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arrived at their village, a council of the braves is held to hear his message, 

 and to determine whether they will open and smoke his tobacco. He makes 

 his speech, states the wrongs suffered by his tribe, tells the number of 

 blankets, horses, and robes that will be paid them for their services, and 

 awaits their answer. If they determine to accept his offer, the tobacco is 

 opened and smoked ; they are then bound by the strongest tics to meet 

 at the rendezvous, and to fulfil their engagements ; if they foil so to do, they 

 are scorned and derided by the other tribes. On their arrival at the ap- 

 pointed place, the articles promised, are handed over to the partisnas or 

 leaders of the different bands in solemn council, and as there will not be 

 enough for every one, the leader, if he is generous, will give these things to 

 those of his band who are poor and have none. On the contrary, should 

 they decline the offer of this ambassador, his tobacco and pipe are returned 

 to him unopened, and he is dismissed with some present. 



The Sioux language is said to be as flexible as our own, having many 

 diff'erent forms for expressing the same idea. They have inflexions of 

 nouns and verbs, but no genders ; it is said to be a more difficult language 

 to acquire, than either the Blackfoot or Crow tongue. Every day seems to 

 develope something interesting relative to the Indians, and a careful ob- 

 server could, in a year or two, collect a volume of valuable facts relative to 

 their habits and languages. 



Thursday, May 30. — This morning at breakfast, I was glad to learn 

 that the carts from the Cheyenne Indians were in sight, and soon afterward 

 was relieved of a good deal of anxiety by seeing them unload my specimens 

 from the Bad Lands. They all came safely, except some of the bags, which 

 had been torn by wolves which had opened the cache, eaten up all the par- 

 fleche, and opened the bags in search of something more palatable, but the 

 unkind bags gave them stones when they asked for meat. I think a number 

 of the small pieces of petrified wood were lost. A part of the morning was 

 passed in packing the specimens in boxes, and soon I had the pleasure of 

 seeing one large box well filled, marked T. A. Culbertson ; another box is 

 also nearly full. Afterwards I prepared a long report to Professor Baird. 

 While engaged in writing it, I heard a gun fired in the yard, and a noise as 

 if a large number of persons had arrived. 



On going to the window, I saw a large band of Indians on horseback, pre- 

 ceded by several on foot, bearing two flags — the stars and stripes ; it was 

 a band of the Blackfeet tribe of Sioux. They had just arrived with about 

 fifty lodges, and, while squaws were putting up these, the "Braves" come 

 to announce themselves. They dismounted and entered the reception room 

 with a friendly shake of the hand to most of the whites present. A feast 

 was ordered for them. In the middle of the room were placed four (five gal- 

 lon) kettles, filled with most tempting mush, and beside these, to keep them 

 in countenance, were two others, equally large, filled with equally tempting 

 coffee, already sweetened, while on the floor were fifty large hard crackers, 

 (pilot bread) and about one-hundred plugs of very common tobacco. The 

 Indians were all around the room on chairs, if they could get them, while 

 those in the middle sat on the floor, enjoying the most happy anticipations. 

 They had no meat in their camps and had been almost starving for some time. 

 I entered and placed myself full length on a bed beside Gilpin, who was 

 master of the feast. While the company were detained, waiting for the ar- 

 rival of one of the young men, I took observations ; and first, I noticed that 

 they had all the gravity of countenance usually exhibited by hungry men of 



