CHAPTER XLII.

SKETCH OF THE SIOUX INDIANS - HOW THEY NURSED THEIR INFANTS

- LEAVING THEIR OLD AND INFIRM TO DIE FROM STARVATION THE PECULIARITIES OF THE RED-PIPE STONE QUARRY-SUPERSTITIONS OF THE SIOUX REGARDING THE PIPE STONE -- THE BUFFALO HUNT.

THE SIOUX Or Dacotas, were at one time the most widely diffused tribe of Indians of the West. Their territory extended far west to the country of the Blackfeet, and from the Missouri in the south to the Upper Mississippi in the north. They subsisted entirely by hunting and fishing, using, until a recent date, the native weapons of their race. One of the most remarkable traits in their character was the strength of maternal affection. According to their custom, their infants were carried for the first six or seven months of their existence, strapped firmly to a board, the hands and feet only being left at liberty. A small hoop was placed over their faces, so. that in case they should fall, no injury would be sustained. This contrivance, or rude cradle, was almost always neatly ornamented with fringe or embroidery. The whole was suspended upon the back of the mother by a strap, which passed around over her forehead. After the child has reached this age it is loosened and nursed in the folds of the mother's blanket or robe. If the infant dies during the time that is allotted to it to be carried in this cradle, it is buried, and the disconsolate mother fills the cradle with black quills and feathers, in the parts which the child's body had occupied, and in this way carries it around with her wherever she goes for a year or more, with as much care as if her infant were alive and in it; and she often lays or stands it against the side of the wigwam, where she is all day engaged with her needle-work, and chatting and talking to it as famil

her loved infant, instead So lasting and so strong

iarly and affectionately as if it were of its shell, that she was talking to. is the affection of these women for the lost child, that it matters not how heavy or cruel their load, or how rugged the route they have to pass over, they will faithfully carry this, and carefully, from day to day, and even more strictly perform their duties to it, than if the child were alive and in it.

One of the most cruel customs among the Sioux was that of leaving their old and infirm to die alone, exposed and unattended. The old sufferers not only assented to this proceeding, but generally suggested it when conscious that they were no longer able to support themselves. They were generally left with a slight protection over them, with a little food by their side, to die, or be devoured by the hungry wolves. It was in the country of the Sioux at the southern extremity of the high ridge, called the Coteau des Prairies, which lies between the head waters of the St. Peter's and Missouri, that the far-famed quarry of red pipe-stone was situated. Pipes made from this stone were common among all the Western tribes. The stone was obtained by digging to a depth of several feet in the prairie at the foot of a precipitous wall of quartz rocks. The geological formation of this spot presents a singular phenomenon, and the pipe-stone is of itself a singular material. It is said to be harder than gypsum, and softer than carbonate of lime, and is different from any other metal ever discovered by geologists. The component materials of this stone, according to the analysis of Dr. Jackson, of Boston, are as follows: " water, 8,4; silica, 48,2; alumina, 28.2; magnesia, 6.0; carbonate of lime, 2.6; peroxide of iron, 5.0; oxide of manganese, 0.6."

"The Indians," says Mr. Brownell, in his valuable book, "use the stone only in the manufacture of pipes; to apply it to any other use they esteem the most unheard-of sacrilege. From the affinity of its color to that of their own skins, they draw some fanciful legend of its formation, at the time of the great deluge, out of the flesh of the perishing red men. They esteem it one of the choicest gifts of the Great Spirit."

The following extracts from the speeches of Sioux orators, will give the reader a good idea of how highly, and in what

light the savages appreciated this stone: "You see," said one (holding a red pipe to the side of his naked arm,) "that this pipe is a part of our flesh. The red men are a part of the red

stone."

Another says, "If the white men take away a piece of the red pipe-stone, it is a hole made in our flesh, and the blood will always run. We cannot stop the blood from running. The Great Spirit has told us that the red stone is only to be used for pipes, and through them we are to smoke to him."

We find another Sioux saying: "We love to go to the PipeStone, and get a piece for our pipes; but we ask the Great Spirit first. If the white men go to it, they will take it out, and not fill up the holes again, and the Great Spirit will be offended."

And still another: "My friends, listen to me! what I am about to say will be truth. I bought a large piece of the pipestone, and gave it to a white man to make a pipe; he was our trader, and I wished him to have a good pipe. The next time I went to his store, I was unhappy when I saw that stone made into a dish! This is the way the white men would use the red pipe-stone if they could get it. Such conduct would offend the Great Spirit, and make a red man's heart sick."

Buffalo hunting was the principal occupation of the Sioux, and in this pursuit they were not excelled by any other Western tribe. They used horses, a wild breed extensively spread over the Western country, the descendants of those originally brought over by the Spaniards in the sixteenth century, and were excellent horsemen, These animals were superior in speed to any animals on the Western prairies. Numbers of them were kept about the encampment of the Indians, hoppled, so as to prevent their straying away. Upon the open prairie, the buffalo were generally pursued on horseback, the Indians being armed with the lance and bow and arrow. The Indian would generally ride furiously on until he came within a few feet of his prey, and then discharging his arrow with great force into its side, would follow it with his lance, which generally proved fatal. This pursuit was not without danger, for oftimes both horse and rider would fall a prey to the dangerous

animal. Yet such was the excitement of the savages while in the chase, that they seemed to be regardless of all danger. In the winter season the buffalo hunt was managed on a different plan. They were generally driven from the high ridges, where they had gathered to feed upon the herbage, into the snow-covered prairies, where, floundering in the deep snow, they were soon overtaken by the savages on their snow shoes, and picked off by the arrow and lance. "When buffaloes are plenty," says the author from whom I have just quoted, "and the Indians have fair opportunity, the most astonishing and wasteful slaughter ensues. Besides the ordinary methods of destruction, the custom of driving immense herds over some precipitous ledge, where those behind trample down and thrust over the foremost, until hundreds and thousands are destroyed, has been often described."

Some early writers have severely censured savage improvidence in this regard, on the grounds that in a few years they would be left without the means of subsistence. But we have lived to see the Indians imprudently destroyed, long before they had killed half the buffaloes of the Western prairies.

CHAPTER XLIII.

THE CROWS AND THE BLACKFEET-THEIR MYTHS AND THEIR WARSCHARACTERISTICS OF THESE TRIBES -INTERESTING INCIDENTS.

WE NOW Come to notice the tribes upon the Yellowstone and the head waters of the Missouri. Among the most noted of these were the Crows and the Blackfeet, and their neighbors and enemies, the Ojibwas, Knisteneaux, and Assinaboins. In 1834, the numbers of the Blackfeet exceeded twenty thousand, but the small-pox, in 1838, reduced their number to about thirteen thousand. The Blackfeet, being farthest removed from the influences of civilization, presented many fine specimens of the Indian race. They were of manly proportions, active, and capable of great endurance. Their dress was both comfortable and ornamental, "bedecked with all the embroidery and fixings characteristic of savage finery." Their dwellings, means of subsistence, customs, etc., were so nearly like those tribes already mentioned that any particulars concerning them in this place will be superfluous. There were, however, a few points of difference which I shall not fail to mention. Their lodges were generally made of buffalo skins, supported by firm poles, which they brought from the distant mountains. The skins were strongly stitched together, and highly ornamented. The tents were easily moved by making the poles into one bundle and the skins into another.

Among these very remote tribes might have been found at a late day many of the ancient superstitous observances of their race, retained with all their original solemnity. One of the most singular of these, says Mr. Brownell, is the preparation of the "medicine-bag," which every man carried with him upon all occasions, as being intricately involved with his own safety and success in war, hunting, or any of the occuptions