GATSCIIET KAS. LEG. COMMENTARY. [71] 39 



thunder, and sometimes the lightning).* Compare also the name of the 

 Blue-Mouths and what is said of these legendary people p. 35. 



White is among American Indians,! just as it is with us, obviously, 

 symbolic for peace, good-will, friendship, innocence, and purity. Among 

 the Dakota it points to consecration when seen upon the plumage of birds. 

 Among the Maskoki the white feathers of the eagle meant peace and 

 friendship : at the installation of Milfort as the nation's Great Warrior, 

 one of the mikalgi presented him with a white tobacco-pouch made of a 

 swan's skin, its white color indicating peace and friendship of the Creeks 

 with the French nation. J The white path and the red path are often re- 

 ferred to in the legend ; the white arrows are placed in opposition to the 

 arrows painted red; spittle is white, and therefore a sign of peace also. 

 White sand was sprinkled over the area of the square on the first festive 

 day of the busk. White ashes were rubbed over the body as part of a re- 

 ligious ceremony, and the uses to which other white objects were applied 

 are to be found vol.i. 181. For certain ceremonial dances of the Southern 

 Indians, the body-paint in use was white; it was called kiipshesh by the 

 Shetimasha. The official title of the Tatars and Tunguses for the czar 

 of Russia and other rulers, is the -white czar, viz., ''the good, peaceful 

 ruler." 



Red meant contest and -war, and is clearly symbolized in the red ox 

 kipdya towns of the Maskoki proper. Red was suggested, as the Cha'hta 

 governor, Allen Wright, explains it, by the red flush of the a?igry warri- 

 or's face, which is conspicuous even when the Indian's skin is of a very 

 dark complexion. Red as a war-emblem is frequently met with in our 

 legend and in traditions of Southern tribes. The pillars sustaining the 

 cabin-roofs of the red towns were painted alternately red and white; the 

 bones of the "man-eater" were red on one side and blue on the other; the 

 scalp-pole (itu tchati, red pole), v/hxch could be raised by two tribes only, 

 was painted red. and gave origin to the terms "Red-stickers," *' Red-stick 

 war''; cf. i. 77. The tribal name of the Huma contains this epithet; the 

 gate and the interior of the Taensa temple of worship were painted red, 

 when seen in 1682; cf. Margry, Decouvertes, i. 567. The body-paint in 

 use for certain dances was a red one. The pillar dividing the territory of 

 the Huma from that of the Bayogoula was painted in the same color (i. 

 114). To the Sioux and Southern Dakotan tribes red symbolizes not war 

 only, but also the sun, the forms of animal and vegetable life, and the 

 procreative power. To the same tribes yelloiv represents the sunlight as 

 distinguished from the fructifying energy of the sun.|| By some tribes of 

 Central and South America the face of the sun-god is painted white; by 

 others, red, ruddy, or yellow. 



* Alice C. Fletcher, in Rep. Peabody Museum, iii. p. 285. 



t Bradford, Amer. Antiq., 189 (quoted by G. Brilhl, Alt- Amerika, p. 215). 



X Milfort, Memoire, p. 211. 



II Rep. Peabody Museum, iii. p. 285, note. On ffree?i, cf. p. 81, note 8. 



