Meanwhile tidings of atrocities committed by Indians upon
unoffending settlers, began to set the blood shivering in the veins
of persons throughout the continent; and one horrible circumstance,
bearing upon the story, I shall relate. At the distant settlement of
Frog Lake, at the commencement of the tumult, when night came down,
Indians, smeared in hideous, raw, earthy-smelling paint, would creep
about among the dwellings, and peer, with eyes gleaming with hate,
through the window-panes at the innocent and unsuspecting inmates. At
last one chief, with a diabolical face, said,

"Brothers, we must be avenged upon every white man and woman here.
We will shoot them like dogs." The answer to this harangue was the
clanking of barbaric instruments of music, the brandishing of
tomahawks, and the gleam of hunting-knives. Secretly the Indians went
among the Bois-Brules squatting about, and revealed their plans; but
some of these people shrank with fear from the proposal. Others,
however, said,

"We shall join you." So the plan was arranged, and it was not very
long before it was carried out. And now runners were everywhere on
the plains, telling that Marton had a mighty army made up of most of
the brave Indians of the prairies, and comprising all the dead shots
among the half-breeds; that he had encountered heavy forces of police
and armed civilians, and overthrown them without losing a single man.

"Now is our time to strike," said the Indian with the fiendish face,
and the wolf-like eyes.

Therefore, the 2nd day of April was fixed for the holding of a