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https://www.zeroacre.com/blog/the-history-of-vegetable-oils#h2-the-origins-of-industrial-oils

Before vegetable oils were considered a food, let alone one of the most consumed foods in the world, the whaling industry played a critical role in supplying oils on a global scale. As the New York Times puts it:

“From the 1700s through the mid-1800s, oil extracted from the blubber of whales and boiled in giant pots gave light to America and much of the Western world[...] Whaling was the fifth-largest industry in the United States; in 1853 alone, 8,000 whales were slaughtered for whale oil shipped to light lamps around the world, plus sundry other parts used in hoop skirts, perfume, lubricants and candles.” [*]

Whale oil wasn’t used to feed the world; rather it was used to light it up, along with many other industrial applications. Interestingly, American sailors often indulged in large batches of doughnuts fried in whale oil [*].

By the mid-1800s, whale oil had fallen out of favor due to both declining whale populations and the rise of cheaper, innovative sources of lamp fuel like camphine and kerosene [*].

During this era, a surge of innovation shifted industries towards cheaper sources of energy like coal, electricity, and petroleum that could power factories and steam engines as well as heat and light people’s homes.

Industrial methods of mass production began transforming every aspect of our lives, from the clothes we wore to the foods we ate to the way we traveled. Instead of handmade goods, machines took center stage.

Machines, however, require lubrication, and oils and fats were commonly used as machine lubricants (among many other applications). Whale oil may have been out of the picture, but the demand for cheap sources of oil was only growing.

The mass production of consumer goods was also taking flight during this era, many of which, such as candles and soap, contained fats and oils.

Traditionally, soap and candles were made with lard and other animal fats, but producers were suddenly under pressure to embrace other sources of fat, or to stop making candles entirely, for at least three reasons:

1. Electricity and other sources of energy were set to largely replace candles.

2. Animal fats were a relatively expensive input.

3. The purity and cleanliness of animal fats were under scrutiny from the public and prominent journalist Upton Sinclair, known for exposing the appalling conditions of the meatpacking industry in the early 1900s [*].

As a result, producers sought innovative ways to replace animal fats and reduce the costs of producing various goods.

On the 18th of February, 1853, I received a letter from Mr. L., superintendent of a royal factory at Annecy, in Savoy, in which he says: "You were kind enough to send on the 20th of April, 1851, medicine sufficient for two months of anti-obesic treatment. Your directions were scrupulously attended to during the first month, and I experienced considerable benefit—in fact I lost nine pounds in weight, and felt more active and much more fit for business. Circumstances prevented my continuing the treatment during the second month and the medicine has been lost. After the lapse of two years I am anxious to resume your plan of treatment, &c." It is now a year since Mr. L. wrote to me, when I sent him all that was requisite. I have not since heard from him by letter, but I know that the second treatment was equally satisfactory. Owing to his favorable report of my system, a notary of Annecy, during the course of last summer, sought my advice. I am also indebted to him for other patients.

This was, it seems, Dr. Simpson's first experience, as well as the captain's, with the typical heat of northern Alaskan winter dwellings. Simpson kept revisiting Eskimo homes during the seven winter months of two years. He describes a healthy and happy people of apparently high longevity who, during the winter, lived practically naked — the children wholly so — in earth and wood dwellings that were seldom cooler than 70° F., who avoided all vegetable foods and salt, and who lived on fat and lean fresh meats that were undercooked or raw. Sweating in temperatures which, during the afternoon and evening, ran to 90° and 100° F., they drank ice water continually.

The only non-native “foods” the Barrow people used in Simpson's time were tea and tobacco, which they had been receiving overland and across the Bering Strait from China long before the Russian “discovery” of Alaska. The tobacco the Barrow people, like all Alaskan Eskimos, smoked in Chinese opium-type pipes, inhaling the smoke. They also chewed; but they did not spit, swallowing the juice instead. They did not, apparently, dip or snuff. Following are a few of Simpson's passages that bear on food and food habits, health and longevity:

“These people ... are robust, muscular and active, inclining rather to spareness than corpulence ... presenting a remarkably healthy appearance ... The expression of the countenance is one of habitual good humor ... The physical constitution of both sexes is strong ... Extreme longevity is probably not unknown among them; but as they take no heed to number the years as they pass they can form no guess of their own ages ... Judging altogether from appearance ... [one man] could not be less than eighty years of age ... There was another ... whose appearance indicated an age nothing short of seventy five. This man died in the month of April 1853 ... There is another man still alive who is said to be a few years older ...

"Nismes (Gard) 4th Aug., 1853.

