E. N. Waddington' Bookstall, Blackpool. PURCHASED FOR THE UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO LIBRARY FROM THE CANADA COUNCIL SPECIAL GRANT FOR ANTHROPOLOGY IS f 'I b LIFE AS10NG THE INDIANS BY GEORGE CATLIN. LONDON: GALL AND INGLIS, 25 PATERNOSTER SQUARE AND EDINBURGH. LIBR4*> MAH * ten ^VOFTO^ PREFACE. ON my recent return from a long and toilsome campaign amongst the Indian tribes of South and Central America, as well as those on the Pacific side of the Kocky Mount- ains in North America, I was requested to prepare a book of facts for youthful readers on the character and condi- tion of the American Indians. I at once embraced the suggestion made to me, and am here entering upon the plan, the results of which will be met and judged of in the following pages. As the youthful readers of this volume will scarcely have read my work on the North American Indians, pub- lished some years since, they may reasonably expect me to give some introduction of myself before we start together, which I will here do in a few words, and leave them to learn more of me when I may incidentally appear in scenes and scenery to be described. The place of my nativity was Wilkesbarre, in the Valley of Wyoming, rendered historically famous by its early and disastrous warfare with the Indians whom the civilized races had driven out of it, and celebrated in lore by the popular poem by Campbell, " Gertrude of Wyoming." In my early youth I was influenced by two predominant and inveterate propensities, those for hunting and fishing. My father and mother had great difficulty in turning my VI PREFACE. attention from these to books. But when, at the proper age, I commenced reading the law for a profession, I attended the law school of the celebrated Judges Reeve and Gould, in Connecticut, for two years, and after reading for a couple of years longer, passed my examination, was admit- ted to the Bar, and commenced the practice of the law, which I followed for several years. During this time, fortunately or unfortunately, another and a stronger passion was getting the advantage of me, that for painting, to which all my love of pleading soon gave way ; and after having covered nearly every inch of the lawyers' table (and even encroached upon the judge's bench) with penknife, pen and ink, and pencil sketches of judges, juries, and culprits, I very deliberately resolved to convert my law library into paint-pots and brushes, and to pursue painting as my future, and apparently more agree- able profession. I thus took leave of professional friends and my pro- fession, and immediately commenced portrait-painting in the city of Philadelphia; and after a few years, in the midst of success, I again resolved to use my art, and so much of the labours of my future life as might be required, in rescuing the looks and customs of the vanishing races of native man in America from that oblivion to which I plainly saw they were hastening before the approach and certain progress of civilization. To do this I was obliged to break, with apparent great cruelty, from friends the most dear to me, who could not appreciate the importance of my views, and who all mag- nified the apprehended dangers before me. With these, and many other obstacles to encounter, I started in 1832 with canvas and colours, and penetrated the vast solitudes from whence I have brought the information to be given in the following pages. I devoted eight years of my life in visiting about fifty PREFACE. Vll tribes in North America, and brought home a collection of more than six hundred oil paintings (in all cases made from nature) of portraits, landscapes, and Indian customs, and every article of their manufacture, of weapons, cos- tumes, wigwams, etc., altogether forming an extensive museum, which was exhibited for several years in the Egyptian Hall, in London, and afterwards in the Salle du Seance, in the Louvre, in Paris, at the invitation of His Majesty, Louis Philippe, who paid it many visits, with the Queen and the rest of the Eoyal Family. Not content with the collection I had thus made and shown to the world, I started again in 1853 for Venezuela, in South America, and subsequently traversed British and Dutch Guiana, the Valley of the Amazon, and other parts of Brazil, the Andes, Peru, Equador, Bolivia, California, to Kamtschatka, the Aleutian Islands, the Pacific Coast to the mouth of the Columbia, across the Rocky Mountains to Santa Fe, by the Rio de Norte to Matamoros in Mexico, to Guatemala, to Yucatan, to Cuba, and back to the start- ing point. These last roamings, which have been performed in three successive campaigns, have been in some parts extremely difficult and hazardous, but full of interest, which was sufficient to enable me to overcome all obsta- cles ; and from incidents, and people, and customs, and countries, that I have met with in these and my former campaigns, I shall endeavour, in this little work, to select and describe for the instruction and amusement of the youthful readers, such as will the most forcibly and correctly illustrate native man and Lis modes, on the American continent. THE AUTHOR. CONTENTS. CHAPTER PAGE I. THE INDIANS OF AMERICA, . . . 17 II. MY ADVENTURE WITH THE FIRST INDIAN I EVER SAW, 27 III. HOW THE INDIANS BUILD THEIR WIGWAMS, 53 IV. INDIAN WAEFARE SCALPS AND SCALPING, . 68 V. MEDICINE MEN " DRAWING FIRE FROM THE SUN," 83 VI. HOW THE INDIANS PAINT THEMSELVES THE PRAIRIES, 99 VII. CATCHING WILD HORSES A BUFFALO HUNT, 108 VIII. AN ADVENTURE WITH BEARS, . . . 121 IX. THE MANDAN INDIANS THE CHIEF'S TALE, 132 X. THE SIOUX INDIANS A CHALLENGE ! .148 XI. PIPE -STONE QUARRY "THE THUNDER'S NEST" "STONE MAN MEDICINE," . 164 XII. A RIDE TO THE CAMANCHEES A FALSE ALARM, 177 CONTENTS. CHAPTER PAGE XIII. A SOLITARY RIDE ON " CHARLEY " ACROSS THE PRAIRIES, 196 XIV. A JOURNEY DOWN THE ORINOCO THE "HANDSOME DANCE," . . . .219 XV. EN ROUTE FOR THE AMAZON THE " MEDI- CINE GUN," ..... 237 XVI. RIO TROMBUTAS ADVENTURES WITH A TIGER AND A RATTLESNAKE, . . . .253 XVII. STILL EN ROUTE FOR THE AMAZON AN ADVENTURE WITH PECCARIES, . . 273 XVIII. ON THE AMAZON, 295 XIX. THE INDIANS OF THE AMAZON POISONED ARROWS, ...... 310 XX. RED INDIANS IN LONDON, . . .325 XXI. RED INDIANS IN PARIS, .... 347 LIFE AND ADVENTURES AMONG THE AMERICAN INDIANS. CHAPTER I. The Name "Indian" General Character Indian Civilisation National Character. |HE native races of man, occupying every part of North and South America at the time of the first discovery of the American continent by Columbus, and still existing over great portions of those regions, have generally been denominated " Indians" from that day to the present, from the somewhat curious fact that the American continent, when first discovered, was sup- posed to be a part of the coast of India, which the Spanish and Portuguese navigators were expecting to find, in steering their vessels to the west, across the Atlantic. To an appellation so long, though erroneously applied, no exception will be taken in this work, in which these races will be spoken of as Indians, or 17 18 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. savages, neither of which terms will be intended necessarily to imply the character generally conveyed by the term " savage!' but literally what the word signifies, wild (or wild man), and no more. These numerous races (at that time consisting of many millions of human beings, divided into some hundreds of tribes, and speaking mostly different languages ; whose past history is sunk in oblivion from want of books and records ; three-fourths of whom, at least, have already perished by fire-arms, by dissipation, and pestilences introduced amongst them by civilized people ; and the remainder of them from similar causes, with no better prospect than certain extinction in a short time) present to the scientific and the sympathising world, one of the most deeply interesting subjects for contemplation that can possibly come under their consideration; and I feel assured that parents will justify the incul- cation of just notions of these simple and abused people, into the minds of their children, as form- ing a legitimate part of the foundation of their education. Confident in this belief, my young readers, for whom I have said this book is intended, we will now start together myself upon my task, and you for your own instruction and amusement ; halting but for one impression more, which I deem it important you should start with, and never lose sight of for a moment when you are estimating the character, the thoughts, the actions, the condition, and the wrongs of these poor people to be set forth in this little GENERAL CHARACTER 19 book, that they are children like yourselves, in many senses of the word. They are without the knowledge and arts of civilized man ; they are feeble ; they are in the ignorance of nature, but they all acknowledge the Great Spirit. In their relationship with civilized people they are like orphans. Govern- ments who deal with them assume a guardianship over them, always calling them their " red children ;" and they, from their chiid-like nature, call all govern- ment officials in their country, "Fathers;" and the President of the United States, their " Great Father ;" and whenever they can have the pleasure of shaking the hand of a little white boy, or a little girl (as would be the case if they could take you by the hand), the relationship is always that of "brother and sister." The civilized races in the present enlightened age are too much in the habit of regarding all people more ignorant than themselves as anomalies (or " oddities/' as they have been called), because they do not live, and act, and look like themselves. They are therefore mostly in the habit of treating the character of the American Indians which, from the distance they are from them, is more or less wrapped in obscurity as a profound mystery; but there, owing to their ignorance of them, they judge decidedly wrong ; for, like everything else nearest to nature, they are the most simple and easy of all the human family to be appreciated and dealt with, if the right mode be adopted. I have said that these people are like children ; 20 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. and from what I have seen, I am quite sure that if you were amongst them you would learn their true character and their feelings much sooner than your parents would ; for with children they would throw off the mask and the reserve which their justly- founded suspicions of white men induce them to wear in their presence. I believe, therefore, that instead of the frightful impressions too often made upon the youthful mind, your early days is the time when the foundation of a lasting knowledge and just appreciation of the true character of these simple people should be formed ; and with that view, from what I have learned in fourteen years of my life spent in familiarity with them, I will try in this little work to bring the condition and customs of these children of the forest in a true light before you. Distributed over every part, and in every nook and corner of North, and South, and Central America, we find these people living in their rude huts, or "wigwams," at present numbering something like four millions, though, in all probability, their num- bers were nearer twelve or fourteen millions at the time of the discovery of America by Columbus ; and yet the world is left (and probably will remain) in profound ignorance of their origin, for want of his- torical proof to show from whence they came. It seems to be the popular belief that the two Americas have been peopled from the Eastern con- tinent by the way of Behring's Strait of this there is a possibility, but no proof ; and I think there is INDIAN CIVILIZATION. 