After traveling about for several years with the famous showman,
thus increasing his knowledge of the weaknesses as well as the
strength of the white man, the deposed and humiliated chief settled
down quietly with his people upon the Standing Rock agency in North
Dakota, where his immediate band occupied the Grand River district
and set to raising cattle and horses. They made good progress;
much better, in fact, than that of the "coffee-coolers" or "loafer"
Indians, received the missionaries kindly and were soon a
church-going people.

When the Commissions of 1888 and 1889 came to treat with the
Sioux for a further cession of land and a reduction of their
reservations, nearly all were opposed to consent on any terms.
Nevertheless, by hook or by crook, enough signatures were finally
obtained to carry the measure through, although it is said that
many were those of women and the so-called "squaw-men", who had no
rights in the land. At the same time, rations were cut down, and
there was general hardship and dissatisfaction. Crazy Horse was
long since dead; Spotted Tail had fallen at the hands of one of his
own tribe; Red Cloud had become a feeble old man, and the
disaffected among the Sioux began once more to look to Sitting Bull
for leadership.

At this crisis a strange thing happened. A half-breed Indian
in Nevada promulgated the news that the Messiah had appeared to him
upon a peak in the Rockies, dressed in rabbit skins, and bringing
a message to the red race. The message was to the effect that
since his first coming had been in vain, since the white people had
doubted and reviled him, had nailed him to the cross, and trampled
upon his doctrines, he had come again in pity to save the Indian.