"Sir,—I have read with much interest the second edition of your precepts, based upon chemistry, for the diminution of obesity, and have carefully examined every statement you have so clearly set forth. The result is, that I am anxious to follow your advice, and to place myself under your course of treatment. I am a doctor of philosophy and professor in the Imperial Lyceum at Nismes. During my whole life I have struggled against this terrible obesity, but almost always in vain. Nevertheless I have succeeded upon two occasions: the first, about twenty years ago, by travelling on foot for three months among the forests and mountains of the north of Europe; the second time, about twelve years ago, by dint of continued and intense intellectual labour. Owing to the sedentary nature of my duties, obesity has since returned in a more threatening manner, and is no doubt the exciting cause of many ailments to which I am now subject, such as accumulation of mucus in the air passages, giving rise to cough, more especially troublesome because I am obliged to talk during the greater part of the day; cold feet, with swelling of the legs and ankles, &c., so that I am no longer able to perform the duties upon which my daily bread depends. My medical attendant can do nothing for me. He has prescribed purgatives and a vegetable diet, without any good result. I have taken thousands of Morrison's pills, and am worse rather than better, and now my mind is made up to make a trial of your plan of treatment, in full confidence that a cure may yet be accomplished.

"Doctor Halberg,
"Professor at the Imperial Lyceum of Nismes."

On the 8th of June Dr. Halberg wrote:

"I find myself infinitely better, my breathing is easy, and I am considerably reduced in size. My great desire is that the swelling in my legs may wholly disappear.

"Dr. Halberg."

In the month of June, 1853, Madame de L., of Amiens, consulted me on her own behalf, and also on that of her husband—both labouring under obesity. I gave her the necessary directions, together with medicine sufficient to last two months. She wrote to me on the 2nd of July in the following terms:

"Sir,—In fulfilment of my promise, I send you a statement of the result of your treatment. My husband has lost eleven pounds in weight, and enjoys excellent health. As for myself, owing to severe indisposition after my return home from Paris, I have only adopted your treatment during the last eight days. Please inform me whether the medicine you furnished to me a month ago is too old to be of any service.

"I have the honour, &c.,
"F. L."

I answered this letter, and no doubt the lady has derived as much benefit as her husband from the treatment.

It is said, that in order to be understood and believed, it is necessary to repeat the same thing over and over again. But all things must have an end; and all the cases which I might yet report, would still end in diminution of obesity. It may be said, however, that, like most medical writers, I report only favourable cases, and conceal those which are unfavourable. My answer is, that I have never treated a single case in which a favourable result has not been obtained, provided the patient has observed my directions for even eight days; and I am satisfied that if any one could be found to say that he has not been benefited, that it would be because he has not been willing to carry out the treatment for even eight days. It has no doubt frequently happened that a patient has consulted me, and has then followed my directions for two, three, or even four days, and then, for some cause, has given them up: under these circumstances it might be said that no benefit has been derived.

Many such cases have occurred. In one instance, a wealthy man, a gold-beater by trade, living in Paris, sought my advice. He followed my system for several weeks, without success. One day I said to him, "I can only explain your want of success by attributing it to excessive drinking. You live upon meat principally, it is true; but how much liquid do you imbibe daily?" His answer was,—"I cannot abstain from drinking when thirsty, and my thirst is frequent. I spend the whole day in the factory, among fifteen or twenty workmen, and the heat is necessarily great, as the nature of our manufacture demands it, and I am therefore obliged to drink a great deal." I consequently recommended him to abstain from further trial of a system which, under these circumstances, could not possibly be of any benefit.

We meet with people who make, or seem to make, a resolution to live according to a certain plan, for eight or ten days, and who, like spoiled children, forget the very next day the resolution they had made. I have met with many such cases. One would scarcely believe that a lady, reduced to despair on account of her obesity, and threatening to commit suicide unless relieved of her embonpoint, could promise that she would obey my instructions to live chiefly upon a meat diet, and to abstain from inordinate quantities of fluid, yet the very next day would resume her customary mode of living;—breakfasting upon eggs, preserves, and two or three cups of sweetened tea; and dine upon rich pastry and sweetmeats, accompanied with a full allowance of champagne. I could not have believed it possible had I not witnessed it myself.

Men generally carry out my directions more faithfully than women, being firmer and more persevering in their resolves.

I am almost angry at times with this want of perseverance in persons who boast that they have carried out my treatment without success. It would be an easy matter to shew that the want of success in such cases is entirely their own fault.

A young lady of one of the most illustrious families of France, and married to a wealthy foreign nobleman, consulted me in the month of May, 1853, in reference to her corpulence. She told me that her cousin, the Duchess of X., had derived great benefit from my treatment; and from what she had witnessed in her case, she was induced to place herself under my care. She promised to commence my system on the following day.

