The chief was riding his horse back and forth in front of his men, as if to banter me, and I concluded to accept the challenge.  I galloped toward him for fifty yards and he advanced toward me about the same distance, both of us riding at full speed, and then, when we were only about thirty yards apart, I raised my rifle and fired; his horse fell to the ground, having been killed by my bullet.  Almost at the same instant my own horse went down, he having stepped into a gopher-hole.  The fall did not hurt me much, and I instantly sprang to my feet.  The Indian had also recovered himself, and we were now both on foot, and not more than twenty paces apart.  We fired at each other simultaneously.  My usual luck did not desert me on this occasion, for his bullet missed me, while mine struck him in the breast.  He reeled and fell, but before he had fairly touched the ground I was upon him, knife in hand, and had driven the keen-edged weapon to its hilt in his heart.  Jerking his war-bonnet off, I scientifically scalped him in about five seconds.

The whole affair from beginning to end occupied but little time, and the Indians, seeing that I was some little distance from my company, now came charging down upon me from a hill, in hopes of cutting me off.  General Merritt had witnessed the duel, and realizing the danger I was in ordered Colonel Mason with Company K to hurry to my rescue.  The order came none too soon, for if it had been one minute later I would have had not less than two hundred Indians upon me.  As the soldiers came up I swung the Indian chieftain’s top-knot and bonnet in the air, and shouted:—­

“The first scalp for Custer!”

General Merritt, seeing that he could not now ambush the Indians, ordered the whole regiment to charge upon them.  They made a stubborn resistance for a little while, but it was no use for any eight hundred, or even sixteen hundred, Indians to try to check a charge of the gallant old Fifth Cavalry.  They soon came to that conclusion and began a running retreat toward Red Cloud agency.  For thirty-five miles we drove them, pushing them so hard that they were obliged to abandon their loose horses, their camp equipage, and everything else.  We drove them into the agency, and followed in ourselves, notwithstanding the possibility of our having to encounter the thousands of Indians at that point.  We were uncertain whether or not the other agency Indians had determined to follow the example of the Cheyennes and strike out upon the war-path; but that made no difference with the Fifth Cavalry, for they would have fought them all if necessary.  It was dark when we rode into the agency, where we found thousands of Indians collected together; but they manifested no disposition to fight.

While at the agency I learned the name of the Indian chief whom I had killed that morning; it was Yellow Hand, a son of old Cut Nose —­a leading chief of the Cheyennes.  Cut Nose, having learned that I had killed his son, sent a white interpreter to me with a message to the effect that he would give me four mules if I would turn over to him Yellow Hand’s war-bonnet, guns, pistols, ornaments, and other paraphernalia which I had captured.  I sent back word to the old gentleman that it would give me pleasure to accommodate him, but I could not do it this time.