drowned. As he pulled the dead body from the spring the water became
agitated, and from the bubbles arose a vapor that gradually assumed the
form of a venerable Indian, with long white locks, in whom the murderer
recognized Waukauga, father of the Shoshone and Comanche nation, and a
man whose heroism and goodness made his name revered in both these
tribes. The face of the patriarch was dark with wrath, and he cried, in
terrible tones, "Accursed of my race! This day thou hast severed the
mightiest nation in the world. The blood of the brave Shoshone appeals
for vengeance. May the water of thy tribe be rank and bitter in their
throats."
Then, whirling up an elk-horn club, he brought it full on the head of the
wretched man, who cringed before him. The murderer's head was burst open
and he tumbled lifeless into the spring, that to this day is nauseous,
while, to perpetuate the memory of Ausaqua, the manitou smote a
neighboring rock, and from it gushed a fountain of delicious water. The
bodies were found, and the partisans of both the hunters began on that
day a long and destructive warfare, in which other tribes became involved
until mountaineers were arrayed against plainsmen through all that
region.
BESIEGED BY STARVATION
A hundred years before the white men set up their trading-posts on the
Arkansas and Platte, a band of mountain hunters made a descent on what
they took to be a small company of plainsmen, but who proved to be the
enemy in force, and who, in turn, drove the Utes--for the aggressors were
of that tribe--into the hills. Most of them took refuge on a castellated
rock on the south side of Bowlder Canon, where they held their own for
several days, rolling down huge rocks whenever an attempt was made to
storm the height; wherefore, seeing that the mountain was too secure a
stronghold to be taken in that way, the besiegers camped about it, and,
by cutting off the access of the beleaguered party to game and to water,
starved every one of them to death.
This, too, is the story of Starved Rock, on Illinois River, near Ottawa,
Illinois. It is a sandstone bluff, one hundred and fifty feet high, with
a slope on one side only. Its summit is an acre in extent, and at the
order of La Salle his Indian lieutenant, Tonti, fortified the place and
mounted a small cannon on it. He died there afterward. After the killing
of Pontiac at Cahokia, some of his people--the Ottawas--charged the crime
against their enemies, the Illinois. The latter, being few in number,
entrenched themselves on Starved Rock, where they kept their enemies at
bay, but were unable to break their line to reach supplies. For a time
they secured water by letting down bark vessels into the river at the end
of thongs, but the Ottawas came under the bluff in canoes and cut the
cords. Unwilling to surrender, the Illinois remained there until all had
died of starvation. Bones and relics are found occasionally at the top.
There is yet another place of which a similar narrative is
extant--namely, Crow Butte, Nebraska, which is two hundred feet high and
vertical on all sides save one, but on that a horseman may ascend in
safety. A company of Crows, flying from the Sioux, gained this citadel
and defended the path so vigorously that their pursuers gave over all
attempts to follow them, but squatted calmly on the plain and proceeded
to starve them out. On a dark night the besieged killed some of their