A few days afterwards I saw her. She told me she had forgotten to take her medicine the day before. In subsequent visits, she confessed that she had not taken any medicine, either because she had been up very late the previous evening and had laid in bed late that morning, or that she had been spending a day or two in the country; or that, having been out for an early ride, she had forgotten all about it. On the occasion of my last visit, she told me that she was going for some time to her country-seat, and from thence intended to visit a watering-place. The Baroness did not follow my treatment for three days consecutively, and consequently lost nothing of her embonpoint. Under such circumstances, want of success ought surely not to be attributed to inefficacy of the treatment.

A very corpulent professor adopted my system for eight days, and lost three pounds and a half in weight. Being relieved at the same time from a sense of oppression which had continually troubled him, he was delighted, and spoke of the happy results to many of his acquaintances. Unfortunately at this time he received from the country a present of a large basket of grapes, and being very partial to them, neglected my instructions, and partook of them inordinately as long as they lasted. The consequence is, that the professor is as fat as ever, although he had followed my plan of treatment for eight days. Now whose fault is this? Nevertheless, his acquaintances, to whom he had spoken of being under my care, will attribute the failure to me. I shall see him again, no doubt, some of these days, when in danger of suffocation.

The reader who has perused the preceding cases of cure, may say that I have omitted to speak of obesity accompanied with skin disease, and in my introduction mention has been made of its frequency. In truth, many such cases have been met with; but skin disease, in my opinion, is of such a nature that it is better not to give a hint even of the parties in whom it has been met with and cured at the same time with co-existing corpulence.

My method of reducing obesity being thus frankly explained, is perhaps likely to lose its value in the eyes of many, owing to its extreme simplicity. M. Desbouillons, of Brest, a patient whom I successfully treated, wrote to me on the 15th August, 1853:—"On reading your treatise a second time, I cannot but express my astonishment that the medical faculty should so long have failed to discover the means which you now so successfully employ for the cure of obesity."

Having accomplished the object I had in view, it matters not whether it be the result of little study or of long and deep enquiry into the secrets of animated nature; my satisfaction consists in having destroyed those false and prejudicial doctrines which had existed for ages in the writings and teachings of philosophers, and in having demonstrated a truth destined to render important services to our common humanity.

Towards the latter end of 1851, Madame Wimy, from the town of Marle, came to consult me in reference to her husband, who was labouring under obesity to such a degree as to be unable to attend to his business. I gave her the necessary advice, together with some medicine. On the 19th of December Madame Wimy told me by letter that her husband had already much improved, that his breathing was easier, he was more capable of exertion, and that his corpulence had notably diminished. This lady again wrote to me in the following year, requesting a further supply of medicine. She said:—"My husband, before commencing your treatment, weighed two hundred and seventy pounds: he now weighs only two hundred, and hopes to weigh still less. You are no doubt in the frequent receipt of letters seeking advice, for we have many inquiries for your address."

In truth the case of M. Wimy has brought me a great many patients. Anxious to know whether he still continued my plan of treatment, and wishing to introduce a statement of his case in this the third edition of my work, I wrote to M. Wimy on the 16th of October last and received the following reply:

"Marle, 19th Oct., 1853.

"Sir,—In your letter of the 16th, you requested me to give a somewhat detailed statement of my case. I commenced the treatment under your directions, the latter part of 1851, and continued it during the early part of 1852. My weight was two hundred and seventy pounds, and I measured sixty-one inches in circumference. I walked with great difficulty—suffered much pain in the kidneys—my legs were swollen. I had a constant cough, and was much troubled with drowsiness. Immediately after adopting your system, my fat began to disappear, my appetite improved, and, after a few months, my weight was reduced to one hundred and sixty pounds, and my circumference to thirty-two inches. My health is now excellent. Being landlord of the Golden Lion Hotel, at Marle, where the stages put up, my recovery is known to a great many; and travellers who stopped at my house two years ago, when I was labouring under obesity, on seeing me at present, and noticing the wonderful change which has taken place, invariably ask by what means it has been effected.

"It always affords me great pleasure to acknowledge that my cure is due to your system of treatment.

"I have the honour to be, &c.,
"Jules Wimy.

"Golden Lion Hotel,
Marle, Aisne."

A person who visited Marle about four months ago, and who had not seen M. Wimy since the great change had been effected in his appearance, was much astonished, and made inquiries respecting the cure. Some time afterwards, this person met, at Orleans, a wealthy gentleman, about forty years of age, suffering from obesity, and told him what he had witnessed at Marle; recommending him at the same time to visit Paris, in order that he might have the advice of the doctor who had freed Wimy from his excessive fat. This gentleman wrote to Marle, before coming to Paris, and received a satisfactory answer.

