We have already noticed the superstitious feelings with which the Indians regard the Black Hills; but this immense range of mountains, which divides all that they know of the world, and gives birth to such mighty rivers, is still more an object of awe and veneration.  They call it “the crest of the world,” and think that Wacondah, or the master of life, as they designate the Supreme Being, has his residence among these aerial heights.  The tribes on the eastern prairies call them the mountains of the setting sun.  Some of them place the “happy hunting-grounds,” their ideal paradise, among the recesses of these mountains; but say that they are invisible to living men.  Here also is the “Land of Souls,” in which are the “towns of the free and generous spirits,” where those who have pleased the master of life while living, enjoy after death all manner of delights.

Wonders are told of these mountains by the distant tribes, whose warriors or hunters have ever wandered in their neighborhood.  It is thought by some that, after death, they will have to travel to these mountains and ascend one of their highest and most rugged peaks, among rocks and snows and tumbling torrents.  After many moons of painful toil they will reach the summit, from whence they will have a view over the land of souls.  There they will see the happy hunting-grounds, with the souls of the brave and good living in tents in green meadows, by bright running streams, or hunting the herds of buffalo, and elk, and deer, which have been slain on earth.  There, too, they will see the villages or towns of the free and generous spirits brightening in the midst of delicious prairies.  If they have acquitted themselves well while living, they will be permitted to descend and enjoy this happy country; if otherwise they will but be tantalized with this prospect of it, and then hurled back from the mountain to wander about the sandy plains, and endure the eternal pangs of unsatisfied thirst and hunger.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

     Region of the Crow Indians—­Scouts on the Lookout—­Visit
     From a Crew of Hard Riders.—­A Crow Camp.—­Presents to the
     Crow Chief.-Bargaining.-Crow Bullies.-Rose Among His Indian
     Friends.-Parting With the Crows.—­Perplexities Among the
     Mountains.—­More of the Crows.—­Equestrian Children.—­Search
     After Stragglers.

The travellers had now arrived in the vicinity of the mountain regions infested by the Crow Indians.  These restless marauders, as has already been observed, are apt to be continually on the prowl about the skirts of the mountains; and even when encamped in some deep and secluded glen, they keep scouts upon the cliffs and promontories, who, unseen themselves, can discern every living thing that moves over the subjacent plains and valleys.  It was not to be expected that our travellers could pass unseen through a region thus vigilantly sentineled; accordingly, in the edge of the evening, not long after they had encamped at the foot of the Bighorn Sierra, a couple of wild-looking beings, scantily clad in skins, but well armed, and mounted on horses as wild-looking as themselves, were seen approaching with great caution from among the rocks.  They might have been mistaken for two of the evil spirits of the mountains so formidable in Indian fable.