The Nez Perces

Tne career of tlie Nez Perces, from their first ontbreak in Idaho to the surrender of a lnrge portion of the band to Gen. Miles at Bear Paw mountain, was one to which even a frontiersman wonld Iteeitate to apply the epithets eowardly anti fiendish which aro xisually oalled into play to stigmatize the course of oven the bravest and most humane Indians. The eondnct of the Nez Perces, liowever, has contrasted so straugely and favorably witli that of nny otlier United States tribe that those who hate bitterly the whole red race cannot consoientiously condemn them without qnalifying their condemnation in the many instanees where their courso was pxaiseworthy. At the very outset of the war, when they began their bloody work in Idaho, they surprised the country bj observing one of the unwritten rules of oivilized warfare, aod gave life and liberty to the women wliile they murdered the men. In one or two instanees, women who came across their trail were subjeotod to a fato worse tlian death, their eondnct at all other times was sueh as to give grounds to the belief that these foul deeds were perpeIratcd by renegades from otlier tribes whom ih" NezPerees could not restrain. Whcn, after traversing the So So trail, and allowing thomselves to be detained for some days by a handful of men, they entered the Bitter Root valley, althcugb the valley was dei'enseless, and they had good reason to be in a bad hutnor, knowing that every ranch contained men who were burning to avengo the atrocities they had committed in Idaho, they fired not a single shot, stole not one horse, wero uniformly courteous to the whites, and a hundred United States soldiers would have pillaged more than did this body of more than 600 hostile Indiana who later proved themselves the best fighters on the plains or in the mountains. There is every reason to believe that the Nez Perces were peaceably inclined when Ihey entered Montana, and that they were inteut on reaching Britisli America to negotiate for an dliauce with the Sioux. They would certainly have succeeded in their purpose and returnea to ravage the frontier, or at least icsolent in the belief that whatever they did henceforth thoy wcre sura of a pardon, had not Gen. Gibbon braved overwhelmiug odds and struck them snch a blow tñat their ilight was badly delayed. Troops were onabled to reach the desired points, aud, without detracting from Gen. Miles' merit as an Indiau fightec, it may be said that hc wonkl never have seen a Nez Perces wigwam had they elnded Gibbon's gallant Seventh Infantry. I am enabled to give you accurate iigures regarding the Indians who perished in the baitle of Big Ilole, by which the reader may judge what a terrible blow the Nez Perces received on the 9th of August. The burial party, composed of Gibbon and Howard's men, buried eighty-three Indians on the battle-groimd, and found six bodies in u ravine some distance therefrom. About a week Bince a party woro sent to the battle-field after the body of Capt. Logan, whicïh they were to take to Fort öhaw for burial. Tliey fouud that the bodies of both whites and Iudians had been exhumed by wild beaBtt-, and that only the bones of the slain remaincd. They also discovered the bodies of twenty-three Indians who had been buried by caviug in the banks of the river on them, makiug a total of 112 warriors, squaws and papooses who died in that desperate iight.