He called to consult with me, saying that he wished to place himself under my care, provided that it would not interfere with his business or with his usual habits. He is postmaster at Orleans, and, previous to the building of the railroad, had a great deal of business to attend to. Having many more horses than necessary for his business at Orleans, he has opened a livery stable in Paris. He is consequently obliged to attend all the fairs and markets, in order to purchase horses and provender for his two establishments,—the one at Paris and the other at Orleans, and is almost constantly travelling between these two cities, and therefore leads a life of great activity. He weighs two hundred and twenty-two pounds, and wishes to lose fifty pounds of fat, but he cannot afford to lose a day from his business.

My reply to Mr. M. was, that so far from my treatment demanding any cessation from work, it would rather give him strength to carry it on. He began the treatment ten weeks since, and has already lost between twenty-eight and thirty pounds of fat; and, as I had promised, without causing him the loss of a single day.

"A major outbreak of cholera reached the district of Soho, London, in August 1854. This was the third cholera outbreak in London, having previously occurred in 1832 and 1849. In the mid-19th century, Soho had a serious problem with filth due to the large influx of people and a lack of proper sanitary services: the London sewer system had not reached Soho at this point and drainage was poor throughout London. It was common at the time to have a cesspit under most homes.

By talking to local residents (with the help of the Reverend Henry Whitehead), Snow identified the source of the outbreak as the contaminated public water pump on Broad Street (nowBroadwick Street). He did this by mapping the deaths from cholera, and noted that they were mostly people whose nearest access to water was the Broad Street pump (see map below from On the Mode of Communication of Cholera, 2nd ed.). His studies of the pattern of the disease were convincing enough to persuade the local council to disable the well pump by removing its handle. This action has been credited with contributing significantly to the containment of the disease in the area. It was later discovered that the water for the pump was polluted by sewage contaminated with cholera from a nearby cesspit."

However, Snow’s theory was not new in 1854. He had argued earlier that it was not an airborne disease in his published essay, On the Mode of Communication of Cholera, in 1849. The germ theory was not developed at this point, so Snow was unaware of the mechanism by which the disease was transmitted, but evidence led him to deduce in 1854 that it was not due to breathing in foul air. In 1855 a second edition was published, incorporating the results of his investigation of the Soho epidemic of 1854.

Hand pumps like that on Broad Street were not the only source of Londoners’ water, or Snow’s only object of study during the 1854 cholera outbreak. The Lambeth Water Company and the Southwark and Vauxhall Water Company were both supplying mechanically-pumped water to residents of South London (see map below from Tracts 376). Snow recorded cholera attacks in this area, alongside information about the water supply to the houses affected. He showed that the Southwark and Vauxhall Waterworks Company was taking water from sewage-polluted sections of the Thames and delivering the water to homes, leading to an increased incidence of cholera.

The first step is to wash out the sour stomach and bowels , and to change the food. The food selected should be such as is least liable to ferment with alcohol and acid yeasts. This is muscle pulp of beef, prepared as heretofore described, when it affords the maximum of nourishment with the minimum of effort to the digestive organs. Nothing else but this food, except an occasional change to broiled mutton.

In the preface, Salisbury described the research that led him to his conclusion:

"In 1854 the idea came to me, in one of my solitary hours, to try the effects of living exclusively upon one food at a time. This experiment I began upon myself alone at first…. I opened this line of experiments with baked beans. I had not lived upon this food over three days before light began to break. I became very flatulent and constipated, head dizzy, ears ringing, limbs prickly, and was wholly unfitted for mental work. The microscopic examination of passages showed that the bean food did not digest."

Did the intrepid scientist stop there? Of course not! In 1858 he enlisted six other schlemiels to come live with him and eat nothing but baked beans. He did not mention whether he had a wife who had to put up with seven flatulent, dizzy mopes in her home; my guess is no. Later he and four other guys subsisted solely on oatmeal porridge for 30 days. Other single-food experiments followed, leading him to the conclusion that lean beef, minced to break down any connective tissue and fully cooked, was the best and most easily digested food. By the time the Civil War started, in 1861, he was ready to test his theories on suffering soldiers.

Quotes relating to meat, fat, hunting.

I was born in Illinois in 1842. I crossed the plains by ox team and came to Utah in 1850. My parents settled in Grantsville, a pioneer village just south of the Great Salt Lake. To protect themselves from the Indians, the settlers grouped their houses close together and built a high wall all around them. Some of the men would stand guard while others worked in the fields. The cattle had to be herded very closely during the day, and corralled at night with a strong guard to keep them from being stolen. But even with all our watchfulness we lost a good many of them. The Indians would steal in and drive our horses and cows away and kill them. Some times they killed the people, too.

