Ever so many times during the night I heard
talking and smothered laughter, and concluded that the soldiers also
were having small visitors with four swift little legs.
We had more delicious trout for our breakfast; that time fried with
tiny strips of breakfast bacon. The men had been out on the lake very
early, and had caught several dozen beautiful fish. The dinner the
evening before had been much like an ordinary picnic, but the early
breakfast up on the side of a mountain, with big boulders all around,
was something to remember. One can never imagine the deliciousness of
the air at sunrise up on the Rocky Mountains, It has to be breathed to
be appreciated.
Everyone fished during the morning and many fish were caught, every
one of which were carefully packed in wet grass and brought to Birch
Creek, to the unfortunates who had not been on that most delightful
trip to Fish Lake. After luncheon we came down from the mountain and
drove to the Piegan Agency. The heavy wagon came directly to camp, of
course. There is nothing remarkable to be seen at the agency--just a
number of ordinary buildings, a few huts, and Indians standing around
the door of a store that resembles a post trader's. Every Indian had
on a blanket, although Major Stokes said there were several among them
who had been to the Carlisle School.
Along the road before we reached the agency, and for some distance
after we had left it, we passed a number of little one-room log huts
occupied by Indians, often with two squaws and large families of
children; and at some of these we saw wretched attempts at gardening.
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