Here was again “high jinks” in the camp.  Captain Bonneville’s men hailed these wild scamperers as congenial spirits, or rather as the very game birds of their class.  They entertained them with the hospitality of mountaineers, feasting them at every fire.  At first, there were mutual details of adventures and exploits, and broad joking mingled with peals of laughter.  Then came on boasting of the comparative merits of horses and rifles, which soon engrossed every tongue.  This naturally led to racing, and shooting at a mark; one trial of speed and skill succeeded another, shouts and acclamations rose from the victorious parties, fierce altercations succeeded, and a general melee was about to take place, when suddenly the attention of the quarrellers was arrested by a strange kind of Indian chant or chorus, that seemed to operate upon them as a charm.  Their fury was at an end; a tacit reconciliation succeeded and the ideas of the whole mongrel crowd whites, half-breeds and squaws were turned in a new direction.  They all formed into groups and taking their places at the several fires, prepared for one of the most exciting amusements of the Nez Perces and the other tribes of the Far West.

The choral chant, in fact, which had thus acted as a charm, was a kind of wild accompaniment to the favorite Indian game of “Hand.”  This is played by two parties drawn out in opposite platoons before a blazing fire.  It is in some respects like the old game of passing the ring or the button, and detecting the hand which holds it.  In the present game, the object hidden, or the cache as it is called by the trappers, is a small splint of wood, or other diminutive article that may be concealed in the closed hand.  This is passed backward and forward among the party “in hand,” while the party “out of hand” guess where it is concealed.  To heighten the excitement and confuse the guessers, a number of dry poles are laid before each platoon, upon which the members of the party “in hand” beat furiously with short staves, keeping time to the choral chant already mentioned, which waxes fast and furious as the game proceeds.  As large bets are staked upon the game, the excitement is prodigious.  Each party in turn bursts out in full chorus, beating, and yelling, and working themselves up into such a heat that the perspiration rolls down their naked shoulders, even in the cold of a winter night.  The bets are doubled and trebled as the game advances, the mental excitement increases almost to madness, and all the worldly effects of the gamblers are often hazarded upon the position of a straw.

These gambling games were kept up throughout the night; every fire glared upon a group that looked like a crew of maniacs at their frantic orgies, and the scene would have been kept up throughout the succeeding day, had not Captain Bonneville interposed his authority, and, at the usual hour, issued his marching orders.