21 much and very strong presumptive proof against its probability. The subject has been one of great interest to me for many years past, and of so excit- ing a nature, that I have recently made a tedious and expensive tour to Eastern Siberia, to the Koriaks and the Kamtschatkas, the Aleutians equi-distant between the two continents and the natives on the American coast opposite to them, and from all that I could learn, there has been a mutual intercourse across the strait, sufficiently proved by the resem- blances in language and in physiological traits ; but no proof of the peopling of a continent either way. In the progressive character with which the Crea- tor has endowed mankind, as distinguished above the brute creations, the American savages have, in several instances, made the intended uses of their reason, in advancing by themselves to a high state of civilization, but from this they have been thrown back by more than savage invaders as seen in the histories of Mexico and Peru and by the hand of Providence, in some way not yet explained, in the more ancient destruction of the ruined cities of Palenque and Uxmal, in Central America. All history on the subject goes to prove (and with- out an exception to the contrary) that, when first visited by civilized people, the American Indians have been found friendly and hospitable ; and my own testimony, when I have visited nearly two millions of them, and most of the time unprotected, without having received any personal injury or insult, or loss of my property by theft, should go a great 22 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. way to corroborate the fact, that, if properly treated, the American Indians are amongst the most honest, and honourable, and hospitable people in the world. In their primitive and natural state they have always been found living quite independently and happily, though poor ; with an abundance of animals and fish in their country for food, which seems to bound nearly all their earthly wishes. As they know nothing of commerce, and are totally ignorant of the meaning and value of money, they live and act with- out those dangerous inducements to crime; and stimulated to honesty by rules of honour belonging to their society, they practise honesty without any "dread of the law;" for there is no punishment amongst them for theft or fraud, except the disgrace that attaches to their character in case they are con- victed of such crimes. If these people, under such circumstances, would guard my life and my property, as they have done, and help me in safety through their country, of which I shall give you many proofs in this little book, you, my young readers, will at once decide with me, that their hearts are good are like your own ; and that their true character and modes are worth your understanding. The contemptuous epithets of " the poor, naked, and drunken Indians," are often habitually applied to these people by those who know but little or nothing about them. And these epithets are some- times correctly applied ; but only so to those classes of Indian society who, to the shame and disgrace of CHARACTER. 23 civilized people, have been reduced to these condi- tions by the iniquitous teachings of white men, who, with the aid of rum and whisky, have introduced dissipation and vices amongst them, which lead directly to poverty, and nakedness, and diseases which end in their destruction. In their primitive state, these people are all tem- perate all " teetotallers ;" and sufficiently clad for the latitudes they live in ; and their poverty, pro- perly speaking, with their other misfortunes, only begins when the treacherous hand of white man's commerce and the jug are extended to them. To estimate the Indian character properly, it should be constantly borne in mind that these people invariably have, as their first civilized neighbours, the most wicked and unprincipled part of civilized society to deal with ; and these white people, using rum, and whisky, and fire-arms, in a country where they are amenable to no law ; and amongst a people who have no newspapers to explain their wrongs to the world. It should also be known that there are two classes of Indian society ; the one nearest to civilization, where they have become degraded and impoverished, and their character changed by civilized teaching, and their worst passions inflamed, and jealousies excited by the abuses practised amongst them. This district being the first and most easily reached by the tourist, who fears to go farther, he too often contents himself by what he can there see, the semi- civilized and degraded condition of the savage ; and B 24s LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. too often endorses what he sees, as the true defini- tion of the appearance and modes of the American Indians ; thus doing injustice to the character of the people, and less than justice to those who read for information. My labours have generally commenced where that state of civilization leaves off ; and, as I have always believed, I have been in the greatest safety when in the primitive state of Indian society. It has been there, and there chiefly, where my ambition has led me, and there where I have laboured, as the only legitimate place to portray the true character of Indian life. The American Indians, as a race, a great and national family, have a national character and appear- ance very different from the other native races of the earth: They differ in language, in expression, and in colour ; and in their native simplicity they have many high, and honourable, and humane traits of character, which will be illustrated in the following There are no people on earth more loving and kind to their friends and the poor ; and yet, like all savage races, they are correctly denominated cruel : and what people are not so ? There is an excuse for the cruelty of savages. Cruelty is a necessity in savage life: and who else has so good an excuse for it? Indian society has to be maintained, and personal rights to be protected, without the aid of laws ; and for those ends each individual is looked upon as the NATIONAL CHARACTER. 25 avenger of his own wrongs; and if he does not punish with cruelty and with certainty there is no security to person or property. In the exercise of this right, he not only uses a privilege, but does what the tribe compel him to do, or be subjected to a disgrace which he cannot outlive ; so that cruelty is at the same time a right and a duty the law of their land. The Indian's " cruelty and treachery in warfare," we hear much of, but cruelty and treachery in Indian and civilized warfare are much alike. The Creator has also endowed the North Ameri- can Indians, everywhere, with a high moral and religious principle, with reason, with humanity, with courage, with ingenuity, and the other intellec- tual qualities bestowed on the rest of mankind. They all worship the Great Spirit, and have a belief in a spiritual existence after death. Idolatry is nowhere practised by them, nor cannibalism, though you may read of many instances of both to the contrary. After these brief suggestions on their general character and condition, which it has taken you but a few minutes to read, you are now prepared to fol- low me through scenes and events in which I shall endeavour to show you how these interesting people live, how they look, and how they act. I have told you that they are children, that they call themselves such, and that if you were amongst them they would take you by the hand as brothers and sisters ; and I believe, therefore, you are now fully prepared in 26 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. estimating their character and actions, which I am to explain to you, to make those allowances which Nature prompts all kind hearts to extend to the actions of all those who are oppressed, and are ignorant and feeble, but who are doing the best they can under their peculiar circumstances. CHAPTEK II. Wyoming Massacre Valley of the Oc-qua-go The Old Saw-mill Lick A Chill, a Shiver, and False Alarm- John Darrow Story of the Panther Deer in the Lick A Huge Indian Red Indian at the Lick A Run from the Lick Johnny O'NeiTs "Gipsies" George's Indiana The Saddle of Venison On-o-gong-way's Story The Kettle of Gold My Tomahawk. 1HE first Indian I ever saw was in this wise. I have before told you that I was born in the beautiful and famed Valley of Wyom- ing, which is on the Susquehanna Kiver, in the State of Pennsylvania. Not a long time after the close of the Kevolutionary War in that country, a settlement was formed in that fertile valley by white people, while the Indian tribes, who were pushed out, were contesting the right of the white people to settle in it. After having practised great cruelty on the Indian tribes, and been warned from year to year by the Indians to leave it, it was ascertained one day that large parties of Indians were gathered on the mountains, armed and prepared to attack the white inhabitants. 27 28 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. The white men in the valley immediately armed, to the number of five or six hundred, and leaving their wives and children and old men in a rude fort on the bank of the river, advanced towards the head of the valley in search of their enemies. The Indians, watching the movements of the white men from themountain tops, descended into the valley, and at a favourable spot, where the soldiers were to pass, lay secreted in ambush on both sides of the road, and in an . instant rush, at the sound of the war-whoop, sprang upon the whites with tomahawks and scalping-knives in hand, and destroyed them all, with the exception of a very few, who saved their lives by swimming the river. Amongst the latter was my grandfather on my mother's side, from whom I have often had the most thrilling descriptions. This onslaught is called in history, the " Wyoming Massacre" Some have called it " treachery" It was strategy, not treach- ery ; and strategy is a merit in the science of all warfare. After this victory, the Indians marched down the valley and took possession of the fort containing the women and children, to whom not one of the hus- bands returned at that time. Amongst the prisoners thus taken in the fort was my grandmother, and also my mother, who was then a child only seven years old. These several hundreds of prisoners, though in the hands of more than a thousand fierce and savage warriors, were not put to death, but kept as prisoners VALLEY OF THE OC-QUA-GO. 29 for several weeks, when a reinforcement of troops arriving over the Pokona mountains for their relief, the Indian warriors left the fort, with the women and children in it, having hunted for them and supplied them with food, and painted their faces red, calling them "sisters and children," and to the honour of the Indian's character, be it for ever known (as attested by every prisoner both men and women), treating them in every sense, with the greatest pro- priety and kindness. These brief facts, which happened many years before I was born, with a thousand others which could be narrated, having become startling legends of that region, will account for the marvellous and frightful impressions I had received in my child- hood, of Indian massacres and Indian murders, and also for the indelible impression made on my mind and my nerves by the thrilling incident I am about to describe. Whilst my infant mind was filled with these impressions, my father, for the relief of his health, impaired by the practice of the law, removed some forty miles from the Valley of Wyoming to a romantic valley on the banks of the Susquehanna River, in the State of New York, where he had purchased a beautiful plantation, resolving to turn his attention during the remainder of his life to agricultural pursuits. This lovely and picturesque little valley, called by its Indian name " Oc-qua-go," surrounded by high and precipitous mountains and deep ravines, being 30 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. nearer to the straggling remnants of the defeated Mohawk and Oneida Indians, who had retreated before the deadly rifles of the avengers of Wyoming's misfortunes, I was in a position to increase rather than to diminish the excitements already raised in my mind relative to the Indians who had barricaded and bravely defended in their retreat, one by one, every defile and mountain pass, and whose paths and other markings were still recent. The ploughs in my father's fields were at this time daily turning up Indian skulls or Indian beads, and Indian flint arrow-heads, which the labouring men of his farm, as well as those of the neighbour- hood, were bringing to me, and with which I was enthusiastically forming a little cabinet or museum ; and one day, as the most valued of its acquisitions, one of my father's ploughmen brought from his furrow the head of an Indian pipe-tomahawk, which was covered with rust, the handle of which had rotted away. At this early age, when probably only nine or ten years old, I had become a pretty successful shot, with a light single-barrelled fowling-piece which my father had designated as especially my own, and with which my slaughter of ducks, quails, pheasants, and squirrels was considered by the neighbouring hunters to be very creditable to me. But I began now to feel a higher ambition that of killing a deer for which the rifles of my two elder brothers were the weapons requisite, and which (they being absent, and pursuing their THE OLD SAW-MILL LICK. 31 academical studies in a distant town) I began now