USA > Colorado > El Paso County > The Indians of the Pike's peak region > Part 3
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Bayou Salado. Here the valley narrowed considerably, and turning an angle with the creek, I was at once shut in by mountains and elevated ridges which rose on each side of the stream. This was now a rapid torrent tumbling over the rocks and stones and fringed with oak and a shrubbery of brush. A few miles on, the cañon opened into a little shelving glade and on the right bank of the stream, raised several feet above it, was a flat, white rock, in which was a round hole where one of the celebrated springs hissed and bubbled with its escaping gas. I had been cautioned against drink- ing this, being directed to follow the stream a few yards to another, which is the true soda spring.
I had not only abstained from drinking that day, but with the aid of a handful of salt, which I had brought with me for the purpose, had so highly seasoned my breakfast of venison, that I was in a most satisfactory state of thirst. I therefore proceeded at once to the other spring, and found it about forty yards from the first and immediately above the river, issuing from a little basin in the flat, white rock, and trickling over the edge into the stream. The escape of gas in this was much stronger than in the other, and was similar to water boiling smartly.
I had provided myself with a tin cup holding about a pint, but before dipping it in I divested myself of my pouch and belt, and sat down in order to enjoy the draught at my leisure. I was half dead with thirst, and tucking up the sleeves of my hunting shirt, I dipped the cup into the midst of the bubbles and raised it, hissing and sparkling, to my lips. Such a draught! Three times without drawing a breath was it replen- ished and emptied, almost blowing up the roof of my mouth with its effervescence. It was equal to the very
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best soda water, but possesses that fresh, natural flavor which manufactured water cannot impart.
The Indians regard with awe the medicine waters of these fountains, as being the abode of a Spirit who breathes through the transparent water, and thus by his exhalations causes the perturbation of its sur- face. The Arapahoes especially attributc to this water god, the power of ordaining the success or miscar- riage of their war expeditions, and as their braves pass often by the mysterious springs when in search of their hereditary cnemies, the Utes, in the "Valley of Salt," they never fail to bestow their votive offerings upon the water sprite, in order to propitiate the Manitou of the fountain and insure a fortunate issue to their path of war. Thus at the time of my visit, the basin of the spring was filled with beads and wam- pum and pieces of red cloth and knives, while the surrounding trees were hung with strips of deer skin, cloth, and moccasins; to which, had they been servicc- able, I would most sacrilegiously have helped my- self. The signs, too, around the spring, plainly showed that here a war dance had been executed by the braves, and I was not a little pleased to find that they had already been here and were not likely to return the same way; but in this supposition I was quite astray.
The large spring referred to by Dr. James, Sage, Frémont, Ruxton, and the other writers whom I . have quoted, is the one now enclosed and used by the bottling works at Manitou. Ruxton says the two springs were intimately connected with the separation of the Comanche and the Snake, or
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Ute tribes, and he gives the following legend concerning the beginning of the trouble: " .
Many hundreds of winters ago, when the cotton- woods on the Big River were no higher than an arrow, and the red men, who hunted the buffalo on the plains, all spoke the same language, and the pipe of peace breathed its social cloud of kinnikinnik whenever two parties of hunters met on the boundless plains --- when, with hunting grounds and game of every kind in the greatest abundance, no nation dug up the hatchet with another because one of its hunters followed the game into their bounds, but, on the contrary, loaded for him his back with choice and fattest meat, and ever proffered the soothing pipe before the stranger, with well-filled belly, left the vil- lage,-it happened that two hunters of different nations met one day on a small rivulet, where both had repaired to quench their thirst. A little stream of water, rising from a spring on a rock within a few feet of the bank, trickled over it and fell splashing into the river. To this the hunters repaired; and while one sought the spring itself, where the water, cold and clear, reflected on its surface the image of the surrounding scenery, the other, tired by his exer- tions in the chase, threw himself at once to the ground and plunged his face into the running stream.
