His thick black hair was unusually long and unadorned with any ornaments. A tall man with a face like a Roman senator, he stood out among the delegation of Sauk and Fox chiefs and warriors whom General Clark-called Flaming Hair by the western nations-had brought to Washington in the summer of 1824.

When McKenney asked one of the interpreters why Pashepahaw wore his hair so long, he was told the chief's untrimmed locks were a symbol of "unsatisfied revenge."

Later McKenney heard the story from General Clark: the Sauk and Fox leader, called the Stabber, had been "offended" in some unknown fashion by the Indian agent at Prairie du Chien and had threatened to kill the white man.

The agency was many miles from the Sauk and Fox camp, but the Stabber was determined to carry out his threat.

Taiomah, a Fox warrior and medicine man, heard about the Stabber's mission. He tried to persuade the chief to follow the white man's way and send a petition to Washington, but the Stabber shook his head; only blood could wipe out the insult, he replied.

Taiomah, a sickly man who would soon die of tubercolosis, knew the murder of the Great Father's representative at Prairie du Chien could bring the feared Dragoons from Jefferson Barracks in St. Louis and perhaps start a frontier war.

Despite his frailty he canoed, rode, and walked to Prairie du Chien to alert the agent that his life was in danger. When the Stabber appeared he was greeted by guns and threats that if he didn't leave immediately he would be arrested and sent in chains to St. Louis.

The Stabber returned to his village and let his hair grow, his symbol of unsatisfied revenge.

Although McKenney found the Sauk and Fox chief to be "vindictive and implacable in his resentments," he had his portrait painted for the Indian Gallery.

Time apparently mellowed the Stabber. Years later Catlin also painted the Sauk and Fox, but described him as "a very venerable old man, who has been for many years the first civil chief of the Sacs and Foxes." His painting depicts the Stabber as an old man, holding a shield, pipe, and staff.