to lay temporary claim to. In my then recent visits to the " Old Saw-mill" on the " Big Creek " a famous place, to which my co-propensity, that of trout-fishing, often called me I had observed that the saw-mill lick was much frequented by deer, and that I soon fixed as the scene of my future and more exciting operations. The "old saw-mill" was the shattered remains of a saw-mill which had been abandoned for many years, and consisting only of masses of thrown-down timbers and planks, converted into piles by the force of the water, under and around which I always had my greatest success in trout-fishing. This solitary ruin, about one mile from my father's back fields, was enveloped in a dark and lonely wilderness, with an old and deserted road leading to it, following mostly along the winding banks of the creek. Near by it, in a deep and dark gorge in the mountain's side, overshadowed by dark and tall hemlocks and fir-trees, was the "lick" to which my aspiring ideas were now leaning. The paths leading to it down the mountain sides were freshly trodden, and the mud and water in the lick, still riley with their recent steps, showed me the fre- quency with which the deer were paying their visits to it. A "lick" (a "deer lick"), in the phrase of the country, is a salt-spring which the deer visit in warm weather, to allay their thirst, and to obtain the salt, which seems necessary for digestion. Most of the 32 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. herbivorous animals seem to visit these places as if from necessity, and appear oftentimes under a sort of infatuation in their eagerness for them, in consequence of which they fall an easy prey to wild beasts, as well as to hunters, which lie in wait for them. Stimulated by the proofs aboved named, and by my recollections, yet fresh, of the recitals of several of the neighbouring hunters of their great success in the old saw-mill lick, I resolved to try my first luck there. A rifle for this enterprise was absolutely neces- sary a weapon which I never had fired, and as yet was not strong enough to raise, unless it was rested upon something for its support. For this I foresaw a remedy, and I had every con- fidence in my accuracy of aim. But the greater difficulty of my problem was the positive order of my father that I was not to meddle with the arms of my elder brothers, which were in covers and hanging against the wall. This I solved, how- ever, by a manoeuvre, at a late hour of the night, by extracting one of them from the cover, and put- ting my little fowling-piece in its place, and taking the rifle into the fields, where I concealed it for my next afternoon's contemplated enterprise. The hour approaching, and finding the rifle loaded, I proceeded, with a light and palpitating heart, through the winding and lonely road, to the old saw-mill lick ; creeping along through narrow defiles, between logs and rocks, until, by a fair glance, A CHILL, A SHIVER, AND FALSE ALARM. 33 at the lick, I found there was no game in it at the moment. I then took to a precipitous ledge of rocks in the side of the hill partly enclosing the dark and lonely place where the salt-spring issued, and where the deer were in the habit of coming to lick. The nook into which I clambered and seated my- self was elevated some twenty or thirty feet above the level of the lick, and at the proper distance for a dead shot. I here found myself in a snug and sly little box, which had evidently been constructed and used for a similar purpose on former occasions by the old hunters. Having taken this position about the middle of the afternoon, with the muzzle of my rifle resting on a little breastwork of rock before me, I remained until near nightfall without other excitement than an occasional tremor from the noise of a bird or a squirrel in the leaves, which I mistook for the footsteps of an approaching deer ! The falling of a dry branch, however, which came tumbling down upon the hill side above and behind me, in the midst of this silent and listless anxiety, gave me one or two tremendous shivers, which it took me some time to get over, even after I had discovered what it was ; for it brought instantly into my mind the story which I had often heard Darrow relate, of "killing the panther," which, it had not occurred tome until that moment, took place, not long before, at the old saw-mill lick ! John Darrow, a poor man living in the neighbour- hood of my father, often worked lor him in his fields, S4 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. but was more fond of hunting, for which his success had gained him a great reputation in that vicinity. He often supplied my father with venison, and as he took a peculiar fancy to me for my hunting pro- pensities, one can easily see how I became attached to this wonderful man, and how I came to take my first lessons in deer-stalking and bear-hunting with him. Well, Darrow had been in the habit of "watching " a great deal in the old saw-mill lick, and of placing beyond the lick, at the height of the middle of a deer's body a small bit of phosphorescent wood (a rotten wood which often occurs in those wildernesses, and called by the inhabitants "fox- fire," probably from phosphor) and which is always visible in the darkest night, looking like a small ball of fire. Then secreting himself before dark on the ground, on a level with his target, his rifle rest- ing in a couple of crotches and aiming directly at his phosphor light, at any time of the night when he heard the stepping of the deer in the lick, and his light was obscured, to pull trigger was a certain death. His story of the panther, which I was now revolving in my mind, he had told on arriving at my father's house one morning at an early hour from one of these nocturnal hunts, himself covered from head to foot with blood, and with a huge panther slung upon his back, with a bullet hole between its eyes, ran thus : " I was watching last night, Squire (as he called my father), at the old saw-mill lick, STORY OF THE PANTHER. 35 and it getting on to be near midnight, I fell asleep. Seated on the ground, and my back leaning against a beech tree, I was waked by a tremendous blow, like a stroke of lightning 'twas this beast, d'ye see ; he sprung upon me, and landed me some ten or twelve feet, and dropped me, and made only one jump farther himself, as I knew by the noise when he stopped. I knew it was a painter, though I could see nothing, for it was total darkness. I was badly torn, and felt the blood running in several places. My rifle was left in the crotches, and feeling my way very gradually with my feet, but keeping my eyes set upon the brute, for I knew exactly where he was lying, I at length got hold of the rifle, but it could do me no good in the dark. My knife had slipped out of the scabbard in the struggle, and I had now no hope but from knowing that the cowardly animal will never spring while you look him in the face. " In this position, with my rifle in both hands, and cocked, I sat, not hearing even a leaf turned by him, until just the break of day (the only thing I wanted it was but a few hours, but it seemed a long time, I assure you), when I could just begin to discover his outline, and then the wrinkles betwixt his eyes ! Time moved slowly then, I can tell you, Squire ; and at last I could see the head of ' Old Ben : ' there was no time to be lost now, and I let slip ! The beast was about twenty feet from me/' One can easily imagine my juvenile susceptibilities much heightened by such reflections in such a place ; and every leaf that turned behind me calculated more 36 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. or less to startle me. My resolve, of course, was not to trust myself in that gloomy place in the night, nor to wait much longer for the desired gratification, which I was then believing I should have to forego for that day at least. The woodlark was at that moment taking its favourite limb in the lofty and evergreen hemlocks for its nightly rest, and making the wooded temple of solitude ring and echo with its liquid notes, whilst all else was still as death, and I was on the eve of descending from my elevated nook and wend- ing my way home. Just then I heard the distant sounds of footsteps in the leaves, and shortly after discovered in the distance a deer (a huge buck !), timidly and cautiously descending the hill and ap- proaching the lick, stopping often to gaze, and sometimes looking me, apparently, full in the face, when I was afraid even to wink, lest he should dis- cover me. My young blood was too boilable, and my nerves decidedly too excitable for my business. Successive chills seemed to rise, I don't recollect where from, but they shook me, each one of them, until after actually shaking my head, they seemed to go out at the top of it The deer kept advancing, and my shakes increas- ing, at length it entered the pool, and commenced licking ; and the resolve that the moment had arrived for my grand achievement, set my teeth actually chattering. My rifle, cocked, was rested before me on the surface of the rock, and all things, save my- DEER IN THE LICK. 37 self, were perfectly ready ; after several useless attempts I got my aim, but before I could pull trigger, from another chill and a shake, I lost it again. I tried again and again, but in vain, and then more prudently resolved to lie still a few moments until I could get my nerves more steady, and at all events, until I could see more clearly the forward sight of my barrel, which, as yet, seemed to be en- veloped in a sort of a mist. Just at this moment also popped into my head another idea that gave me one or two renewed shivers. I had fired my little fowling-piece hun- dreds of times without harm, but I never had fired a rifle " It may be overloaded, or so long loaded as to kick, or to explode ! but never mind, I must run those risks." After checking my latter apprehen- sions for a few moments, and feeling again more calmed, I was getting my aim with tolerable accu- racy, when away went another of those frightful chills, like a snake running through me from my feet to the top of my head, because I was just about to pull trigger ! The deer at this time seemed to have got enough of licking, and, stepping out of the lick, disappeared in the thicket. " Oh, what a loss ! what a mis- fortune ! What a chance is gone ! What a coward, and what a poor fool am I ! But if he had stopped, though, one minute longer, I am sure I could have killed him, for I don't tremble now." Just at this cool moment the deer came gliding through the bushes and into the lick again, much 38 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. nearer than before. One little chill began ; but by gritting my teeth tight together I succeeded in get- ting a more steady aim, when bang ! went the crack and the flash of a rifle, a little to the left of me! and the deer, bounding a few rods from the pool on to an elevated bank, and tumbling upon the ground, quite dead, showed me that I was too late! My head and the breech of my rifle were instantly lowered a little more behind my stone breastwork, and then oh, horrid ! what I never had seen be- fore, nor ever dreamed of seeing in that place the tall and graceful form of a huge Indian, but half bent forward, as he pushed his red and naked shoul- ders, and drew himself slowly over the logs and through the bushes. Trailing his rifle in his left hand, and drawing a large knife with the other from its sheath in the hollow of his back, he ad- vanced to the carcase of the deer, which had fallen much nearer to me than it was when it was shot. His rifle he leaned against a tree, and the blade of his bloody knife, which he had drawn across the neck of the deer, he clenched between his teeth, while he suspended the animal by the hind legs from the limb of a tree to let it bleed. "Oh, horrid ! horrid ! what what a fate is mine ! what am I to do?" No length of life could ever erase from my recol- lection the impression which this singular and un- expected scene made upon my infant mind, or the ease, and composure, and grace with which this KED INDIAN AT THE LICK. 39 phantom seated himself upon the trunk of a large and fallen tree, wiping his huge knife upon the moss and laying it by his side, and drawing from his pouch his flint, and steel, and spunk, with which he lit his pipe, and from which it seemed, in a few moments, as if he were sending up thanks to the Great Spirit in the blue clouds of smoke that were curling around him. Who will ever imagine the thoughts that were passing through my youthful brain in these exciting moments ? for here was before me, for the first time in my