The savages that gave us the most trouble were called Gosiutes. They lived in the deserts of Utah and Nevada. Many of them had been banished into the desert from other tribes because of crimes they had committed. The Gosiutes were a mixed breed of good and bad Indians.

They were always poorly clad. In the summer they went almost naked; but in winter they dressed themselves in robes made by twisting and tying rabbit skins together. These robes were generally all they had to wear during the day and all they had to sleep in at night.

They often went hungry, too. The desert had but little food to give them. They found some edible roots, the sego, and tintic, which is a kind of Indian potato, like the artichoke; they gathered sunflower and balzamoriza seeds, and a few berries. The pitch pine tree gave them pine nuts; and for meat they killed rabbits, prairie dogs, mice, lizards, and even snakes. Once in a great while they got a deer or an antelope. The poor savages had a cold and hungry time of it; we could hardly blame them for stealing our cattle and horses to eat. Yes, they ate horses, too. That was the reason they had no ponies, as did the Bannocks and Shoshones and other tribes.

A few tame Indians hung around the settlements begging their living. The people had a saying, “It is cheaper to feed them than to fight them,” so they gave them what they could; but the leaders thought it would be better to put them to work to earn their living; so some of the whites hired the Indians. My father made a bargain with old Tosenamp (White-foot) to help him. The Indian had a squaw and one papoose, a boy about my age. They called him Pantsuk.

At that time my father owned a small herd of sheep, and he wanted to move out on his farm, two miles from the settlement, so he could take better care of them. Old Tosenamp thought it would be safe to do so, as most of the Indians there were becoming friendly, and the wild Indians were so far away that it was thought they would not bother us; so we moved out on the farm.

Father put the Indian boy and me to herding the sheep. I had no other boy to play with. Pantsuk and I became greatly attached to each other. I soon learned to talk his language, and Pantsuk and I had great times together for about two years. We trapped chipmunks and birds, shot rabbits with our bows and arrows, and had other kinds of papoose sport.

Some months after this the poor little fellow took sick. We did all we could for him, but he kept getting worse until he died. It was hard for me to part with my dear little Indian friend. I loved him as much as if he had been my own brother.

After Pantsuk died, I had to herd the sheep by myself. The summer wore along very lonely for me, until about the first of August, when a band of Shoshone Indians came and camped near where I was watching my sheep. Some of them could talk the Gosiute language, which I had learned from my little Indian brother. The Indians seemed to take quite a fancy to me, and they would be with me every chance they could get. They said they liked to hear me talk their language, for they had never heard a white boy talk it as well as I could.

One day an Indian rode up to the place where I was herding. He had with him a little pinto pony. I thought it was the prettiest animal I ever saw. The Indian could talk Gosiute very well. He asked me if I did not want [10]to ride the pony. I told him that I had never ridden a horse. He said that the pony was very gentle, and helped me to mount it. Then he led it around for a while. The next day he came again with the pony and let me ride it. Several other Indians were with him this time. They took turns leading the pony about while I rode it. It was great sport for me. I soon got so I could ride it without their leading it. They kept coming and giving me this fun for several days.

One day, after I had ridden till I was tired, I brought the pony back to the Indian who had first come, and he asked me if I did not want to keep it.

“I would rather have that pony,” I replied, “than anything else I ever saw.”

“You may have it,” he said, “if you will go away with us.”

I told him I was afraid to go. He said he would take good care of me and would give me bows and arrows and all the buckskin clothes I needed. I asked him what they had to eat. He said they had all kinds of meat, and berries, and fish, sage chickens, ducks, geese, and rabbits. This sounded good to me. It surely beat living on “lumpy dick”(Made by cooking moistened flour in milk.) and greens, our usual pioneer fare.

“Our papooses do not have to work,” he went on, “they have heap fun all the time, catching fish and hunting and riding ponies.”

That looked better to me than herding a bunch of sheep alone in the sagebrush. I told him I would think it over. That night I talked with old Tosenamp. The Indians had tried to get him to help them induce me to go with them. He refused; but he did tell me that they would not hurt me and would treat me all right. The next day I told them I would go.

My parents knew nothing about it. They would never have consented to my going. And it did look like a foolish, risky thing to do; but I was lonely and tired and hungry for excitement, and I yielded to the temptation. In five days the Indians were to start north to join the rest of their tribe. This Indian was to hide for two days after the rest had gone and then meet me at a bunch of willows about a mile above my father’s house after dark with the little pinto pony. The plan was carried out, as you will see. I went with them, and for two years I did not see a white man. This was in August, 1854. I was just about twelve years old at the time.

