Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-06-26

time but one and all they race and tear
through the alley way and over the ten
mis- grounds and swarm over the lake
bluff, and take them all in all, they are
as hearty and enterprising set OF
youngsters as ever you saw.
But it seems they got tired of hare and
| hound, hunt the wolf, and the like, and
decided on q novelty. They determined
to play Indian awhile, and came to see
me about it. They wanted to know the
Sioux for Red Cloud, Spotted TAI,
Charging Bear, Crazy Horse, and they
wanted a lot of Crow names or Pawnees,
for they were going TO have two big
bends-Sioux and their enemies-ano
dress up in such Indian garo as they
could borrow or their fancy might con-
trive, and have terrific conflicts, slay
and scalp and carry off squaws and pap
poosss, and it was all very bloody and
aw e-inspiring, but some of them became
so interested in the sign language of
the Indians that presently the war was
forgotten.
And now it seems to me that perhaps
there are many boy readers of our youths
department who would like to know
something about this strange and won
derful sign language by which the In
dams of any tribe readily converse with
total strangers, whose spoken language
would be complete mystery TO them. l
never learned very much of it during the
few years of active campaigning among
them, for just about as soon as we were
getting a little acquainted with one tribe
we would be whisked off TO fight another,
and so in rather confusing haste we traV-
eled from among the Apaches OF Arizona,
through the land of the Nayajoes, (that
"j'' is the Spanish ''h, - and the word
is pronounced Nsyvahoe,) and among
the Pueblo Indians of New Mexico. We
had had Hualpai, Tonic and Apache
Iohave scouts, aud had picked up lit
tie of their talk; but the next thing we
knew we were in the midst of the great
war with the Sioux in 1876, and
here we had Crows, Pawnees and
Shoshones for our scouts, and could
study them at times. The next year,
1877, we were sent up to the backbone
of the continent, as the Indians call
the Rocky Mountains, in the endeavor
to head off that wonderful Indian gen.
ersl, Chief Joseph, who led his Nez
Perces from Western Idaho to within a
days march OF Asslnniboia before he
was finally checked, and this time we
had Sioux, Cheyennes, Arapahoes and
SuOsuOuco DIS OuI SCOulS dhb AhoH
winter when we got back to our station
lot of Ute chiefs made their way into
Cheyenne to complain that they were all
starving at their agency in the Colorado
mountain, and our colonel did his best
to help them and our officers treated
them cordially and Hospitality (Which
they duly rewarded next year by killing
and wounding many of their entertainers
when our troops were ordered to march
into their territory to see what was
wrong at the agency; and take it all in
all the Fifth cavalry, my old regiment,
managed to see good deal of the CONT
nent and most of the Indians in the
course of q ten years sojourn on the
Western frontier, and very interesting
study did those wild warriors make.
Think of it boys! Some of their dia-
lects are SO harsh and gutteral that it is
said that two Arrapahoes or two Chey-
ennes can hardly make themselves I'M
derstood when talking to one another in
the dark, where their signs cannot be
seen. On the other hand, in the day
time and by the freight, they can con-
verse-and so can nearly all Indians
tiuently and never utter word.
Now, to begin with, almost every
tribe of Western Indians has some we'll
known sign which takes the place of a
name, and very often when you ask an
Indian what tribe he belongs to will sim