life, the living figure of a Red Indian ! " If he sees me I'm lost ; he will scalp me and devour me, and my dear mother will never know what be- came of me !" From the crack of that rifle, however, I had not another chill, nor a shiver : my feeling now was no longer the ebullition of childish anxiety, but the awfully flat and stupid one of dread and fear ; and every muscle was quiet. Here was " perhaps death in a moment" before me. My eyeballs, which seemed elongated as though they were reaching half-way to him, were too tightly strained to tremble. An instant thought came to me, when his naked back and shoulders were turned towards me " My rifle is levelled, and I am perfectly cool ; a bullet would put an end to all my fears." And a better one followed when he turned gently around, and moved his piercing black eyes over and about the ledge where I was sitting, and the blue streams were curling upwards from his mouth and bis nos- c 4f) LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. trils ; for I saw then (though a child), in the momen- tary glance of that face, what infant human nature could not fail to see, and none but human nature could express. I saw humanity. His pipe burned out ; the deer, with its fore and hind legs tied together, he slung upon his back, and, taking his rifle in his hand, he silently and quietly disappeared in the dusky forest, which at this time was taking the gloom of approaching night. My position and reflections were still like lead that could not be removed, until a doubly reasonable time had elapsed for this strange apparition to be entirely out of my way. He having seemingly, at last view, to have taken the direction of the " old road" by which I had expected to return, my atten- tion was now turned to a different but more difficult route. By clambering the huge precipice still above me, which I did as soon as perfect safety seemed to authorise it, and by a run of more than a mile through the woods, scarcely daring to look back, I was safely lodged in my father's back fields, but without hat or rifle, and without the least know- ledge of the whereabouts in which either of them had been deposited or dropped. The last of these, however, was recovered on the following day, but the other never came to light. Such was the adventure, and such the mode of " my first seeing an Indian." Having seen him, the next thing was to announce him, which I did without plan or reserve, but solely with youthful impulse ; exclaiming as I approached JOHNNY O'NEIL'S " GIPSIES." 41 the vicinity of my father's bouse, and as pale as a ghost, " I've seen an Indian ! I've seen an Indian ! " No one believed me, as no Indian had been seen in the neighbourhood for many years. I related the whole of my adventure, and then they thought " the boy was mad." I was mad I went to bed mad and crying ; and my poor dear mother came and knelt by my bed, and at last comforted me a little by saying, " My dear George, I do believe you I believe your story to be true I believe you have seen an Indian." I had a restless night, however, and in the morning, when I awoke, Johnny O'Neil, a faithful farm-labourer in my father's employment, was at the door, announcing that, " Jist in the toother eend of the bag whate-field, where ye sae thit lattle smohk areesin, has kimmed thae japsies; sae ye may be lookin' oot for yer toorkies, an' yer suckin'- pigs, an' yer chahkins, for I tal ye ther'll be nae gude o' 'em." Poor Johnny O'Neil ! he was not believed either ; for, said my father, " That's almost a bull, Johnny, for there are no gipsies in this country." " I bag yer parthen," said Johnny ; and my father continued "I'll be bound these are George's Indians!" and putting on his hat, and taking me by the hand, he and Johnny O'Neil and myself started off for the farther corner of the " big wheat-field," where we found my Indian warrior (Paddy's gipsy) (Plate No. I.) seated on a bear-skin spread upon the ground. His legs were crossed, his elbows resting on his knees, and his pipe at his lips ; with his wife, and 42 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. his little daughter of ten years old, with blankets wrapped around them, and their necks covered with beads, reclining by the side of him ; and over them all, to screen them from the sun, a blanket, sus- pended by the corners from four crotchets fastened into the ground, and a small fire in front of the group, with a steak of venison cooking for their breakfast. " There's the japsies !" said Johnny O'Neil, as we were approaching. " There is the Indian, father !" said I ; and my father, who had been familiar with Indians, and had learned to sing their songs and speak somewhat of their language in his early life, said to me, " George, my boy, you were right, these are Indians." " Yes," said I, " and that's the very man I saw." He was smoking away, and looking us steadily in the face as we approached ; and though I began to feel something of the alarm I had felt the day be- fore, my father's stepping up to him and taking him by the hand with a mutual " How how how/' and the friendly grip of his soft and delicate hand, which was extended to me also, soon dissi- pated all my fears, and turned my alarm to perfect admiration. Understanding and speaking a little English, he easily explained to my father that he was an Oneida, living near Cayuga Lake, some one hundred and fifty miles distant, that his name was On-o-gong- way (a great warrior). He asked us to sit down by him, when he cleaned out his pipe, and, charging it THE SADDLE OF VENISON. 43 afresh with tobacco, lighted, and gave it to my father to smoke, and then handed it to me, which, my father explained, was a pledge of his friendship. My father then explained to him the story of my adventure the day before at the old saw-mill lick, to every sentence of which I was nodding " yes," and trembling, as the Indian was smoking his pipe, and almost, but not quite, commencing a smile, as he was earnestly looking me in the face. The story finished, he took me by both hands, and repeated the words, " Good good good hun- ter." He laid his pipe down, and very deliberately climbing over the fence, stepped into the shade of the forest, where he had suspended a small saddle of venison, and brought it, and laying it by my side, exclaimed, as he laid his hand on my head, " Dat you, you half very good;" meaning that I was a good hunter, and that half of the venison belonged to me. The saddle of venison, though very small, was no doubt a part of the animal I had seen in the lick, though it had appeared to me the day before, as I had represented it at home, a "buck of the most enormous size," and the Indian a giant, though on more familiar acquaintance, to my great surprise, he proved to be no larger than an ordinary man. This generous present added much to my growing admiration, which was increased again as I listened to his narrative, made to my father and myself, of his history and of some of his adventures, as well as the motive which had brought him some hundreds 44 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. of miles over a country partly of forest and partly inhabited by a desperate set of hunters whose rifles were unerring, and whose deep-rooted hostility to all savages induced them to shoot them down whenever they met them in their hunting grounds. His father, he said, had been one of the warriors in the battle of Wyoming, and amongst them was afterwards driven by the white soldiers, after many battles and great slaughter, up the shores of the Susquehana to the country where the remnant of his tribe now lived, between the Oneida and Cayuga Lakes. During this disastrous retreat, he being a boy about my size, his father made him assist in carrying many heavy things which they had plundered from the white people, where they fought a great battle, at the mouth of the Tunkhannock ; amongst which, and one of the most valuable, as one of the most difficult to carry, was a kettle of gold. "What!" said my father, " a kettle of gold !" " Yes, father," said he, " now listen. " The white soldiers came through the narrows you see yonder " (pointing to a narrow gorge in the mountains, through which the river passes) ; " and on those very fields, which then were covered with trees " (pointing to my father's fields, lying beneath and in front of us), " was a great battle, and many were the warriors that fell on both sides; but at that time, father, another army of white men came from the north, and were entering the valley on that side, and the poor Indians had no way but to leave THE KETTLE OP GOLD. 45 the river and all their canoes, and to cross these high mountains behind us, and make their way through the forests to Cayuga. " In passing these mountains, my father, they fol- lowed the banks of that creek to its head " (pointing to the creek on which the old saw-mill was built, and which passed in a serpentine course through my father's farm to the river). " On the banks of that creek many things were buried by the Indians, who were unable to carry them over the mountains ; and amongst them, somewhere near that bridge, my father, where the road crosses, on the farther bank, I saw my father and my mother bury the * kettle of gold,' with other things, in the ground. "When my father was old and infirm, I was obliged to hunt for him, and I could not come ; but since he has gone to the land of his fathers, I have made the journey a great way, to dig up the ' kettle of gold.' But I see this day, from where I now sit, that there is no use in looking for it, and my heart is very sad. " My father we buried the ' kettle of gold ' at the foot of a large pine-tree that stood on the bank ; but I see the trees are all gone, and all now is covered with green grass ; and where shall I go to look? This, my father, I kept a secret for many years, but I see there is no use in keeping it a secret any longer, and this makes my heart sad. I have come a great way, my father, and my road in going back I know is beset with many enemies. " These green fields, my father, which are now so 46 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. beautiful to look upon, were once covered with large and beautiful trees, and they were then the hunting grounds of my fathers, and they were many and strong ; but we are now but a very few we live a great way off, and we are your children." My father asked him many questions about the "kettle of gold," and in answering these, he ex- tended both arms in the form of a circle, his fingers' ends just touching each other. " There," said he, " it was about thus large, and just as much as I could lift ; and must be of great value." My father, after a study of a few minutes, turned to me, and said, " George ! run down to the house and ask your mother to give you the * little brass kettle,' and bring it here as quick as you can." I never, perhaps, had run more nimbly (but on one occasion) in my lifetime, than I ran and scaled the fences on this errand. While this conversation was passing about the " kettle of gold," it had occurred to my father that Buel Rowley, one of his hired men, had ploughed up a small brass kettle a few years before, on the bank of the creek, and at the identical spot designated by the forefinger of the Indian ; and that kettle being brought by me from my mother's culinary collection, was now under the eyes of the child of the forest. Whilst he was in silence gazing upon it, and turning it over and over, my father described to him the manner and place in which it was found, and that it was made of brass, which, to be sure, looked like gold, but was much harder, and of much less THE KETTLE OF GOLD. 47 value. After a pause of a few minutes, and without the change of a muscle, but drawing a deep sigh, as ii he recognised the long-hidden treasure, and trying his knife two or three times on the upper rim of it, he laid it down, and drawing a deep breath or two through his pipe, said to my father, that he had no doubt but it was the same kettle, but that two things troubled his mind very much the first was, that the kettle should be so small; and the other, that he found it was not a " kettle of gold" The first error he attributed to his having carried it when he was quite a small boy, as it was then a heavy load for him ; and the other, from having learned amongst the white people that a very small piece of gold was worth ten dollars ; and having estimated from this standard the probable value of a " kettle of gold," not having as yet learned enough from the white people to know the difference be- tween gold and brass. Poor ignorant child of the forest ! he had learned from his teachers something of the value of gold before he knew what it was ; and he had risked his life, and those of his wife and his little daughter, in wending his way for hundreds of miles through the forests infested with hunters whose rifles were levelled upon every Indian they could meet. His long journey had cost him no gold, for he had none to spend ; his rifle had supplied him and his family with food, and he had thus far escaped his enemies, and in this wise accomplished his object ; but his dangerous steps, which were to be retraced, were 48 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. rendered tenfold more dangerous from the vague reports which had accidentally and unfortunately got into circulation amongst the hunters and bri- gands of the forests through which he had to pass, that he had dug up, and was returning with, a " kettle ofgold" My father and several of his neighbours paid frequent visits to his little bivouac ; and I spent nearly all my time there, so completely were all my fears turned into admiration. My rusty tomahawk head I brought to him, for which he made me a handle, and curiously carved it with his knife. The handle was perforated for smoking through, a mys- tery which no one of the neighbours could solve, as " there was no gimlet long enough to make such a hole," little thinking, as he explained the secret to me, that the handle was made of a young ash, the pith of which is easily burned away with a heated wire, or a piece of hard hickory wood. The handle finished, my friend Johnny O'Neil laid the head and blade of it on the grindstone while I turned, until it was everywhere silvery bright, and its edge as sharp as a knife. This lighted the eyes of the child of the forest, and he gave a new gleam to mine, when he filled the bowl MY TOMAHAWK. 