The latter had been unsuccessful in the chase, and perhaps his bad fortune and the sight of the fat deer, which the other hunter threw from his back before he drank at the crystal spring, caused a feeling of jealousy and ill-humour to take possession of his mind. The other, on the contrary, before he satisfied his thirst,
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raised in the hollow of his hand a portion of the water, and, lifting it towards the sun, reversed his hand and allowed it to fall upon the ground,-a libation to the Great Spirit who had vouchsafed him a successful hunt, and the blessing of the refreshing water with which he was about to quench his thirst.
Seeing this, and being reminded that he had neglected the usual offering, only increased the feel- ing of envy and annoyance which the unsuccessful hunter permitted to get the mastery of his heart; and the Evil Spirit at that moment entering his body, his temper fairly flew away, and he sought some pre- tense by which to provoke a quarrel with the stranger Indian at the spring.
"Why does a stranger," he asked, rising from the stream at the same time, "drink at the spring-head, when one to whom the fountain belongs contents himself with the water that runs from it?"
"The Great Spirit places the cool water at the spring, " answered the other hunter, "that his children may drink it pure and undefiled. The running water is for the beasts which scour the plains. Au-sa-qua is a chief of the Shos-shone; he drinks at the head water."
"The Shos-shone is but a tribe of the Comanche," returned the other; "Waco-mish leads the grand nation. Why does a Shos-shone dare to drink above him?"
"He has said it. The Shos-shone drinks at the spring-head; other nations of the stream which runs into the fields. Au-sa-qua is chief of his nation. The Comanche are brothers. Let them both drink of the same water."
" The Shos-shone pays tribute to the Comanche.
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Waco-mish leads that nation to war. Waco-mish is chief of the Shos-shone, as he is of his own people."
"Waco-mish lies; his tongue is forked like the rattlesnake's; his heart is black as the Misho-tunga [bad spirit]. When the Manitou made his children, whether Shos-shone or Comanche, Arapahoe, Shi-an, or Pā-né, he gave them buffalo to eat, and the pure water of the fountain to quench their thirst. He said not to one, Drink here, and to another, Drink there; but gave the crystal spring to all, that all might drink."
Waco-mish almost burst with rage as the other spoke; but his coward heart alone prevented him from provoking an encounter with the calm Shos-shone. He, made thirsty by the words he had spoken-for the red man is ever sparing of his tongue-again stooped down to the spring to quench his thirst, when the subtle warrior of the Comanche suddenly threw himself upon the kneeling hunter, and, forcing his head into the bubbling water, held him down with all his strength, until his victim no longer struggled, his stiffened limbs relaxed, and he fell forward over the spring, drowned and dead.
Over the body stood the murderer, and no sooner was the deed of blood consummated than bitter remorse took possession of his mind, where before had reigned the fiercest passion and vindictive hate. With hands clasped to his forehead, he stood transfixed with horror, intently gazing on his victim, whose head still remained immersed in the fountain. Mechan- ically he dragged the body a few paces from the water, which, as soon as the head of the dead Indian was withdrawn, the Comanche saw suddenly and strangely disturbed. Bubbles sprang up from the bottom,
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and rising to the surface, escaped in hissing gas. A thin vapoury cloud arose, and gradually dissolving, displayed to the eyes of the trembling murderer the figure of an aged Indian, whose long, snowy hair and venerable beard, blown aside by a gentle air from his breast, discovered the well-known totem of the great Wan-kan-aga, the father of the Comanche and Shos- shone nation, whom the tradition of the tribe, handed down by skillful hieroglyphics, almost deified for the good actions and deeds of bravery this famous war- rior had performed when on earth.
Stretching out a war-club towards the affrighted murderer, the figure thus addressed him:
"Accursed of my tribe! this day thou hast severed the link between the mightiest nations of the world, while the blood of the brave Shos-shone cries to the Manitou for vengeance. May the water of thy tribe be rank and bitter in their throats." Thus saying, and swinging his ponderous war-club (made from the elk's horn) round his head, he dashed out the brains of the Comanche, who fell headlong into the spring, which, from that day to the present moment, remains rank and nauseous, so that not even when half dead with thirst, can one drink the foul water of that spring.
