To prove that Ab-sa-ra-ka, as the tribe designated their beautiful hunting-grounds, was rightly named, it is only necessary to quote a conversation which took place at a council held at Fort Philip Kearny, in July, 1866, when the following question was asked of Black-Horse, the Wolf-That-Lies-Down, Red-Arm, and Dull-Knife:—­

“Why do the Sioux and Cheyennes claim the land which belongs to the Crows?” To which these chiefs answered:—­

“The Sioux helped us.  We stole the hunting-grounds of the Crows because they were the best.  The white man is along the great waters, and we wanted more room.  We fight the Crows because they will not take half and give us peace with the other half.”

It is claimed that the Crows sprang from the Gros Ventres of the Missouri, whose language they speak.  The Gros Ventres were a very weak tribe, or band, who had, by incessant wars with the surrounding tribes, become reduced to a very insignificant number of warriors.  It is alleged, according to their tradition, that the Crows became a separate nation nearly two hundred years ago, because the tribe was becoming too numerous.

In the early years of the century the head chief of the Crows was A-ra-poo-ash.  The celebrated Jim Beckwourth[51] had already become a leader among the Crows, and shortly after the death of A-ra-poo-ash was unanimously chosen in his place.

The Blackfeet were always very persistent and unrelenting enemies of the Crows, and some of the most bloody combats recorded in savage warfare occurred between these two tribes.

Once, while in the Crow village, a party of Blackfeet, numbering thirty or forty, came stealing through the Crow country, killing every straggler, and carrying off every horse they could lay their hands on.  The Crow warriors immediately started after them and pressed them so closely that they could not escape.  The Blackfeet then threw up a semicircular breastwork of logs at the foot of a precipice, and awaited the approach of their enemies.  Logs and sticks were piled up four or five feet in front of them, which thoroughly protected them.  The Crows might have swept over this breastwork and exterminated the Blackfeet; but though outnumbering them, they did not dream of storming the little fortification.  Such a proceeding would have been altogether repugnant to the savage notion of warfare.  Whooping and yelling, and jumping from side to side like devils incarnate, they poured a shower of bullets and arrows upon the logs, yet not a Blackfoot was hurt; but several of the Crows, in spite of their antics, were shot down.  In that ridiculous manner the fight continued for an hour or two.  Now and then a Crow warrior, in an ecstasy of valour and vainglory, would scream forth his war-song, declare himself the bravest and greatest of all Indians, grasp his hatchet, strike it wildly upon the breastwork, and then, as he retreated to his companions, fall dead, riddled with arrows; yet no combined attack was made, the Blackfeet remaining secure in their intrenchment.  At last Jim Beckwourth lost patience:—­