These are the Apaches From the top of the big mountains, always covered
with snow they look towards the bed of the sun. They see the green grass
of the prairie below them, and afar the blue salt-water Their houses are
as numerous as the stars in heaven, their warriors as thick as the
shells in the bottom of our lakes. They are brave; they are feared by
the Pale-faces--by all; and they too, know that we are their fathers;
their tongue is our tongue their Manitou our Manitou; their heart a
portion of our heart and never has the knife of a Shoshone drunk the
blood of a Apache, nor the belt of an Apache suspended the scalp
of Shoshone.
"And afterwards, again, more of our children left us. By that time they
left us because we were angry. They were few families of chiefs who had
grown strong and proud. They wished to lord over our wigwams, and we
drove them away, as the panther drives away her cubs, when their claws
and teeth have been once turned against her. These are the Arrapahoes
They are strong and our enemies, yet they are a noble nation. I have in
my lodge twenty of their scalps; they have many ours. They fight by the
broad light of the day, with the lane bow, and arrows; they scorn
treachery. Are they not although rebels and unnatural children, still
the children, of the Shoshones? Who ever heard of the Arrapahoes
entering the war-path in night? No one! They are no Crows, no Umbiquas,
no Flat-heads! They can give death; they know how to receive
it,--straight and upright, knee to knee, breast to breast, and their eye
drinking the glance of their foe.
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