4-9 of it with tobacco (or k'nick-k'neck, an Indian substitute for tobacco) and commenced smoking through it. And yet the great charm and mystery of the tomahawk was still to come yet to be learned. My young readers must know that the tomahawk (like the scalping-knife, which generally has the Sheffield mark upon it) is a contrivance of civilized invention and construction, too deadly and de- structive to have been made by the poor Indian; combining the two essential requisites of being capable of being used in war as the most efficient and deadly weapon, by throwing or striking with, and, when war is at an end, of being turned into a luxury, for which it is equally valued, the smoke passing through it when charged with tobacco. The first of these characters of the tomahawk having been illustrated as above stated, to my inex- pressible delight, and the tobacco all burned out ; my good and confiding friend now arose with the tomahawk in his right hand, and raised my aston- ishment and admiration still higher, by throwing it at the trunk of a tree some rods distant, and bury- ing its blade in the solid wood, explaining to me the certain fate of an enemy within an equal distance. I had not the power to draw it out ; but under his practised hand it seemed to leave the tree like a breath of wind. He then stepped back again some ten or fifteen steps, with the end of the handle in his hand, when chick ! it seemed to pronounce, as quick as elec- 50 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. tricity, and was there buried again ! This he did more than twenty times, without failing once, to the astonishment of my father and others looking on ; the weapon revolving many times in the air, and the blade, no matter what the distance, always entering the tree. Here I was left in one of the several inexplicable mysteries which I have met in Indian life, and never have been able to solve, even to the present day. My flint arrow-heads I brought to him, which he looked upon with an evident gloom. He made me shafts (which he feathered) to a number of them ; and from a young hickory he made me a beautiful bow, and ornamented it with woodpeckers' feathers ; and from the skin of the fawn (the " huge buck," which I would have killed) he made me a quiver, and, with the arrows in it, slung it on my back. What could more completely have capped the climax of my boyish ambition than this ? The honesty and childlike simplicity of these poor people gained them many friends in the neighbour- hood, and yet there were, no doubt, murderous enemies in disguise plotting and prowling around them. My father made them many presents, and my attachment to them laid iny mother's pantry under daily and heavy contributions. My father was under constant apprehensions for their safety, and while he was maturing a plan for sending them home by a different route, and at his own expense, it was discovered one morning that their smoke was missing in the corner of my father's MY TOMAHAWK. 51 " big wheat-field ;" and on the same morning was found hanging in my father's wood-house, which was always open on one side, a fine saddle of venison, with one of the beautiful and well-known eagle quills from the head of On-o-gong-way fastened in it! Poor, honest, and harmless man ! he had left, to meet the chances for his life on his long journey home; and as an unmistakable evidence of his friendship and gratitude, he had left this silent parting gift, and with it, as he could not write his name, his choicest plume, to identify the giver. " The Indians are gone ! the Indians are gone ? " was echoed everywhere, and through the neighbour- hood, in the morning; and poor Johnny O'Neil, when he looked upon the saddle of venison con- taining the eagle's quill, exclaimed, " Upon my word, squire, thase is nae japsies an' I'll be shot if thot mon's not a gintleman ! " A few days after the departure of the Indians, two neighbouring boys and myself were practising with my tomahawk, by throwing it at the trunk of a tree ; and when thrown by the hand of one of the boys, it glanced from the tree, by which I was standing too closely, when the sharp blade struck me on the left cheek, cutting deep into the cheek- bone, and felling me to the ground, covered with blood ; giving me a wound which was several months in healing, and a scar which any one of my youthful readers may always know me by, if they have the opportunity of seeing me. 52 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. This was the first catastrophe growing out of the new and singular acquaintance thus recited, but not the saddest ; that came to our knowledge a few days later, and in this lamentable form that the dead body of poor On-o-gong-way was found, pierced by two rifle bullets, in Randolph Valley, a dark and dreary wilderness, some eight or ten miles from my father's plantation, which it was necessary for him to cross in order to reach his own country and friends. What became of his poor wife and the interesting and innocent little daughter, no mortal was ever able (or willing) to say ; and the " kettle of gold," which my father had confident hopes would have led to the detection of so foul a murder, notwithstanding his exertions from year to year, never furnished any clue to the villainy. CHAPTER III. Indian Tribes Portraits and Costumes The Sioux Sionx Village Interior of Wigwams Drying Meat Indian Slavery Scalp-Day Skin-builders Grass-builders Dirt- builders Bark-builders Timber-builders. IN the foregoing chapter I have shown how I received my earliest impressions of the Indian character ; and skipping over the intervening part of my life, from my boyhood to the age of thirty-three, when, as I have said, I entered the forests to learn more of it, we will now enter upon scenes that I witnessed in those pursuits, from which a more intimate knowledge of these people and their customs may be gleaned. The great valley of the Mississippi and Missouri, containing nearly one-half of North America, with its vast prairies, and mountains, and lakes, was the first field of my roamings, which occupied some five or six years of my life ; during which time I visited many tribes, and some of the finest races of mankind in America or in the world ; the principal, and most numerous, and most interesting of these were the Sioux the Blackfoot the Crows the Mandans 53 54 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. the Pawnees Ojibbeways Camanchees Osages and Choctaws ; and in my subsequent travels west of the Eocky Mountains, a few of the numerous tribes,the Flatheads the Apachees the Shoshonees the Arapahos, and others; and in South and Central America, the Garibbees the Arowaks the Ghaymas the Gooagives the Macouchis the Guarani the Tupi the Botocudos the Connibos the Chiquitos the Moxos, and fifty others. A connected narrative of my wanderings amongst all of these remote people would require a very large and perhaps tedious book; but, my young readers, I will not fatigue you by travelling over the whole ground I will take a shorter way. I will introduce you at once to the people themselves and their modes of living, and afterwards to their customs, which you will then be better able to appreciate. After knowing how they look and how they live, you will more easily and correctly under- stand how they act Will you not ? We now take an immense stride of twelve hundred miles in a moment, from the scenes of my younger days just described, in the State of New York, where the Indian tribes have all disappeared many years since, to the centre and heart of the great American wilds, where men and animals are still roaming in their native beauty and independ- ence, on the great and almost boundless grassy plains of the Upper Missouri In the absence of a pictorial illustration, let me describe a painting from life, which my portfolio PORTRAITS AND COSTUMES. 55 contains, of a family group, comprising the head war-chief of the great Sioux nation, with his daughter (an unmarried girl) and his wife, with her infant (papoose) slung in its pretty crib, or cradle, orna- mented with porcupine quills, dyed of various bright colours. The chief wore a robe made of the skin of a buffalo, with the battles of his life painted on it. His shirt (or tunic) and leggings were made of deer- skins, and the seams embroidered with porcupine quills and fringed with scalp-locks. His moccasins, made of deer-skins, were handsomely embroidered ; in his right hand he held his lance ; and his head- dress, made of war-eagles' quills and ermine skins, extended quite to the ground, and was surmounted by a pair of horns, denoting his office as head war- chief of his tribe, a curious mode, which I found to be the same in most of the tribes. The dress of the young woman was made of the skins of the mountain sheep, more light and more soft than deer-skins, andwas very prettily embroidered and painted. The costume of the wife of the chief was much the same as that of the daughter ; her leggings and moccasins being beautifully garnished. It will be seen by this description that these people are not always the " poor naked Indians ; " for in their native state, before white men come to destroy their game, they have an abundance of skins and furs to clothe themselves with ; and, except in very warm weather, when it is more agreeable to be partly naked, they are abundantly and comfortably, and oftentimes elegantly, clad. D 56 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. We discover in this family group, also, a good illustration of the domestic relations existing amongst these poor people. Here is the father, the mother, the husband, the wife, the children ; clearly showing that these people have the institution of marriage, as we have it in the civilized world. By my observa- tions amongst them I find that they feel and observe those conjugal, those paternal and filial affections as strongly as any people in more enlightened society, some striking examples of which will yet be given in this little book. The Sioux* is one of the most numerous and powerful tribes in North America, numbering about twenty-five thousand, divided into forty bands, each band having a chief at its head, which chiefs are again subordinate to one head-chief ; and with him, in council, they form the government of the nation ; and such is the custom amongst most of the other tribes. There is no tribe better clad, who live in better houses (wigwams), or who are better mounted, than the Sioux. They catch an abundance of wild horses, which are grazing on the prairies, oftentimes in groups of several hundreds, and from their horses' backs, at full speed, they deal their deadly arrows, or wield their long and fatal lances in the chase of the buffaloes, and also in war with their enemies. These people, living mostly in a country of prairies (meadows), where they easily procure the buffalo- skins, construct their wigwams with them, in form * Pronounced See-oo. SIOUX VILLAGE. 