FLINT IMPLEMENTS AND FOSSIL REMAINS. 249 



correspondence with the Indian agent for the Osage tribe make it cer- 

 tain that they alone were largely, if not wholly, responsible for the 

 deposit. 



The following- paragraph is quoted from a letter from Mr. O. A. 

 Mitscher, Indian agent at Pawhuska, Indian Territory, to Dr. II. II. 

 Harper, of Afton, who had written making inquiries: 



Sir: Referring to your letter of the 7th instant relative to a certain spring located 

 between Afton and Miami, in which were found numerous large teeth, about live 

 hundred arrow points or spearheads, etc, asking me to learn from the Osage 

 Indians what, if anything, these signified, I have the honor to report that I submit- 

 ted this matter to old man lied Eagle, the oldest man in the Osage tribe, who dis- 

 tinctly remembers the spring, and states that it used to be the meeting place of the 

 old medicine men of the tribe when he was a young man; that the spring was held 

 as a sacred place, and the doctors met there to hold their councils. 



The arrow-points or spearheads were worn by the medicine men as medals. It 

 was the custom of the tribe to offer the spearheads and other tokens to appease 

 nature or their gods by depositing them in the spring, which they considered holy 

 ground. This custom was observed whenever the tribe went on the warpath, to 

 insure victory; when a child was born, to secure blessings for the child; and for 

 any unusual undertaking, to make it successful. These deposits of tokens in the 

 springs were also good-luck offerings. 



The spring was usually a shrine resorted to by the old-time Indians to commune 

 with the unseen world. This custom, however, is not now in vogue, and has not 

 been practiced by the Indians for some time. 



I am assured by Red Eagle that wdien he was a boy, and before the white people 

 intermingled with the Indians, it was the practice of the medicine men and the 

 leaders to gather at these springs for the purpose of holding councils, etc. 



Some of the tribes farther west seem to have had similar practices, 

 and instances of sacrifice to springs are recorded. Mr. F. H. Cashing- 

 and Dr. Walter Hough report the ceremonial ust 1 of springs in vari- 

 ous localities, and Mr. Thomas Ewbank speaks of a sacred spring' 

 near Zuni, New Mexico, as follows: 



The spring is cleared out every year, when an offering is made to the spirit of the 

 font of one or more waterpots, which are placed on the wall. A dozen or more 

 whole ones were observed, while fragments abounded. Some of the remaining 

 vases are reputed to have been offered centuries ago by the pueblo caciques. Spec- 

 imens were brought away, notwithstanding the tradition that whoever abstracted 

 one would be struck by lightning. As the Zufii Indians do not have recourse to 

 artificial irrigation, they depend entirely on rain; and it is their belief that if they 

 neglected the annual ceremonies at the spring their crops would be destroyed by 

 drought." 



Early in 1893 some Navaho Indians brought to Mr. T. V. Keam, 

 the trader at Keams Canyon, in northeastern Arizona, several speci- 

 mens of antique pottery which they had uncovered while digging- for 

 water at a point about 5 miles from the trading post. Mr. Keam had 

 the Indians continue the work, with the result that in the course of a 

 week's digging they unearthed several hundred specimens of ancient 



"Ewbank, Report on Indian Tribes, Pacific Railroad Surveys, 111, 1856, pp. 44-4"). 



