The Dying Grass, page 161
I could not find the names of Looking-Glass’s wives in Aoki’s dictionary. To make it easier for the non–Nez Perce–conversant reader to keep track of them in this novel, I substituted two other women’s translated names from Aoki’s dictionary: Blackberry Person for Wa-win-te-pi-ksat and Asking Maiden for I-a-tu-ton-my.
“These Bostons who came here were the cause of all our trouble.”—After Bartlett, who quotes Joseph as saying: “I told Monteith he was my friend and I did not wish to talk to him so, but these Bostons here in Wallowa were the cause of all our trouble” (p. 25).
Caching of cous; cattle rustling of Nez Perce herd by whites—McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 176.
Now “the sage hens have already finished dancing in the Buffalo Country”—April, according to Linderman, p. 39.
Make of Joseph’s rifle—Detailed in Jerome A. Greene, Jerome M. Greene, Nez Perce Summer 1877: The U.S. Army and the Nee-Me-Poo Crisis (Helena: Montana Historical Society Press, 2000), p. 486, fn. 116.
Faraway Mountain—See Glossary 3.
Toohhoolhoolsote asks the identity of Washington—After Linwood Laughy, comp., In Pursuit of the Nez Perces, As Reported by Gen. O. O. Howard, Duncan McDonald, Chief Joseph (Kooskia, Idaho: Mountain Meadow Press, 4th pr., 2002), p. 230 (Duncan McDonald). [Henceforth cited: Howard et al.]
Fraudulent branding of Nez Perce cattle by the settlers—Ibid., p. 284 (Joseph).
Fashioning of grass bridles by the boys—Information from Kent Nerburn, Chief Joseph & the Flight of the Nez Perce: The Untold Story of an American Tragedy (New York: HarperOne, 2005), p. 63.
Toohhoolhoolzote “came here to excite our young men.”—After Howard et al., p. 288 (Joseph). In the original it is unclear whether Toohhoolhoolzote speaks for war in Wallowa or at Split Rock.
Young children lashed to the horses—Leighton, p. 38 (1866): “Strapped to one of the horses, with a roll of blankets, was a Nez Perces [sic] baby. This infant, although apparently not over a year and a half old, sat erect, grasping the reins, with as spirited and fearless a look as an old warrior’s.”
Frequent appearance of brass (and copper) bracelets among Nez Perce—Information from Ronald P. Koch, Dress Clothing of the Plains Indians (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, The Civilization of the American Indian ser., no. 140, 1977), p. 69.
Colors of Nez Perce women’s clothes—After Pearson, pp. 29–30.
Description of the descent of Hell’s Canyon to the Snake River (at Dug Bar, Oregon, with Washington State on the other side)—From a journey by car and on foot in September 2006.
The Modoc boys shooting frogs with bows and arrows—Information from Malcolm Margolin, ed., The Way We Lived: California Indian Stories, Songs & Reminiscences (Berkeley: Heyday Books & California Historical Society, 1993 rev. of 1981 ed.), p. 14 (“When I Was a Child,” Peter Sconchin, Modoc).
The People as COYOTE’s children—Deward E. Walker, Jr., in collaboration with Daniel N. Matthews, Blood of the Monster: The Nez Perce Coyote Cycle (No place of publication given: High Plains Publishing Co., 1994), p. 55.
And Black Birds on the Lake
Descriptions of Tolo Lake—After a visit there in August 2006.
The Stick Game and the Bone Game are described in Lewis and Clark, vol. 7, pp. 137–38.
Shore Crossing’s aquatic exploits, running speed, etc.—McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 188. My description of his doings and motivations is partially indebted to the remainder of this chapter; but here, contradicting other accounts, McWhorter makes Swan Necklace a young follower rather than an instigator. There is much variance in people’s memories regarding the first Salmon River raid. For instance, Two Moons claims that there were three men and they were drunk (op. cit., p. 201); McWhorter himself (pp. 191–93) says that there were two men who were sober. So I have tried to steer my own wavering middle course.
Description of the petroglyphs along the Snake River—After a trip to Buffalo Eddy, Washington, in September 2006. These were 4,500–300 years old. There were also petroglyphs at Pitttsburg Landing and Geneva Bar. These sites were all in Hell’s Canyon.
Re: Toohhoolhoolzote’s outfit: Common use of bone-bead loop necklaces among Nez Perce—Information from Koch, p. 66.
White Bird’s outfit—He was old, and possibly set in his ways. The fashion I describe dates back to Lewis and Clark, vol. 5, pp. 258–59. I suspect that this would have been rare in 1877, but since the Nez Perce were both highly individualistic in their attire and also ancestor-loving, why not?