The night came at last when we were to leave. Just after dark I slipped away from the house and started for the bunch of willows where I was to meet the Indian. When I got there, I found two Indians waiting for me instead of one. The sight of two of them almost made me weaken and turn back; but I saw with them my little pinto pony and it gave me new courage. They had an old Indian saddle on the pony with very rough rawhide thongs for stirrup straps. At a signal from them, I jumped on my horse and away we went. Our trail led towards the north along the western shore of the Great Salt Lake.

The Indians wanted to ride fast. It was all right at first; but after a while I got very tired. My legs began to hurt me, and I wanted to stop, but they urged me along till the peep of day, when we stopped by some very salt springs. I was so stiff and sore that I could not get off my horse, so one of them lifted me off and stood me on the ground, but I could hardly stand up. The rawhide [14]straps had rubbed the skin off my legs till they were raw. The Indians told me that if I would take off my trousers and jump into the salt springs it would make my legs better; but I found that I could not get them off alone; they were stuck to my legs. The Indians helped me, and after some very severe pain we succeeded in getting them off. A good deal of skin came with them.

I ate some duck and dried meat and felt better.

We traveled all day over a country that was more like the bottom of an old lake than anything else. We camped that night by another spring. The Indians lifted me from my horse, put me down on a robe and started a fire. Then they caught some fish and broiled them again on the coals. It was a fine supper we had that night.

The next morning I felt pretty well used up; but when I had eaten some fish and a big piece of dried elk meat for breakfast, I felt more like traveling. Then we started again.

The old squaw put her hand on my head and began to say something pitiful to me, and I began to cry. She cried, too, and taking me by the arm, led me into the tepee, and pointed to a nice bed the chief’s wife had made for me. I lay down on the bed and sobbed myself to sleep. When I awoke, this new mother of mine brought [17]me some soup and some fresh deer meat to eat. I tell you it tasted good.

The next morning my new mother thought she would give me a good breakfast. They had brought some flour from the settlements, and she tried to make me some bread, such as I had at home. They had no soda, nothing but flour and water, so the bread turned out to be pretty soggy. I think she didn’t like it very well when she found I didn’t eat it, but I simply couldn’t choke it down. I did make a good meal, however, of the fried sage chicken and the fresh service berries that she brought with the bread.

Nothing else of importance happened until we reached Big Hole Basin. There I saw the first buffalo I had seen since crossing the plains. Seven head of them appeared one morning on a hill about a mile away. Ten Indians started after them. One, having a wide, blade-like spear-head attached to a long shaft, would ride up to a buffalo and cut the hamstrings of both legs, then the others would rush up and kill the wounded animal.

About fifteen squaws followed the hunters to skin the buffaloes and get the meat. Mother and I went with them. The squaws would rip the animals down the back from head to tail, then rip them down the belly and take off the top half of the hide and cut away all the meat on that side from the bones. They would tie ropes to the feet of the carcass and turn it over with their ponies, to strip off the skin and flesh from the other side in the same way.

The meat was then carried to camp to be[23] sliced in thin strips and hung up to dry. When it was about half dry, the squaws would take a piece at a time and pound it between two stones till it was very tender. It was then hung up again to dry thoroughly. The dried meat was put into a sack and kept for use in the winter and during the general gatherings of the tribe. The older it got the better it was. This is the way the Indians cured all of their buffalo meat. Washakie had about five hundred pounds of such meat for his own family when we reached Deer Lodge Valley, now in Montana, the place of our great encampment.

Washakie’s wife was there and she told me to dash ahead and tell the chief to hurry back. When he came, he ordered the band to stop and pitch camp. We had to stay there a week to let mother get well enough to travel again. There were a great many antelope in the valley and plenty of fish in the stream by the camp. When mother would go to sleep, I would go fishing. When she awoke Hanabi would call, “Yagaki come,” and I would get back in double-quick time.

One day while we were camped here waiting for mother to get better, I went out with Washakie and the other Indians to chase antelope. About fifty of us circled around [31]a bunch and took turns chasing them. The poor little animals were gradually worn out by this running and finally they would drop down one after another, hiding their heads under the bushes, while the Indians shot them to death with their bows and arrows. I killed two myself. When I got home and told mother about it, she bragged about me so much that I thought I was a “heap big Injun.”

