being prepared to move, in a few moments succeeding our arrival, was en route for the Platte river. The spectacle was novel and imposing. Lodge followed lodge in successive order, —forming vast processions for miles in length. Squaws, children, horses, and dogs, mingling in promiscuous throng, covered the landscape in every direction, and gave it the aspect of one dense mass of life and animation.
Here a troop of gorgeously dressed and gaily painted damsels, all radiant with smiles and flaunting in conscious beauty, bestriding richly caparisoned horses, excited the admiration and commanded the homage of gallantry; there a cavalcade of young warriors, bedaubed with fantastic colors — black, red, white, blue, or yellow, in strict accordance with savage taste — habited in their nicest attire, swept proudly along, chanting their war-deeds in measured accents to the deep-toned drum; and then another band of pompous horsemen scoured the spreading plain, in eager race to test the speed of their foaming chargers; and, yet again, a vast army of mounted squaws, armed with the implements for root-digging, spread far and wide in search of the varied products of the prairie; then, among the moving mass, passed slowly along the travées, conveying the aged, infirm, and helpless, screened from the heat of a summer's sun by awnings of skins, that beshaded their cradled occupants, —while immense trains of pack-animals, heavily laden with provisions and camp equipage, as they crowded amid the jogging multitudes, united to complete the picture of a travelling Indian village.
Yielding to the request of our new friends, we proceeded with them ten or twelve miles further and passed the night in their lodge.
Our route from Beaver creek led over a tumulous country, interspersed with valleys of a rich soil, and prolific in rank vegetation. The side-hills afforded large quantities of pomme blanc, and the prairies and bottoms a splendid array of choice floral beauties.
The creeks disclosed wide, sandy beds, often dry and skirted by broad valleys which were passably well timbered. The principal ridges were not high, but surmounted by dense pine forests, with pleasant openings, smiling in all the loveliness of spring.
Notwithstanding the scanty volumes of the streams, the country presents to the traveller the appearance of being well watered by frequent rains, while ever and anon a gurgling fountain strikes upon his ear with its soft music.
Stratified rock is usually rare; the only species noticed were limestone and sandstone. I remarked a great abundance of silex and hornblend, with