Information on Red Heart’s family—From McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 333.
Description of Looking-Glass—After a photograph reproduced in Wilfong, p. 176 (W. H. Jackson, 1871).
Looking-Glass’s “two daughters, both husband-ready.”—Carson (p. 138) quotes a volunteer at Fort Fizzle who hears Looking-Glass say: “I have two good looking daughters up at the camp. Come and see them.”
Ollokot’s collar—After information on Lewis and Clark, vol. 7, p. 224 (Clark, Wednesday May 7th 1806): “The article of dress on which they appear to bestow most pains and orniments [sic] is a kind of collar or brestpate [sic]; this is most Commonly a Strip of otter Skins of about six inches Wide . . .” This may be an anachronism, since Ollokot does not appear to be wearing this in the portraits I have seen. But perhaps it was an old style item still sometimes employed on formal occasions. If so, the scene in which I imagine Ollokot giving his collar to Sound Of Running Feet to keep her warm may be more plausible.
The blue and green paints used on Looking-Glass’s tipi—That these colors (which must have been mineral pigments) were available is surprising, but Lewis and Clark reported their widespread use among the Nez Perce even in 1805 (vol. 5, p. 259).
Description of baking camas—After information from Leighton, p. 38 (“between the Snake and Spokane,” 1866); Lewis and Clark, vol. 8, Over the Rockies to St. Louis, pp. 14–16 (Lewis, Wednesday June 11th 1806).
List of women beginning with Cloudburst [Wet-a-ton-mi] and Niktseewhy—Taken from Jerome A. Greene, Beyond Bear’s Paw: The Nez Perce Indians in Canada (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2010), pp. 178–82 (Appendix C: Nez Perce never captured after Bear’s Paw battle).
Digging baneberry roots—Hart, p. 10. This author mentions the practice in connection with the Cheyenne. I have supposed that so useful a piece of knowledge would also have been in the Nez Perce repertoire, since the plant was in their traditional homeland.
Description of Nez Perce horse racing and gambling—After Edwin Bingham and Tim Barnes, Wood Works: The Life and Writing of Charles Erskine Scott Wood (Corvallis: Oregon State University Press, 1997), pp. 65–68 (“An Indian Horse-Race”); and occasional passages in Humfreville, who did not personally know Nez Perce life very well but who saw many Plains Indian horse races during his Indian service. The Nez Perce are known to have been expert at leaping sideways on their horses.
Discussions of the chiefs there, and subsequent doings—After McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, pp. 41ff., Jerome M. Greene, Nez Perce Summer, pp. 30–31. The estimate of 120 warriors comes from McWhorter. Greene (p. 28) puts the figure at “say 95.”
When COYOTE cunningly entreated the MONSTER—Information from Walker and Matthews, p. 10.
Roster of warriors—Once again I have taken some names from Appendixes A–C of Greene, Beyond Bear’s Paw, where various Nez Perce escapees from Bear’s Paw and their fates are listed.
“And soon they will wipe their buttocks on our heads!”—“A formulaic expression of abuse and mistreatment,” says Aoki, p. 946 (slightly altered by WTV).
“We need a wide country, so that we can always find meat.”—Sentiment expressed in Linderman, p. 10. [Henceforth, in defiance of my usual practice (since there is as much of him as her in it), Linderman.] I suppose the Nez Perce thought much the same about this as the Crows.
“They want to put us in a small place.”—Somewhat after McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, p. 35.
Prevalence of buffalo-hunting journeys: Ruby and Brown, p. 188: “After 1860 the Nez Percés went less to buffalo, depending more on the Salish to do their hunting for them.” For meat and hides they traded watertight bags.
Description of Smohalla—After Relander, photo insert 2, following p. 96.
Description of WOWSHUXLUH—Based on photo insert 10, loc. cit.
Grandfather Looking-Glass’s helpfulness to Lewis and Clark—Information from Lewis and Clark, vol. 7, pp. 202 (Lewis, Saturday May 3rd 1806), 206 (Lewis, Sunday May 4th 1806), 215 (Lewis, Tuesday May 6th 1806).
Looking-Glass’s words at the council of 1874—After Helen Addison Howard, p. 100.
Looking-Glass: “For every white man you kill . . .”—Gulick, p. 147.
“Talking slowly is good.”—Verbatim from Gulick, p. 107 (speech of Old Joseph, 1855).
Joseph’s speech: “My People, you ask me to show my heart . . .”—First two sentences somewhat after Howard et al., p. 279 (Joseph). The rest is invented.
