Beadle's Half Dime Library No. 723

This issue contains "The Border Beagle's Secret Mission," a frontier romance by Jos. E. Badger, Jr., subtitled "A Romance of the Great Craze." The narrative follows Buck Horton and Max Donaldson as they observe an Indian camp where a Sioux medicine-man preaches the doctrine of an Indian Messiah to gathered Shoshones, Bannocks, Crees, and Grosventres. Max seeks to retrieve his employer's son, Dave Woodbridge, who has adopted the name Silverblade and participated in the Ghost Dance movement. The medicine-man, elaborately painted and wearing eagle feathers, claims to channel the Messiah's voice, promising restoration of Indian lands and buffalo herds. Silverblade questions the medicine-man's authority and refuses to prove his faith through ritualistic bloodletting, maintaining skeptical distance from the movement's fervor despite his tribal heritage.