57 of tents, which are more comfortable than rude huts constructed of timber, are more easily built, and have the advantage of being easily transported over the prairies ; by which means the Indians are enabled to follow the migrating herds of buffaloes during the summer and fall seasons, when they are busily engaged in drying meat for their winter's consump- tion, and dressing robes for their own clothing, and also for barter to the fur traders. From this view (Frontispiece) of a Sioux village, on the Upper Missouri, my little readers will get a very correct notion of the manner in which these curious people live. There were in this village about four hundred skin tents, all built much in the same manner : some fifteen or twenty pine poles forming the frame, covered with one entire piece of fifteen or twenty buffalo-skins sewed together, and most curiously painted and embroidered, of all colours ; presenting one of the most curious and beautiful scenes imaginable. Inside of these tents, the fire is placed in the centre, the smoke escaping out at the top ; and at night the inmates all sleep on buffalo-skins spread upon the ground, with their feet to the fire ; a most safe, and not uncomfortable mode. When you enter one of these wigwams you have to stoop rather awkwardly ; but when you are in, you rise up and find a lofty space of some twenty feet above your head. The family are all seated, and no one rises to salute you, whatever your office or your importance may be. All lower their eyes to your feet, instead 58 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. of staring you in the face, and you are asked to sit down. A robe or a mat of rushes is spread for you, and as they have no chairs you are at once embarrassed. It is an awkward thing for a white man to sit down upon the ground until he gets used to it, and when he is down, he don't know what to do with his legs. The Indians, accustomed to this from childhood, sit down upon, and rise from, the ground with the same ease and grace that we sit down in, and rise from, a chair. Both men and women lower them- selves to the ground, and rise, without a hitch or a jerk, and without touching their hand to the ground. This is very curious, but it is exceedingly graceful and neat. The men generally sit cross-legged ; and to sit down they cross their feet, closely locked together, and extending their arms and head forward, slowly and regularly lower their bodies quite to the sitting posture on the ground : when they rise they place their feet in the same position, and their arms and head also, and rise to a perfectly straight position, apparently without an effort. The women always sit with both feet and lower legs turned under and to the right or the left, and, like the men, lower and raise themselves without touching the ground. When you are seated, to feel at ease your legs must be crossed, and your heels drawn quite close under you, and then you can take the pipe when it is handed to you, and get a fair and deliberate glance at things around you. INTERIOR OF WIGWAMS. 59 The furniture in these wigwams is not much, but it is very curious in effect, and picturesque, when we look at it. The first startling thing you will meet on entering will be half-a-dozen saucy dogs, barking, and bristling, and showing their teeth, and often- times as many screaming children, frightened at your savage and strange appearance. These hushed, you can take a look at other things, and you see shields, and quivers, and lances, and saddles, and medicine bags, and pouches, and spears, and cradles, and buffalo masques (which each man keeps for dancing the buffalo dance), and a great variety of other picturesque things hanging around, suspended from the poles of the tent, to which they are fastened by thongs ; the whole presenting, with the picturesque group around the fire, one of the most curious scenes imaginable. In front of these wigwams the women are seen busily at work, dressing robes and drying meat. The skin-dressing of the Indians, both of the buffalo and deer-skins, is generally very beautiful and soft. Their mode of doing this is curious : they stretch the skin, as seen in the illustration, either on a frame or on the ground, and after it has remained some three or four days with the brains of the buffalo or elk spread over the fleshy side, they grain it with a sort of adze or chisel, made of a piece of buffalo bone. After the process of " graining/' and the skin is apparently beautifully finished, they pass it through another process, that of "smoking." For this, a 60 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. hole of some two or three feet in depth is dug in the ground, and a smothered fire kindled in the hole with rotten wood, producing a strong and peculiar sort of smoke ; and over this a little tent, made of two or three buffalo-skins, and so closed as to pre- vent the smoke from escaping, in which the grained skins hang for three or four days. After this pro- cess, the dresses made of these skins may be worn repeatedly in the rain, and will always dry perfectly soft a quality which, I believe, does not yet belong to dressed skins in civilized countries. " Drying meat " is done by cutting it into thin slices and exposing it in the sun, hung upon poles (as seen in the cut), where it dries, and is successfully cured, without salt and without smoke. Men are here seen also coming in from the hunt, with their horses loaded with meat and skins, to keep the poor women at work. It is proverbial in the civilized world that " the poor Indian woman has to do all the hard work." Don't believe this, for it is not exactly so. She labours very hard and constantly, it is true. She does most of the drudgery about the village and wigwam, and is seen transporting heavy loads, etc. This all looks to the passer-by as the slavish compulsion of her cruel husband, who is often seen lying at his ease, and smoking his pipe, as he is looking on. His labours are not seen, and therefore are less thought of, when he mounts his horse, with his weapons in hand, and working every nerve and every muscle, dashes amongst the herds in the chase, INDIAN SLAVEKY. 61 to provide food for his wife and his little children,and scours the country both night and day, at the con- stant risk of his life, to protect them from the assaults of their enemies. The Indian woman's life is, to be sure, a slavish one ; and equally so are the lives of most women equally poor in all civilized countries. Look into their humble dwellings in all cities and towns, or in the country, in civilized communities, and see the industry and the slavish labour of poor woman ! She works all the days of her life, brings water, makes fires, and tends to her little children, like the poor Indian woman ; and she may be a slave to an idle husband, who is spending his time and his money, as well as her own earnings, in a tap-room. The civilized world is full of such slavery as this ; but amongst the American Indians such a system does not and cannot exist ; every man is a hunter and a soldier ; he must supply his family with food, and help to defend his country. The education of woman in those countries teaches her that the labours are thus to be divided between herself and her husband ; and for the means of sub- sistence and protection, for which she depends upon his labours, she voluntarily assumes the hard work about the encampment, considering their labours about equally divided. " Slaves to their husbands " is an epithet so often and so inappropriately applied to the poor Indian woman by the civilized world, and so frequently reiterated and kept alive by tourists who have 62 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. happened to see an Indian woman or two at work when their husbands were asleep or smoking their pipes, that I cannot, in common honesty to you, my young readers, nor injustice to the Indian, consent to pass it by in this place without some further comment. One of the distinguishing natural traits of the American Indian, that stamps his character as mentally superior to that of the African and some other races, is his uncompromising tenacity for un- bounded freedom. All efforts made (and there have been many) to enslave these people, have re- sulted in failures ; and such an abhorrence have they of the system, that they cannot be induced to labour for each other or for white men for any remunera- tion that can be offered, lest the disgraceful epithet " slave " should be applied to them by their tribe. In the relationship of man and wife, in which, as amongst white people, " both are one," they can and do labour for mutual interests and mutual subsist- ence, without incurring this reproach ; and I do not believe that, among the poorer class of any civilized people on earth, a better and a more voluntary division of the toils of conjugal life can be found than exists amongst the American Indians. By the custom in all the American tribes, the person of every individual in society, either within the pale of the domestic relations or out of it, is considered sacredly protected from the lash or a blow, which in themselves imply degradation or servitude, and in all cases they may be revenged with death, If this system should, by possibility, have its SCALP-DAY. 63 disadvantages, how much does it redound to the credit of the Indian's character, and to the honour of his race, and what a lesson is it for the civilized world, that there never was known to exist amongst them the unnatural brute that has beaten his wife or his little child ! But we left these poor women at their " slavish work," dressing robes and drying meat. Let us go back to them for a few moments yet, lest we should lose sight of a Sioux village before we know all about it, and of course be unable to appreciate some extraordinary and amusing Sioux customs, to be explained further on as we advance. We here see the Indian women in the full enjoy- ment of their domestic happiness, with their little children and dogs around them, the villagers dressed in their ordinary costumes, and the little cupids taking their first lessons in archery, which is the most important feature in their education. This happens to be " scalp-day ; " the Sioux, like most of the other tribes, having several days in the year for " counting scalps," which are observed somewhat as holidays. The chief on those days passes through an aperture in the side of his wigwam, and erects over it a pole called the " scalp-pole," from which are suspended the scalps which he has taken, which is the signal for all the warriors to do the same ; so that the chief and every person in the village can count them, and understand each warrior's standing and claims to promotion, which are estimated by the number of scalps he has taken. 64 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. Amongst the Indian tribes every man is a mili- tary man, a warrior, a brave, or a chief. All are armed and ready to go to war if necessary. A warrior is one of those who has taken one or more scalps ; a brave is one who goes to war as a soldier, but as yet has taken no scalps, has killed no enemy. Taking the scalp is practised by all the American tribesmuch in the same way, and for the same objects, which, with the mode of taking it and using it, will be more fully described hereafter. From the Sioux mode of constructing their villages, which I have thus briefly explained, and to which we shall have occasion again to return, we will now take a glance at some other modes practised by other tribes living at great distances from them. The Assinneboins, the Crows, the Blackfoot, the Omahas, the Shiennes, the Camanchees, and yet several other tribes living in the vicinity of the herds of buffaloes, build their wigwams, and live much in the manner of the Sioux. All of these I would denominate "skin-builders." There are also the grass-builders, the dirt-builders, the bark-builders, and the timber-builders, and yet other builders, all of whom will be noticed in their proper places. How curious it is that these ingenious people, who have invented so many ways of constructing their dwellings, never yet have adopted the mode of build- ing with stone. This is probably not the result of ignorance or want of invention, but from their universal policy of leaving no monuments. All the GRASS-BUILDEES. 