Mother’s arm soon got well enough for her to travel, for the medicine man had fixed it up very well, so we took up our journey again. There were a great many buffaloes and antelope too, where we next pitched camp. We stayed there for about three weeks. During the times that she could not watch me, mother had Washakie take me out on his hunting trips. That just suited me. It was lots of fun to watch the Indian with the big spear dash up and cut the hamstrings of the great animals. When they had been crippled in this way, we would rush up and shoot arrows into their necks until they dropped dead. The first day we killed six, two large bulls and four cows.

I told Washakie that my bow was too small to kill buffaloes with. He laughed and said I should have a bigger one. When we got back to camp, he told some Indians what I had said and one very old Indian, whose name was Morogonai, gave me a very fine bow and another Indian gave me eight good arrows. I felt very proud then; I told mother that the next time I went out I would kill a whole herd of buffaloes. She said she knew I would, but she did not know what they could do with all the meat.

Washakie said that I was just like the rest of the white men. They would kill buffaloes as long as there were any in sight and leave their carcasses over the prairies for the wolves. He said that was not the way of the Indians. They killed only what they needed and saved all the meat and hides.

“The Great Spirit,” he said, “would not like it if we slaughtered the game as the whites do. It would bring bad luck, and the Indians would go hungry if they killed the deer and buffaloes when they were not needed for food and clothing.”

Two or three days after this we went out again and killed two more buffaloes. When we got back mother asked how many I had killed. I told her that I shot twice at them and I believed I had hit one. She said that I would be the best hunter in the tribe afterwhile, and some day, she said, I would be a big chief.

We now started for the elk country. When we got there, the Indians killed about one hundred elk and a few bear; but by that time it was getting so cold that we set out for our winter quarters. After traveling a few days we reached a large river, called by the Indians Piatapa, by the whites the Jefferson River; it is now in Montana. Here we pitched camp to stay during the “snowy moons.”

Most of the buffaloes by this time had left for their winter range; but once in a while we saw a few as they passed our camp. The Indians did not bother them, however, because we had plenty of dried meat, and for fresh meat there were many white-tail deer that we could snare by hanging loops of rawhide over their trails through the willows. There were also a great many grouse and sage hens about in the brush. I have killed as many as six or seven of these a day with my bow and arrows.

My old mother also told me many things that happened when she was a little girl. She said that her father was a Shoshone, and her mother a Bannock. She said she was sixty-two “snows” (years) old when I came. She had had four children, three boys and a girl. When the girl was seven years old, she was dragged to death by a horse. Her two sons were killed by the snowslide, so Washakie and I were the only ones she had left.

For three or four more days we all traveled south again. The game was plentiful here, elk, deer, antelope, and buffalo, so we camped for several days and stocked up with fresh meat.

It was a great game country, too. We could see buffaloes at any time and in any direction that we looked. There were herds of antelope over the flats. I had great fun running them. Washakie said that I was riding my horse too much, that he was getting thin. He told me to turn the pony out, and he would give me another horse. I was very glad to let my little pinto have a rest and get fat again.

The next morning I went with mother and another squaw to get the elk. Washakie asked me if I thought I could find it. I told him that I knew I could, so we started and I led them right to it. As we were skinning the elk, mother said that I had spoiled the skin by shooting it so full of holes. But the meat was fat and tender.

The Indians killed a great many elk, deer, and moose while in this valley, and the squaws had all they could do tanning the skins and drying the meat. I asked Washakie if he was planning to winter in this valley.

“Oh, no,” he replied. “The snow falls too deep here. After the buffalo get fat, and we kill all we want for our winter use, we will go a long way west out of the buffalo country, but where there are plenty of deer and antelope and fish. Some of the fish,” he said, “are as long as you are.”

Berries were getting ripe, so we papooses would go with our mothers up in the hills and gather them to dry. It was great fun.

By this time we had gathered most of the berries that grew along the foothills; the squaws were afraid to go farther into the mountains after the bear excitement; so then they stopped berry picking and went to work in earnest tanning buckskin and drying meat for winter use. The Indians quit hunting for elk and deer; for they already had all of the skins that the women could get ready for the trading trip they had planned.

It was the custom of the tribe to make a journey almost every fall to Salt Lake City, and other White settlements, and swap their buckskin and buffalo robes for red blankets, beads, ammunition, and other things they needed. Mother and Hanabi worked all day and away into the night to get their skins ready in time, and I helped them all I could. I got an old horse and dragged down enough wood to last while we stayed there. I carried all the water for them, and no kid dared to call me a squaw either.

Finally the time came for us to begin killing buffaloes for our winter’s supply of meat. We did not have to hunt them, however, for we could see them at any time in almost any direction. Many a time I went out with Washakie to watch the hunters kill the buffaloes. Washakie wanted only five and we soon got them; but it took mother and Hanabi a good many days to tan their hides and get the meat ready for winter.

