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Rufus Sage (in Rocky Mountain Life) provides a description of methods in use to avoid detection and for safe travel across the prairies: "In our mode of travelling, we always used due precaution to avoid surprise and attack. This is easily done, while among buffalo, by noticing their movements, -as these animals invariably flee across the wind upon the approach of man, and neither Indians nor whites can traverse their range without setting the whole country in motion. We observed another plan of caution by frequently ascending some imminence, and scanning the wide expanse, far and near. Our general practice was to travel till night, and camp without fire in the open prairie, thus precluding the possibility of being discovered, even though in the immediate vicinity of Indians. A
party of three or four men can pass through a dangerous country and avoid
coming in contact with enemies, provided they exercise a needful vigilance
much more easily than one of larger numbers. With a large company
too much dependence is reposed in each other, which soon results in
individual carelessness and neglect. Added to this, they are apt to
rely upon their numerical strength, and forgetting this simple truism,
that "caution is the parent of safety," rush into danger when
they are least aware of it. It thus occurs that large parties are
more liable to surprise than smaller ones, and more frequently suffer
losses from the depredations of prowling enemies."
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