65 American tribes are more or less migratory ; and when they move, they destroy all their marks, by burning their wigwams, if they cannot take them with them, and " smoothing over the graves of their parents and children." The Pawnee-Picts (in their own language Tow-ee- ahge), a numerous tribe living on the head waters of the Ked River, in Western Texas, build their wig- wams by a sort of thatching of long prairie grass, over a frame of poles fastened in the ground and bent in at their tops ; the structure, when com- pleted, having much the shape and appearance of a straw beehive. This singular mode, which is only practised by that tribe, and partially so by the Kiowas and Wicos, smaller tribes subjugated by the Pawnee-Picts, is very convenient ; they are comfortable dwellings, 66 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. easily constructed, and easily demolished when they are left, by putting a fire-brand to them. The tribe of Mandans, on the Upper Missouri, the Pawnees of the Platte, the Minatarees, and the Riccarrees, are the only dirt-builders, and they all seem to construct their wigwams much in the same manner. These tribes, unlike the Sioux and other tribes living in skin tents, and who are constantly roaming about the country, live in permanent villages, and construct their wigwams with more labour and more strength, and uniformly fortify them against the assaults of their enemies, by the bank of a river on one side, and a stockade on the other. These wigwams are always made by excavating, in a cir- cular form, some three or four feet into the ground, for a foundation, from which they make a super- structure of round timbers lying against each other, BARK-BUILDERS AND TIMBER-BUILDERS. 67 the butt ends placed in the bottom of the excavation, and the smaller ends concentrating near the top, and supported within by beams resting on upright posts ; the whole is covered with willow-boughs, to preserve the dryness and soundness of the timbers; and covered again with a foot or two in thickness of a concrete of tough clay and gravel, permitting the whole family, dogs and all, to recline and gambol on the top of it in pleasant weather. In the Mandan village I measured several of these, and found the smallest to be forty-five feet, and many of them sixty feet in diameter. The fire is always built in the centre, with the smoke escaping at the apex, as seen in the illustrations. These, then, are the only modes of construction which are confined to any uniform shapes ; the wood- builders, and the bark-builders, and others, like the timber-builders and palm-builders in Central and South America, using a thousand different shapes in constructing with those materials. So much for the various modes in which these curious people live. We will now take a little further view of their personal appearance, and then proceed to their actions and usages, from which I intend you shall draw more amusement, and obtain important information in support of the character of these abused people, which, I have fearlessly said, entitles them to a high position amongst the families of the world. CHAPTER IV. Warriors "War Dress and War Paint War Weapons- Smoking the Shield Warfare War-Whoop War- Whistles Flags Scalps and Scalping Prisoners of War Calumet (Pipe of Peace). |OW, my little readers, we are soon coming to scenes and events that will be more excit- ing ; skip over nothing, but read every word as you pass along, for we are so far getting a foundation for what is to follow. Don't get im- patient for the description of Scalps and Scalping, for the Buffalo-hunts, the Dog-feasts, the Stone- man Medicine, the Thunders Nest, etc., but learn how the people look first ; and then, as I have said, we will more easily understand their actions. In the last chapter I have described to you the family of an American wild man, an officer of the highest rank, the head war-chief of his tribe, in full dress, with his wife and children around him ; and I now present to your acquaintance (Plate No. III.) three distinguished Indian warriors, in war dress and war paint, and equipped for war. These I have selected from amongst my numerous Dortraits painted 68 WARRIORS. 69 from the life, and from them you will be able to get faithful and lasting ideas of the appearance of that class of citizens who are found in all the tribes of the American Indians. These gallant young men were all my familiar and hospitable friends, whilst I was living amongst them ; and ready at all times to afford me any aid or facili- ties in their power ready to guard my property and life, even at the hazard of their own. With these fine young men I have smoked, wrestled, run races ; and in hunting with them I have confidently and safely trusted my life with them in our excursions over the prairies, and places far distant from their homes. These young men are warriors. Warriors, I have said, are those who have taken scalps. The leggings of these men were fringed with scalp-locks taken from their enemies' heads ; and yet they were the last of all people on earth to meddle with mine. Nothing, my young readers, that I can convey to you of Indian character and Indian modes can pos- sibly be more interesting and more important than the chapter I am now entering upon, of Indian warriors and Indian warfare the key, in fact, to Indian life and Indian doings yet to be described in the following chapters. Every Indian tribe is a separate community, sur- rounded by other tribes with whom they are generally at war, owing to several causes which don't exist to the same extent amongst civilized nations. They have no settled (but always disputed and imperfectly 70 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. defined) boundaries, over which their fierce hunting excursions often lead them, exposing them to the attacks of their enemies : another, and more frequent cause of warfare, is the popular ambition to signalise themselves, which is felt amongst all Indian warriors, who have but the one mode to rise to enviable dis- tinction in their tribes, that of being a great warrior. I have already said that every tribe has its civil and its military, or war chief, and that all the young men are warriors and braves. In war, the war-chief takes the command, and without the least compul- sory power leads his warriors, who are all volunteers, and at liberty to desert the chief at any time, if they are willing to meet the disgrace that attaches to them on their return. Of the three warriors shown in Plate II. No. 1 represents Om-pa-ton-ga (the Big Elk), an Omaha warrior, dressed, and armed, and painted for war with his bow and several arrows clenched in his hand, and always ready at an instant his buffalo robe, with his battles painted on it, wrapped around him and his quiver slung on his back, filled with arrows. No. 2. Seekh-hee-de (the Mouse-coloured Feather), a Mandan warrior, in war costume and war paint his bow and arrows ready, and his quiver slung on his back ; he wears a necklace made of the huge paw of a grizzly bear, and his leggings are fringed with scalp-locks. No. 3. Loo-ra-wee-re-coo (the Bird that goes to War), a Pawnee warrior, in war paint and war cos- WAR DRESS AND WAR PAINT. 71 tume with bow and arrows, and shield, and quiver, and his spear in his left hand ; his body is curiously ornamented with his war paint ; his ankle ornaments are strings of antelopes' hoofs, which make a frightful rattling noise when he dances or walks ; he wears a beautiful kilt made of eagles' quills, and his head is shaved (according to the uniform custom of the tribe) and ornamented with a beautiful red crest made of the hair of the deer's tail dyed red, and horse-hair; in shape much re- sembling a Grecian helmet. " War dress and war paint" here, is something very curious. It is the invariable custom of the warriors of all Indian tribes in America, to go to war in war dress and war paint ; the first consist- ing in a mode of dressing the person just as each individual may fancy for himself, so as to afford the greatest facility for the free use of his weapons ; and, in fact, most generally amounting to (nearly) no dress at all And the second, his limbs being chiefly naked, consisting of a thick daubing or streaking of red and white clay, vermilion, and charcoal, mixed with bears' grease, covering various parts of his body and limbs, as well as his face, sometimes half black and half red, and at other times the whole face black, in such a manner as even to be disguised, oftentimes, from his own familiar friends. Each warrior has some peculiar and known way of painting, by which he is recognised by his fellow- warriors, at a distance at which they would not dis- tinguish him from his comrades from the natural 72 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. differences, so great is their resemblance in the open air when naked and in action. It was one of the curious and unaccountable facts that I met with in my travels, that I never in any instance was able to get a warrior to stand for his portrait until he had spent the requisite time at his toilette (oftentimes from sunrise until eleven or twelve o'clock) to arrange himself in his war dress and war paint. And I also everywhere learned that allwarriors apprehended through life, with thegreatest solicitude, the possibility and the misfortune of losing their lives when they are not in their war paint. The principal arms (or weapons) of all the Ameri- can tribes are seen in the portraits of these three warriors their bows and arrows. Their bows are short and light, for easy and effective handling on horseback ; but they have great power, being mostly covered on the backs with layers of buffalo sinews, giving them great elasticity. Their arrows are mostly pointed with flints, broken in so ingenious a manner, with a point and two sharp edges, as to enable them to enter the flesh of the buffaloes or their enemies, on whichsoever they may use them. These arrows are carried in a quiver slung on the back, and generally made of the skins of animals adapted in shape and size to hold them. When not in service, their arrows are carried in the quiver with the points downwards, for protection ; but when they are going into battle, the arrows are reversed, leaving the points standing out, being thus more ready to be drawn suddenly and without obstruction. SMOKING THE SHIELD. 73 Besides the bow and arrow, the tomahawk, already shown and explained, and war clubs of various shapes and materials, and lances, are used in war- fare, and shields carried on the left arm for protec- tion. These shields are carried by every horseman, completing his dress and equipments, completely in the classic style of the ancient Koman and Grecian cavalry. These shields are invariably made of the skin of the buffalo's neck, the thickest part of the hide ; tanned and hardened in such a manner with the glue remaining in them, that they are proof against arrows, and even against a gun shot when held obliquely, which they do with great skill. They paint and ornament these shields in a great variety of ways, and add to their picturesque appearance by suspending eagle quills and other beautiful plumes from them, and oftentimes painting the representation of their medicine bags upon them. ("Medicine bags " you will understand in a few moments.) " Smoking the Shield" Have you ever heard of " Smoking the Shield ? " I believe not. Why, it is one of the grandest and. most imposing ceremonies to be seen in the Indian countries. Let's see. An Indian lad is old enough to go to war he is sixteen or eighteen years old he wants a shield "must have one can't go to war without one. Can he buy one ? He might, perhaps, but " it won't protect him if he does " he must make it for himself and how ? He must kill the buffalo bull with his own hand. With a gun ? No ; a smaller boy than he can do 74 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. that : he must kill it with an arrow, and take the hide off with his own hand ; and then Well, then what ? Why, he has got to make his shield. Can he do this privately, and at his leisure ? No ; Indian soldiers are counted by their shields. Indian war- riors are the property of their nation. Can any Indian lad secretly enlist, and make himself a war- rior ? Have they any newspapers to announce their enrolments ? No : the making of a warrior is a public act, and must be made in a public way : the warriors help in this. In the great Camanchee village, in 1836, I was invited to go and see the " Smoking a Shield." An immense crowd was assembled a little out of the village, within which a circle, of a hundred feet or more in diameter, was preserved by a line marked on the ground. In the centre of this circle a young man had dug a hole in the ground, and over it, stretched horizontally, a little elevated above the surface, the bit of bull's hide, of which he was to forge his shield, tightly strained by a great many pins driven into the ground, and a fire burning in the excavation underneath, while the glue extracted from the buffalo's hoofs, and spread over the skin, was frying and roasting into it, to give it the hard- ness and stiffness required. To witness this ceremony, which they call "smoking (or roasting) the shield," in order to insure its success, and legitimately to publish its owner's change from the phase of boyhood to that of warrior, all the warriors of the village had assem- WARFARE. 