The feast in honor of Springtime’s baby—In another version, Joseph’s party were going to kill eleven head of beef and share them out as the bequest of Looking-Glass’s father. See McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 197 (testimony of Camille Williams).
Hanging of Red Moccasin Tops’s grandfather—Howard et al., p. 218 (Duncan McDonald).
“When Lawyer sold our country, my father was not there . . .”—Abbreviated and slightly altered from Pearson, p. 18.
Joseph’s memories of riding toward Asotin and Anatone with his father—After a trip from Grande Ronde to Lewiston, August 2011.
Toohhoolhoolsote: “I must not anger HIM WHO LIVES ABOVE . . .”—Somewhat after his speech at a previous winter’s council, given in McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 163.
Promise of General Palmer to Looking-Glass’s father [in 1855]—McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 92.
Colonel George Wright to Cayuses, Nez Perces and Tenino chief Stockwhitley (October 1856): “The bloody shirt shall now be washed . . .”—Ruby and Brown, p. 157.
Wottolen: “Why submit to this wrong? . . .”—Quoted in McWhorter, op. cit., pp. 167–68.
Description of Looking-Glass, White Bird and Ollokot breaking a horse—After procedure given in: Oregon Historical Society MSS 2445. Wood, Erskine, 1879–1983. Diary of a Fourteen-Year-Old Boy, Days with Chief Joseph, 1893. This was Erskine’s second stay with Joseph. Here he was describing the actions of Joseph and two other men, so I have imagined that Looking-Glass had two companions in his own effort.
When Coyote invited his EXCREMENT CHILDREN to poke out each other’s eyes—Recounted in Walker and Matthews, p. 51.
Description of the ornaments of Blackfoot’s buffalo pony—After an illustration in George P. Horse Capture and Emil Her Many Horses, eds., A Song for the Horse Nation: Horses in Native American Cultures (Washington, D.C.: National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution, in assoc. w/ Fulcrum Publishing, 2006), p. 26.
The murder of Utsinmalihkin—A rumor only, reported in McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 113.
Catalogue of Nez Perce murdered by whites—Ibid., pp. 118–31.
The murder of Black Eagle and his wife—Ibid., p. 23.
“We came from no country, unlike the whites. We were always here.”—Closely after McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, p. 18 (words of White Thunder).
List of Joseph’s companions en route to Buzzard Mountain—McWhorter, Hear Me, pp. 195–96 (testimony of Wetatonmi).
The inveigling of Shore Crossing into murder—This is only one version of events. In other versions, Swan Necklace is not an instigator but a follower.
Description of Swan Necklace—After a photograph in McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, p. 45 (undated).
Killing of the old white man (Richard Devine)—According to McWhorter (Hear Me, p. 192), he was not in bed. The sources differ.
Descriptions of the next two murders—After the same, pp. 193ff.
“They kill those two dogs.”—On this point the testimony in Hear Me is slightly confused, claiming that one of the two men got away but that the Nez Perces killed two men. The one who found against the Indians in the blacksnake whipping case and who supported Larry Ott’s murder of Chief Eagle Robe, saying: “He should not be prosecuted for killing a dog,” was Henry Elfers.
“Blood darker than Salish cherries.” In Montana farmers’ markets one often sees Flathead cherries for sale. These delicious fruits are deep crimson and so is their juice.
The Time Has Passed
Description of Toohhoolhoolzote turning away and wrapping himself in a buffalo robe—After W. Raymond Wood, Joseph C. Porter and David C. Hunt, Karl Bodmer’s Studio Art: The Newberry Library Bodmer Collection (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2002), p. 146 (plate 22: Figure in a Bison Robe).
Shore Crossing’s new Sharps buffalo rifle—Detailed in Greene, Nez Perce Summer, p. 450 (fn. 90).
“If they conclude to become slaves of Cut Arm . . .”—Somewhat after the words of Kamiakin to Owhi, 1856, quoted in Ruby and Brown, p. 156.
“Peopeo Tholekt said we could never win.”—Information from McWhorter, p. 167 (testimony of Peopeo Tholekt).
Description of Shore Crossing as a “smoothly moonfaced young warrior . . .”—After Scott M. Thompson, p. vi (photo of Henry Eneas, National Park Service, Nez Perce National Historic Park, NEPE-HI-1171).
Red Heart’s wife—“The Bostons never did anything to hurt me . . .”—Somewhat after Oregon Historical Society MSS 800. Wood, Charles Erskine Scott. Private journal transcription photocopy. 1878. Box 1, t 2.03.03. Henceforth cited: Wood diary, 1878 or 1879 (1879 pp. follow p. 28 of the original). This then is Wood diary, 1879, p. 32 (Chief Moses parley).
