Among the soldiers stationed at Gilman’s Ranch were a number of Omaha and Winnebago Indians, who belonged to my company, in the First Nebraska Cavalry.  I had done all I could to teach them the ways of civilization, but despite my instructions, and their utmost endeavours to give up their wild and barbarous practices, every now and then old habits would become too strong upon them to be borne, and they would indulge in the savage customs of their youth.  At such times they would throw aside their uniforms, and, wrapping a blanket about them, sing and dance for hours.

One evening they were in a particularly jolly mood, and having obtained permission to have a dance, went out in front of the building, and for want of a better scalp-pole, assembled around one of the telegraph poles.  One fellow pounded lustily on a piece of leather nailed over the mouth of a keg, while the others hopped around in a circle, first upon one leg, then the other, shaking over their heads oyster-cans, that had been filled with pebbles, and keeping time to the rude music, with a sort of guttural song.  Now it would be low and slow, and the dancers barely move, then, increasing in volume and rapidity, it would become wild and vociferous, the dancers walking very fast, much as the negroes do in their “cake-walks.”  We had had all manner of dances and songs, and enough drumming and howling to have made any one tired, still the Indians seemed only warming up to their work.  The savage frenzy was upon them, and I let them alone until near midnight.  Their own songs and dances becoming tiresome, I asked them to give me some Sioux songs, for I had been thinking all the evening of the village up the Missouri, and of my squaws.  The Indians immediately struck up a Sioux war song, accompanying it with the war dance.

All the Indian songs and dances are terminated with a jump, and a sort of wild yell or whoop.  When they had danced the Sioux war song, and ended it with the usual whoop, what was our surprise to hear it answered back at no great distance, out upon the prairie.  At first I thought it was the echo, but Springer, a half-breed Indian, assured me what I had heard was the cry of other Indians.  To satisfy myself, I bade the Indians repeat the song and dance, and this time, sure enough, when it was ended the whoop was answered quite near the ranch.  I went inside, lest my uniform should be seen, and telling Springer to continue the dance, I went to a back window and looked out, in the direction from which the sound came.

The moon was just rising, and I could distinctly see three Sioux Indian warriors sitting on their ponies, within a few hundred paces of the house.  They seemed to be intently watching what was going on, and were by no means certain as to the character of the performers or performance.  At a glance, I made them out to be our deadly enemies, the Ogallalla Sioux,