Mother was afraid that I would get sick from not having bread and milk to eat, for I told her that was what I always had for supper when I was home. She thought that eating meat all the time would not agree with me and would make me unhealthy. Often she would have fried fish and fried chickens or ducks for supper. When I first went to live with her, she made a small sack and tied it to my saddle. She would keep this sack full of the best dried fish when we were traveling, so that I could eat if I got hungry; for she said that I could not go all day without eating anything, as the Indians often did. Every morning she would empty my lunch sack and refill it with fresh food. She soon found out what I liked best, and she always had it for me; so you see I had plenty to eat, even if I was with Indians; and that is more than a great many white children had at that time.

I was very healthy while I was with the Indians.

Spring came at last. We moved down the river about fifteen miles where we could get better grass for our horses. Here were plenty of white-tailed deer and antelope, some elk, and a few mountain sheep. Ducks and geese also were plentiful.

We stayed here until about the middle of May. The big fish they had told me about began to come up the river. And they were really big ones; two of them made all the load I could carry. They must have weighed thirty or thirty-five pounds each. Mother and Hanabi dried about two hundred pounds of these fish. I afterwards learned that they were salmon. The first that came up were fat and very good, but they kept coming thicker and thicker until they were so thin that they were not fit to eat.

The Indians killed a great many black-tailed deer and antelope and dried the meat. I think Washakie and I killed seventeen while we stayed here.

While we were staying here, one of the War Chief’s boys was accidentally shot and killed. Oh, what crying we had to do! Every one in camp who could raise a yelp had to cry for about five days. I had to mingle my gentle voice with the rest of the mourners. They killed three horses and buried them and his bow and arrows with him. The horses were for him to ride to the Happy Hunting Grounds. When they got ready to bury him, every one in camp had to go up to him and put a hand on his head and say he was sorry to have him leave us. When it came my turn, I went into our tepee and would not come out. Mother came after me. I told her I would not go, that I was not sorry to see him go, for he was no good anyhow.

“Don’t say that so they will hear it,” she said. Then she went back and made excuses for me.

They took him up to a high cliff and put him in a crevice with his bedding, a frying pan, an ax, his bow and arrows, and some dried buffalo meat. After this they covered him with rocks. When they got back to camp, they let out the most pitiful howls I ever heard. I joined them too, just as loud as I could scream, as if I was the most broken-hearted one in the camp, but it seemed so foolish to keep up this howling, as they did for five days. I got so hoarse I could hardly talk.

Here we did nothing but fish. The buffalo were not fat enough to kill, and besides, we had all of the dried elk and deer meat we wanted. It was a beautiful place to camp, and we had the finest of grass for our horses.

I broke a few more colts, two for mother and four for Washakie. Our horses by this time were getting fat and looking fine, but my little pinto was the prettiest one of all. Hardly a day passed but some Indian would try to trade me out of him. One Indian offered me two good horses if I would swap, but I thought too much of the pony to part with him even for a whole band of horses. He was just as pretty as a horse could be.

Our next journey took us a long way northeast. Washakie said that we were going where the buffaloes were too many to count. After about a week of travel, we reached the north fork of the Madison River, about on a line with the Yellowstone Park; and oh, the kwaditsi (antelope) and padahia (elk) and kotea (buffalo) there were! Every way we looked we could see herds of them.

While we were at this camp another boy was killed by a horse. He was dragged almost to pieces through the rocks and brush.

When I heard of it, I told mother to get her voice ready for another big howling.

“Aren’t you ashamed to talk that way?” asked Hanabi.

“I am afraid you are a hard-hearted boy,” said mother.

After the poor fellow was buried, we went up the Madison River about ninety miles and camped there for a month. The buffalo were now in better condition, so we killed a good many, drying their meat and making their hides into robes. Then we went on south and came to the beautiful lake where we had had such a good time the summer before. It is now called Henry’s Lake, and is the head of the north fork of the Snake River. We did nothing here but fish, for we had enough dried meat to last till we reached the usual hunting grounds.

“We did not know,” said the old arrow maker, “what whooping cough, measles, and smallpox were until the whites brought these diseases among us. A train of emigrants once camped near us; some of their white papooses had the whooping cough; our papooses caught it from them. Our medicine man tried to cure it as he would a bad cold, and more than half of our papooses died from the disease and the treatment. Hundreds of our people have been killed with the smallpox brought to us by the white man.

“The white men keep crowding the Indians that are east of here out west, and they keep crowding us farther west. Very soon they will have us away out in Nevada where there is nothing but lizards and snakes and horned toads to live on. If they crowd us farther than that, we shall have to jump off into the Great Water.”