thirty thousand Indians there, and the Indians who invited them prepared
to take care of a large crowd in good style, so confident were they that
this time "the pot" would be theirs. They had hunted down, killed and
dressed some fifty or sixty buffalo, and had them cooking whole, in the
ground--barbecuing the meats. This time the putting up of the bets
before the races came off was still more exciting than at the previous
race, for the Indians had from 500 to 1,000 ponies to put up. The white
men matched their money against the ponies of the Indians. The race had
begun. As it proceeded, shouts of "Hooray, hooray," the Indians' black
stallion is ahead, 100 feet in advance of the soldiers' horse, he goes.
The race is won, and the black stallion stands erect and excited, proud
and defiant, and has won the laurel for his man, and seems to know that
the trophy is theirs. All had placed their bets in the hands of the
squaws for the spokesman, Little Ravin, the orator and regular dude of
the Arapahoes, gave the white people to understand that everything would
be safe in the hands of the squaws he had selected to hold stakes. These
squaws proved true to their trust. After the distribution of the
winnings, Little Ravin told the soldiers to stay and eat. Everybody grew
merry. The soldiers went to the government dining room there at Fort
Larned and got all the knives and forks they could rake and scrape
together and took them to the barbecue. When the Indians saw that the
white people had entered into the banquet with such enthusiasm and zest
they went to the settlers' store and bought two or three hundred dollars
worth of candies, canned goods of all kinds, crackers, etc., to make
their variety larger. They also bought 50 boxes of cigars with which to
treat the citizens and soldiers. When everything was in readiness for
the feast, the white men all stood up near the feast with a few of the
greatest chiefs of the several tribes, while the other Indians who were
not acting as waiters, to see that the choicest pieces of buffalo meat
were given their guests, stood in a ring back of the white guests, and