75 bled at his invitation, in full war dress and war paint, with their shields on their arms, who formed in rings within rings, and danced in circles around the roasting shield; and each one passed it brandishing their war clubs, their tomahawks, and shields over it, vaunting forth the wonderful effici- ency of their own, and invoking the " fire-spirit " to give strength and hardness enough to that of the young warrior, to guard and protect him from the weapons of his enemies. Was he then a warrior ? No ; his shield finished, he was a brave a soldier ; and this ceremony his enlistment no more. He can go to war, as you have been told. If he can take a scalp, he then becomes a warrior. All the American tribes may properly be said to be warlike. I have explained the principal causes of their wars, and a book might yet be written on their modes of conducting and ending them. Their arms, as I have shown, are not numerous, nor so destructive as those used by civilized nations ; and consequently their wars are not so devastating. Warfare amongst those people is generally con- ducted by small parties who volunteer under a war- chief, to avenge some wrong or cruelty inflicted by their enemy; and when a few scalps are taken, sufficient for retaliation, they generally return, make a great boast, and entertain the villagers with the scalp dance and other ceremonies. As these people have fewer and less efficient weapons, they depend somewhat more upon strategy to gain advantages than white men do ; and in these 76 LIffE AMONG SHE INDIANS. they are beyond all conception ingenious and inventive. In the warfare waged between these people and civilized forces, the Indians are often condemned for their strategy, as "cowardly," because they prefer secret ambuscades and surprises, instead of coming out into the open field and " taking a fair fight " (i.e., coming out and standing before the cannon's mouth, and being shot down like pigeons). This is wrong ; the poor Indians know the advantages which white men have, with their rifles, and revolvers, and cannons, in the open field ; and their refusal to stand before them and be cut down, under such circumstances, should be called prudence rather than cowardice. There are no people on earth more courageous and brave than the American Indians, if they can only be assured that they are contending with an enemy with equal weapons. Their sagacity in tracing or reconnoitring an enemy, and evading pursuit if necessary, is almost beyond the reach of comprehension for those not familiar with their modes. Their signals in war are many, and very intelligent as well as curious. The world-wide notorious (but partially appreciated) war-whoop (or war-cry) is one of these, and is given by all the tribes, both in North and South America, precisely alike, when rushing into battle. It is a shrill and piercing note, sounded long, and with a swell, on the highest key of the voice, with the most rapid vibration possible, WAR-WHOOP WAR-WHISTLES. 77 made by the striking of the flat of the hand or the fingers against the lips. There is nothing so very frightful in the sound itself, for many sounds can be produced by the human voice, in themselves far more terrifying than the war-whoop ; but none other, perhaps, that could be heard so far, and so distinctly in the din and confusion of battle. It is the associations of those who know its meaning and its character, that give it its terror; its being known to be the infallible signal for attack the war-whoop never being sounded until the rush is made, and weapons are raised for shedding blood. A person not accustomed to Indian modes might listen to the war-whoop as the Indians were rushing on to him, without alarm, when others, aware of its meaning, would shudder at its sound. No Indian is allowed to sound the war-whoop in time of peace, except in the war-dance and other ceremonies countenanced by the chiefs, lest it should be echoed by their sentinels on the hill tops and their hunting parties through their country, raising an unnecessary and disastrous alarm. Another signal is the war-whistle, which is very curious. Every chief leading in war carries a little whistle of six or eight inches in length, made of the bone of a turkey's leg, the two ends of which have two very different sounds, so shrill and so piercing, and so different from the mingled war-cry and other din in battles, that they can be distinctly heard an immense distance ; blowing in one end is the signal 78 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. for " advance on on ; " and in the other for retreat. No chief goes into battle without one of these little war-whistles suspended from his neck and hanging on his breast ; and no warrior goes to war without knowing the distinction and meaning of these sounds. Flags also are used as war-signals. The white flag is in all tribes a flag of truce, an emblem of peace, and a red flag the challenge to combat. How curious is this ! All savages are found using the white flag, and advance with it even into their enemies' ranks, in the midst of battle, their lives sacred and protected under it, the same as in civilized nations. How strange (not that the Indians should use it, for civilized nations have brought the custom out of savage life) ; but how strange that the native races of all the world should use the same colour as the emblem of peace ; and as sacred and inviolable, even in the din and rage of battle ! Has an Ameri- can Indian ever been known to violate the sacredness of the white flag in time of war? No. Have Christian nations ever done so in their wars with the Indians ? We shall see. Such a disgraceful act would be strategy 1 No ; its better name would be " treachery'." But then the "savage cruelty of scalping!" savage, of course, because savages do it ; but where is the cruelty of scalping ? A piece of the skin of a man's head is cut off after he is dead ; it don't hurt him ; the cruelty would be in killing ; and in the Christian world we kill hundreds of our fellow beings SCALPS AND SCALPING. 79 in battle where the poor Indians kill one ! Cutting off a small piece of the skin of a dead man's head is rather a disgusting thing ; but let us look What better can the Indian take? He must keep some record. These people have no reporters to follow them into battles, and chronicle their victories to the world; their customs sanction the mode, and the chiefs demand it. If civilized warriors should treat their fallen victims thus, it would be far worse. There would be no motive or apology for it. It would be almost as bad as taking their watch, or the gold from their pockets ! But the Indians scalp the living? Yes, that sometimes happens, but very rarely. The scalp being only the skin with the hair, a man might be scalped without injuring the bone, and, of course, without destroying life; and in the hurry and confusion of battle, the wounded and fallen, sup- posed to be dead, have sometimes been scalped, as the Indians were rushing over them, and have after- wards risen from the field of battle and recovered. I have seen several such. These scalps, if the Indian should ever be made aware of the fact, would not be carried; but would be buried, as things which warriors would not have a right to claim, and which their superstitious fears would induce them to get rid of. The scalp, to be a genuine one, must be from an enemy's head, and that enemy dead, and killed by the hand of him who carries and counts the scalp. 80 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. An Indian may have sufficient provocation to justify mm, under the customs of his country, in slaying a man in his own tribe ; but he would disgrace himself in such case by taking the scalp. Scalps are the Indian's badges or medals, which he must procure by his own hand ; he can neither buy nor sell them without disgracing himself ; and when he dies, they are buried in his grave with him ; his sons can't inherit them ; if they want scalps, they must procure them in the same way as their father got his. Prisoners of war are made in savage warfare as well as in civilized nations. The cruelty of savages to their prisoners is sometimes terrible, but this has been much exaggerated. Their modes of torturing prisoners of war, in the few instances that we know of, have been cruel and diabolical, almost beyond the reach of imagination ; but these occurrences nave been but very rare at any time, and for the last half-century have not been heard of at all. All tribes exchange prisoners, precisely as is the practice in civilized nations, as far as equal exchanges can be made ; the remainder of those not exchanged are adopted into the tribe, where they are captives ; and as far as there are widows of warriors who have been killed in battle, these prisoners are compelled to marry them and support them and their children; the surplus are adopted into the tribe, with all the rights and privileges of other citizens, and go to war with them, and make reliable and efficient warriors, even against their own nation. CALUMET (PIPE OP PEACE). 81 The torturing of prisoners is therefore nowhere a general custom, nor a frequent mode, as the world has been led to believe. In the isolated cases which have been known, the relations of persons who have been cruelly tortured by the enemy's tribe, have demanded of the chiefs one or two of the prisoners taken, to wreak their revenge upon ; and the chiefs, after a long deliberation and hearing of the grounds of the claim, have handed over the prisoners demanded, to the women related to the person or persons who have suffered; and their modes of cruelty have, in some cases, no doubt, been as cruel and fiendish as the accounts we have heard of them. Wars are ended, and treaties of peace made amongst the Indian tribes, much in the same manner as amongst civilized nations ; but from the causes above named, peace establishments amongst them are less solid, and of less duration. The chiefs and warriors come together in treaties under the white flag, and take their seats in two semicircles on the ground, facing each other, each warrior having his head decorated with two eagle's quills, one white, and the other blood red, informing their enemies that they are ready for war or for peace. In these treaties the calumet (or pipe of peace) is used. The calumet is strictly a sacred pipe, differing in appearance and in its uses from all others. It is public property, and always kept in the possession of the chief, and only used on such occasions. 82 LIFE AMONG THE INDIANS. For this purpose, in the centre of the circle formed by the chiefs and warriors seated in treaty, the calumet rests in two little crotches, charged with tobacco, and ready to be smoked when the treaty stipulations are agreed upon ; when each chief, and after him, each warrior of the two tribes, in turn, draw one whiff of smoke through the sacred stem, as the solemn engagement to abide by the terms of the treaty. These treaties are all verbal, of course, as they have no means of recording them ; and the smoking through the sacred stem is equivalent to the " signing " of a treaty, which they are unable to do in writing. CHAPTEE V. Medicine Men Looking at the Sun Medicine Wedding- Bain Makers Rain Stoppers Medicine Lodge The " Great White Medicine "Medicine Bag. |NDIAN life has many phases, and here we suddenly enter upon a new and a different chapter. Amongst ignorant, and consequently superstitious, people, mysteries are so mixed up with the actions and thoughts of their lives, that it is necessary we should know something of them fully to understand the people and their customs. The American Indians are all more or less superstitious, and all have their physicians, who deal in roots, and herbs, and other specifics, and also pretend to great and marvellous cures by mysteries, or a kind of sorcery, which they practise as the last resort with their patients, when all the other attempted remedies have failed. These Indian doctors were called by the French- men, who were the first traders on the frontiers, " Me'decins" the French word for physicians ; and by 83