Looking-Glass: “You have acted like children in murdering these Bostons . . .”—Somewhat after Howard et al., p. 230 (Duncan McDonald); abbreviated, expanded and embellished.
“Lewiston, where we once had a cemetery”—Somewhat after Lewis and Clark, vol. 7, p. 219 (Clark, Tuesday May 6th 1806, re: “the Mouth of the Kooskooske” = Clearwater).
Some Kind of Peace
Two Moons comes to tell Joseph the news of the raids—Based on the account in Yellow Wolf. Two Moons himself tells the story differently, in McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 202.
White Bird’s Dreamer song—Invented by WTV, roughly after the import of the monitory “Dream Song” in McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 84.
Beating an untanned elkskin while singing war-songs—The untanned skin, called quilílu, could be either elk or buffalo (Aoki, p. 585).
“White Bird rides his horse round and round . . .”—After Howard, Report—In the Field, p. 1.
Participation in the raids of Geese Three Times Alighting On Water—McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 199.
“If we stay in this place until the Bluecoats come, we shall make some kind of peace with them.”—White Thunder quotes Joseph: “Let us stay here until the soldiers come. We will make some kind of peace with them” (McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 196).
Kate’s crossed shoulder-sashes of trade beads—After Lewis and Clark, vol. 7, p. 253 (Tuesday May 13th 1806).
Wounded Head’s trade of a horse for a gun—Somewhat after McWhorter, Hear Me, pp. 204–5.
Moss Beard—My own invented Nez Perce nickname for Agent Monteith.
“His blood is on fire.”—After Howard et al., p. 290 (Chief Joseph).
Two Moons’s flight to Weir Place—McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 203.
Advice of Old Yellow Wolf: “If you ride to war and get shot, no weeping!”—Somewhat after McWhorter, Yellow Wolf, p. 89.
Description of Kalkalshuatash—Somewhat after a portrait of the same, in Gulick, p. 158 (dated 1868, so of course he would actually have looked older in 1877).
Just for Awhile
Ollokot: “If Cut Arm troubles me, I shall fight him at once!”—Almost verbatim from Howard et al., p. 234 (McDonald).
The tale of the MUSSELSHELL SISTERS—After Allen P. Slickapoo, Sr., Nez Perce Tribe, director; Leroy L. Seth, Nez Perce Tribe, illustrator; and Deward E. Walker, Jr., University of Colorado, technical adviser, Nu Mee Poon Tit Wah Tit (Nez Perce Legends), 2nd ed. (n.p.: Nez Perce Tribe of Idaho, 1972), p. 85. [Henceforth cited: Slickapoo, Seth and Walker.]
Description of the route from Split Rock to Driving-In Cave—After a trip from White Bird Canyon to Cottonwood, September 2006.
The burning of the Snake warriors in Driving-In Cave—McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 15.
Relating to Red Grizzly Bear and Koolkooltom—Ibid., pp. 18–19, 21.
Joseph’s smoking of the war pipe, and his oration on that occasion—Somewhat after Peopeo Tholekt/ Sam Lott, pp. 4–5. The latter was not actually present at any such scene, having withdrawn to the Clearwater with Looking-Glass’s contingent.
Joseph: “Now we will have to fight . . .”—A little after Howard et al., p. 227 (Joseph).
The murder of Chief Pah Wyan and his wives—McWhorter, Hear Me, p. 22.
White Bird: “ . . . you must do the best that you can . . .”—Substantially after Howard et al., p. 235 (Duncan McDonald).
Well, Colonel, This Means Business
Dialogue between Howard and his officers until the entrance of Mr. West—After Howard, Nez Perce Joseph, pp. 96, 94, 91, some verbatim.
Corruption-related difficulties contingent on Lieutenant Bomus as quartermaster, alluded to here and there throughout The Dying Grass—A few specific issues, situations and references to matériel derive from Charles Leib, late captain and assistant quartermaster, U.S. Army, Nine Months in the Quartermaster’s Department, or, The Chances for Making a Million (Cincinnati: Moore, Wilstach, Keys & Co., Printers, 1862).
Howard’s telegram—Slightly abbreviated from the same work, p. 98.
“Some of” Perry’s Company “F” “helped Crook clean up the Pi-Utes ten years ago.”—Information from Gregory Michno, The Deadliest Indian War in the West: The Snake Conflict, 1864–1868 (Caldwell, Idaho: Caxton Press, 2007), p. 233.
