I know that the Dahcotahs will smoke with the strangers." "Mahtoree is a great chief! The Big-knives are welcome," said the Teton, laying his hand on his breast, with an air of lofty politeness that would have done credit to any state of society.

"The arrows of my young men are in their quivers." The trapper motioned to Middleton to approach, and in a few moments the two parties were blended in one, each of the males having exchanged friendly greetings, after the fashions of the prairie warriors.

But, even while engaged in this hospitable manner, the Dahcotah did not fail to keep a strict watch on the more distant party of white men, as if he still distrusted an artifice, or sought further explanation.

The old man, in his turn, perceived the necessity of being more explicit, and of securing the slight and equivocal advantage he had already obtained.
While affecting to examine the group, which still lingered at the spot where it had first halted, as if to discover the characters of those who composed it, he plainly saw that Ishmael contemplated immediate hostilities.

The result of a conflict on the open prairie, between a dozen resolute border men, and the half-armed natives, even though seconded by their white allies, was in his experienced judgment a point of great uncertainty, and though far from reluctant to engage in the struggle on account of himself, the aged trapper thought it far more worthy of his years, and his character, to avoid than to court the contest.