They came from a world of salmon rivers and camas prairies, and the Saskatchewan plains offered neither.

The Lakota were generous hosts within their capacity, but Sitting Bull’s community was not in a position to easily absorb 300 additional refugees.

Resources were already under pressure.

The Mounted Police were watching.

The Canadian government was maintaining a position of calculated distance: not forcibly removing the refugees, but not providing assistance that would encourage permanent settlement.

Sitting Bull himself returned to the United States and surrendered in 1881, after the deterioration of conditions in Canada made the exile untenable.

Some of his followers went with him.