September 9
Although nothing has been said, we have not been so cheerful as usual for the past few days, for all have known that we must soon part and go our several ways. Tail-Feathers-Coming-over-the-Hill is a sick man, and Yellow Wolf but little better, so to-night we decided to break camp in the morning. To-morrow night each family will be at home on Cutbank, Willow Creek, Two Medicine, and Badger, all streams of the Reservation, and I shall be upon my way to the Always-Summer-Land.
Well, we have had a pleasant time these past two months, traveling and camping along our old trails, and yet the evenings around the lodge fires have not been of unalloyed joy: all have been tinged with sad memories of other days; of deep regret that the old days—days when we had all this great country to ourselves—are gone forever. And so, to-night, after our quiet, last evening meal together, we had no story-telling, no passing of the pipe; none had the heart for it; and I am writing these last words by the light of a dying fire, true symbol of the passing of all things. And now, by its last, blue flicker, I write—
The End