"She rode across the rolling prairie for what
seemed like miles.
No sign of buffalo.
Not a track.
The sun was sinking lower in the sky.
Rose grew worried about getting back
to camp before dark.
She couldn't turn back yet.
She was so close.
She could sense it."
As Rose lies in bed, alongside her younger sister and warmed by the buffalo robes that surround them, she finds sleep elusive. She is very excited at the thought of tomorrow's buffalo hunt. Her family is gathered with many other Metis families to take part in the biannual hunt that will ensure their survival through the coming season. Finding buffalo has become more difficult since 'the arrival of the settlers and their iron horses'. Once plentiful, the herds are now harder to find and fewer in number.
For the first time, Rose's father is a captain for the hunters. Rose offers a prayer of thanks to the buffalo for their gifts to her people, and wishes her father good luck. After several days of tracking, there is no sign of a herd. Rose wants to accompany her father; he says she must stay with her mother. When Rose hears her parents talking one evening, and understands how upset her father is at their failure to find any buffalo, she decides to go out on her own. How will she find them? Surprised to see a wolf behind her saddle, she soon realizes it is her father's spare wolf skin, useful for hunting.
"Rose knew that a person on horseback would scare buffalo
more than a single wolf.
She took a deep breath and slipped the skin over her head."
Her scouting begins again, and she nears the herd. Rushing back to camp, she is able to share the news with her father. After the hunt, although her help is much appreciated, her father is not pleased that she did not do as she was told. She is given a task to keep her busy. While her father watches her work, she is able to voice her wish to hunt with her father the next time. He does not disagree.
Carole Lindstrom (a proud member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Ojibwe and Métis from the Red River area in Manitoba, Canada) and Aly McKnight (a member of the Shoshone-Bannock tribes) have collaborated to bring an adventure story that depicts life on the prairies in the 1880s when the buffalo hunt was extremely important if tribes were to survive from one season to the next. Rose's story is compelling. The watercolor and graphite artwork represents life at camp, and includes many images that present cultural and spiritual connections. These Metis traditions are backdropped by the beauty of the prairie landscape. Back matter includes an author's note, a history of the buffalo hunt and its importance to the Metis way of life, as well as a bibliography.
It is a story not often told. Ms. Lindstrom tells readers why she wanted to share it:
"Rose’s story is my version of the Little House series. So readers will know that before there was a little house on the prairie, there was a little tipi on the prairie…on the same land where the Little House stories were set."
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