The good Wan-kan-aga, however, to perpetuate the memory of the Shos-shone warrior, who was re- nowned in his tribe for valour and nobleness of heart, struck, with the same avenging club, a hard, flat rock which overhung the rivulet, just out of sight of this scene of blood; and forthwith the rock opened into a round, clear basin, which instantly filled with bubbling, sparkling water, than which no thirsty hunter ever drank a sweeter or a cooler draught.
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Thus the two springs remain, an everlasting memento of the foul murder of the brave Shos-shone, and the stern justice of the good Wan-kan-aga; and from that day the two mighty tribes of the Shos-shone and Comanche have remained severed and apart; although a long and bloody war followed the treacher- ous murder of the Shos-shone chief, and many a scalp torn from the head of the Comanche paid the penalty of his death.
In telling of the great quantities of game in this region, Ruxton says:
Never was there such a paradise for hunters as this lone and solitary spot.
Game abounded on every hand. Bear, elk, deer, mountain sheep, antelope, and grouse were in abundance in the surrounding mountains and valleys. Of buffalo there were few except in the valleys west of Pike's Peak and in the Bayou Salado, or South Park, as it is now known.
Ruxton further says:
It is a singular fact that within the last two years the prairies, extending from the mountains to one hundred miles or more down the Arkansas, have been entirely abandoned by the buffalo; indeed, in crossing from the settlements of New Mexico, the boundary of their former range is marked by skulls and bones, which appear fresher as the traveler advances west- ward and towards the waters of the Platte.
The evidences that Ruxton here mentions were
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still apparent twelve or fourteen years later, when the first settlers of this region arrived. Buffalo skulls and bones were scattered everywhere over the plains, but live buffalo could seldom be found nearer than one hundred miles east of the mountains.
The reason for this has been variously stated, some claiming that a contagious disease broke out among the buffalo in the early forties, which virtually exterminated those along the eastern base of the mountains. Others say that about that time there was a tremendous snowfall in the early part of the winter which covered the whole country along the eastern base of the mountains to a depth of six to eight feet, and that as a result all the buffalo within the region of the snowfall starved to death during the following winter. It is very possible that the latter reason may have been the true one, as a heavy fall of snow in the early part of the winter is not unknown. In the winter of 1864-1865 the antelope of this region nearly starved to death, owing to a two- foot fall of snow, on the last day of October and the first day of November, 1864, which covered the ground to a considerable depth for most of the winter.
While it is true that there were no buffalo in
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this immediate region at the time Ruxton was here, nor afterwards, it is well-known that they had been fairly plentiful in earlier years. Lieuten- ant Pike tells of killing five buffalo the day he reached the present site of Pueblo in 1806, and a day or two afterwards he killed three more on Turkey Creek, about twenty miles south of where Colorado Springs now stands, and saw others while climbing the mountains in his attempt to reach the "high point, " as he calls it, now known as Pike's Peak.
In 1820, Long's expedition, on its way from Platte Cañon, killed several buffalo on Monument Creek, a few miles south of the Divide; and later, while camped on the Fountain a short distance below the site of the present city of Colorado Springs, killed several more.
Sage says that in 1842, during a five days' stay at Jimmy's Camp (ten miles east of the present city of Colorado Springs), he "killed three fine buffalo cows."
After Ruxton had been camped near Manitou Springs for two or three weeks, while out hunting one day, he ran across an Indian camp, which startled him very much. No Indians were in sight at the time, but later he got a glimpse of two carrying in a deer which they had killed. The
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next morning Ruxton concluded that as a matter of safety, he had better remove his camp to some more secluded spot. The following day a fire was started on the side of the mountain to the south of the springs, which rapidly spread in every direction. He says:
I had from the first no doubt that the fire was caused by the Indians who had probably discovered my animals, and thinking that a large party of hunters might be out, had taken advantage of a favorable wind to set fire to the grass, hoping to secure the horses and mules in the confusion, without risk of attacking the camp.
