THE SCALP HUNTER IS INTERVIEWED

“YES, I’m the man you’re talkin’ about, the Brute that murders the Soos
On the upper Athabasca; an’ you kin tell ’em the news
Down East, where they print the Tribune, and the Quaker people blow
About the wrongs of the Red man. It’s cursed little they know
About the wrongs of the White man, for you want to recollect
Thet a white man hez no rights which a red is bound to respect.

So, they’ve got me into the papers; and I am a ‘Fiend,’ and ’whar
I find a squaw or a papoose, I shoot ’em an’ raise the har?’

It’s tol’able true, I reckon. As sure as you’re alive,
I’ve hunted them dev’lish redskins, till I’ve scalped some thirty-five!

Wouldn’t ’a thought I could done it? Well, the yarn is middlin’ tough,
For the devils are mighty cunnin’ an’ the country is cold an’ rough,

An’ I was alone for the most part. There was three of us at the start;
But they shot Jim Biddle one mornin’, with an arrer, thro’ the heart.

An’ we had to cache for safety, Tom Burlingame an’ me,
For the Soos war right upon us, an’ Tom was hit in the knee

An’ couldn’t run. So, seein’ our fix, it seemed more wise
To cache in a pra’rie dugout, an’ sell at the goin’ price.

We played our hands right lively; killed seven, did Tom an’ I,
Besides a few that was gut-shot, an’ hid in the grass to die.

But they played it low down on us; heaped pra’rie grass an’ sticks
About our den an’ smoked us out. ’Twas one of their Injun tricks.

No use to tell how they flanked us with their blasted savage fun,
Makin’ us run the ga’ntlet—only Tom, he couldn’t run.

So they tied him with buff’ler lariats to a stake driv’ in the ground,
An’ roasted him by a slow fire, while they hooted an’ danced around.

They cut out his tongue, cut his ears off, then keerfully saved his har
By peelin’ the scalp—it’s a wonder what a mountain man kin bar

Without peepin’; an’ Tom was bully; quiet, silent, an’ grim.
They tried all manner of torments, but never a yelp from him.

He died as game as a badger. They ’lowed to keep me a spell,
Then git up an Injun pow-wow, an’ give me special hell.

An’ they would ’a done it certain, for I was cowed an’ lame,
But Sheridan’s men war on it, an’ blocked that little game.

Bust into the camp one mornin’, an’ scattered the gang like chaff,
Killed an’ wounded a hundred.—Oh no, I didn’t laugh!

‘Providential,’ was it? Don’t seem to see it that way.
Sheridan giv’ the order—soldiers mostly obey.

Good fellers, them boys o’ Sheridan’s; they did the handsome thing,
Cured me up an’ fitted me out for another start in spring.

Giv’ me a navy Colt, a knife, an’ rifle, an’ hoss,
Told me to raise the har of every Soo I kem across,

An’ I’ve mostly done it. ‘Git me?’ Of course the game’ll turn.
But I shall go under fightin’,—I aint a-goin’ to burn;

I’ve seen that once too often. An’ stranger, don’t talk too loud
When you tell of the old scalp hunter some day to an Eastern crowd.

Remember thar ain’t no story but is bound to hev two sides,
And thar’s reason for every bullet I stick in their blasted hides.

For I had a wife an’ children, which the same was dear to me,
Murdered in Minnesota, the year of the massacree.

I might hev stood the killin’, though hit was savage enough—
But stakin’ a woman down to the ground is playin’ it dev’lish rough.

The way they murdered my little gals of twelve an’ fourteen years—
No matter—swearin’ is too thin, an’ I don’t run to tears,

They blur the eyes for shootin’. But mebbe you might git riled,
If I told you the sickenin’ trick they played my wife an’ unborn child.

I found her out on the pra’rie with a stake drove through her breast,
An’ the babe right on her bosom.—Perhaps you can guess the rest.

’Twas a hellish sight for a father. My heart froze hard right thar.
I dried clean down to ugliness, an’ went in wicked for har.

I’ve panned ’em down to the bed-rock, ’n’ I reckon afore I’ve done,
The scalps of my wife an’ children will bring me twenty for one.

And when you write to the papers, if you want to mention me,
Remember Minnesota, and tell of the massacree.