How often has it happened that a
belligerent, well practised in his art, has kept his own colors out
of the affair, and then boasted that they were not lost! Now, an
Indian practises no such shameless expedients. His point of honor is
not a bit of rag, but a bit of his skin. He shaves his head because
the hair encumbers him; but he chivalrously leaves a scalp-lock, by
the aid of which his conquerors can the more easily carry away the
coveted trophy. The thought of cheating in such a matter never
occurs to his unsophisticated mind; and as for leaving his "colors"
in barracks, while he goes in the field himself, he would disdain
it--nay, cannot practise it; for the obvious reason that his head
would have to be left with them.
Thus it was with Pigeonswing. He had made his toilet for the war-
path, and was fierce in his paint, but honest and fair-dealing in
other particulars. If he could terrify his enemies by looking like a
skeleton, or a demon, it was well; his enemy would terrify him, if
possible, by similar means. But neither would dream, or did dream,
of curtailing, by a single hair, that which might be termed the
flag-staff of his scalp.
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