In order to be out of reach of the fire, Ruxton moved his camp down the Fontaine qui Bouille six or seven miles. He says:
All this time the fire was spreading out on the prairies. It extended at least five miles on the left bank of the creek and on the right was more slowly creeping up the mountainside, while the brush and timber in the bottom was one mass of flame. Besides the long, sweeping line of the advancing flame the plateaus on the mountainside and within the line were burning in every direction as the squalls and eddies down the gullies drove the fire to all points. The mountains themselves being invisible, the air from the low ground where I then was, appeared a mass of fire, and huge crescents of flame danced as it were in the very sky, until a mass of timber blazing
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at once exhibited the somber background of the stupendous mountains.
The fire extended towards the waters of the Platte upwards of forty miles, and for fourteen days its glare was visible on the Arkansas River fifty miles distant.
The testimony of Ruxton bears out information I have from other sources, that a large portion of the great areas of dead timber on the mountain- sides of this region is the result of fires started by the various Indian tribes in their wanderings to and fro. Old trappers say that the Utes fre- quently went out upon the plains on horse-stealing expeditions; that when they had located a camp of their enemies, they would stealthily creep in among their ponies in the night, round them up, and start off towards the mountains with as many as they could hastily gather together. They were sure to be pursued the following morning when the raid had been discovered, and often the Utes with the stolen herd would find their pursuers close after them by the time they reached the moun- tains. In that case, they knew that if they fol- lowed up Ute Pass they were likely to be overtaken, but by crossing over the northern point of Cheyenne Mountain and on to the west along a trail that ran not very far distant from the route now fol-
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lowed by the Cripple Creek Short Line, they could much more easily elude their pursuers. If, when west of Cheyenne Mountain the Utes found their enemies gaining upon them, they would start a timber fire to cover their retreat. These fires would, of course, spread indefinitely and ruin immense tracts of timber. This is doubtless one of the principal reasons why our mountainsides are so nearly denuded of their original growth of trees. These horse-stealing raids were no un- common occurrence. Colonel Dodge, in his book Our Wild Indians, tells of one made by the Utes in 1874, which was daring as well as successful. He says:
A mixed band of some fifteen hundred Sioux and Cheyennes, hunting in 1874, went well up on the head- waters of the Republican River in search of buffalo. The Utes found them out and a few warriors slipped into their camp during the night, stampeded their ponies at daylight, and in spite of the hot pursuit of the Sioux, reached the mountains with over two hundred head.
Ruxton frequently mentions the Ute Pass, and states that it was the principal line of travel to and from the South Park for all the Indian tribes of this region at the time of his arrival, as well as previous thereto.
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There was another much-used trail into the South Park which entered the mountains near the present town of Cañon City. It led in a north- westerly direction from the latter place, and reached the South Park proper near Hartsell Hot Springs. This route was used by the Indians occupying the country along the Arkansas River and to the south of it. In addition to the two principal trails, there were others of lesser note, as, for example, that over the north end of Chey- enne Mountain, and one west of the present town of Monument; but these were difficult and were not used to any great extent.
In 1806, Lieutenant Pike attempted to lead his exploring expedition over the Cañon City trail, but evidently had a very poor guide, and, as a result, lost his way very soon after leaving the Arkansas River. They wandered about through the low mountains west of the present mining camp of Cripple Creek, and finally reached the Platte near the west end of Eleven-Mile Cañon where the river emerges from the South Park. He mentions having found near that point a recently abandoned Indian camp which he esti- mates must have been occupied by at least three thousand Indians.
Thomas J. Farnham, on his way to Oregon in
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1839, passed through the South Park, reaching it from the Arkansas River by the trail already de- scribed. He tells of his trip, in a rudely bound little book of minutely fine print, published in 1843. In recounting his journey from the Arkan- sas River to the South Park, he frequently men- tions James Peak as being to the east of the route he was traveling. Previously, when encamped on the Arkansas River, below the mouth of the Fon- taine qui Bouille, he speaks of the latter stream as heading in James Peak, eighty miles to the north- west; he also states that one of the branches of the Huerfano originates in Pike's Peak, seventy to eighty miles to the south. This brings to mind the fact that previous to about 1840 the peak that we now know as Pike's Peak was known as James Peak. Major S. H. Long, who was in command of the expedition that explored the Pike's Peak region in 1820, gave it this name in honor of Dr. James, who is supposed to have been the first white man to ascend it. After about 1840, this name was gradually dropped and Pike's Peak was substituted.
Farnham was very much pleased with the South Park, and says of it, after describing its streams, valleys, and rocky ridges:
This is a bird's-eye view of Bayou Salado, so named 4
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from the circumstance that native rock salt is found in some parts of it. We were in the central portion of it. To the north and south and west its isolated plains rise one above another, always beautiful and covered with verdure during the months of spring and summer. A sweet spot this, for the romance of the future as well as of the present and past. The buffalo have for ages resorted here about the last days of July from the arid plains of the Arkansas and the Platte; and hither the Utes, Cheyennes and Arapahoes, Black Feet, Crows and Sioux of the north, have for ages met and hunted and fought and loved, and when their battles and hunts were interrupted by the chills and snows of November, they separated for their several winter resorts.
How wild and beautiful the past, as it comes up fledged įwith the rich plumage of the imagination! These vales, studded with a thousand villages of conical skin wigwams, with their thousands of fires blazing on the starry brow of night! I see the dusky forms crouching around the glowing piles of ignited logs, in family groups, whispering the dreams of their rude love, or gathered around the stalwart form of some noble chief at the hour of midnight, listening to the harangue of vengeance or the whoop of war that is to cast the deadly arrow with the first gleam of morning light.
Or, may we not see them gathered, a circle of old braves, around an aged tree, surrounded each by the musty trophies of half a century's daring deeds. The eldest and richest in scalps rises from the center of the ring and advances to the tree. Hear him!
"Fifty winters ago when the seventh moon's first horn hung over the green forests of the Ute hills, myself
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and five others erected a lodge for the Great Spirit on the snows of the White Butte and carried there our wampum and skins, and the hide of a white buffalo. We hung them in the Great Spirit's lodge and seated ourselves in silence till the moon had descended the western mountain, and thought of the blood of our fathers that the Comanches had killed when the moon was round and lay on the eastern plains. My own father was scalped, and the fathers of five others were scalped, and their bloody heads were gnawed by the wolf. We could not live while our father's lodges were empty and the scalps of their murderers were not in the lodges of our mothers. Our hearts told us to make these offerings to the Great Spirit who had fostered them on the mountains, and when the moon was down and the shadows of the White Butte were as dark as the hair of a bear, we said to the Great Spirit: 'No man can war with the arrows from the quiver of thy storms. No man's word can be heard when thy voice is among the clouds. No man's hand is strong when thy hand lets loose the wind. The wolf gnaws the heads of our fathers and the scalps of their murderers hang not in the lodges of our mothers. Great Father Spirit, send not thine anger out. Hold in thy hand the winds. Let not thy great voice drown the death yell while we hunt the murderers of our fathers.' I and the five others then built in the middle of the lodge a fire, and in its bright light the Great Spirit saw the wampum and the skins and the white buffalo hide. Five days and nights I and five others danced and smoked the medicine and beat the board with sticks and chanted away the powers of the great Medicine Men, that they might not be evil to us and bring sickness into our bones. Then
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when the stars were shining in the clear sky, we swore (I must not tell what, for it was in the ear of the Great Spirit), and went out of the lodge with our bosoms full of anger against the murderers of our fathers whose bones were in the jaws of the wolf and went for their scalps, to hang them in the lodges of our mothers." See him strike the aged tree with his war-club; again, again, nine times. "So many Comanches did I slay, the murderers of my father, before the moon was round again and lay upon the eastern plains."
Farnham, continuing, says:
This is not merely an imaginary scene of former times in the Bayou Salado. All the essential incidents related happened yearly in that and other hunting- grounds, whenever the old braves assembled to cele- brate valorous deeds of their younger days. When these exciting relations were finished, the young men of the tribe who had not yet distinguished themselves were exhorted to seek glory in a similar way; and woe to him who passed his manhood without ornamenting the door of his lodge with the scalps of his enemies.
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