SOURCE OP ST. Peter's river. 217 



(on the borders of a lake^) that living on fish, which they 

 got in the lake in great plenty, they gave them the name of 

 PuantSj because all along the shore where their cabins are 

 built, one saw nothing but stinking fish which infected the 

 air." 



In a manuscript narrative of a journey from Bellefon- 

 taine on the Missouri to the Falls of St. Anthony, and to 

 the Wisconsan portage, performed in 1817, by Major Long, 

 we have observed the following account of their mode of 

 conveying information by a sort of hieroglyphic writing. 



" When we stopped," says Major Long, " to dine, 

 White Thunder, (the Winnebago chief that accompanied 

 me,) suspecting that the rest of his party were in the 

 neighbourhood, requested a piece of paper, pen and ink, to 

 communicate to them the intelligence of his having come 

 up with me. He then seated himself and drew three rude 

 figures, which at my request he explained to me. The first 

 represented my boat with a mast and flag, with three 

 benches of oars and a helmsman ; to show that we were 

 Americans, our heads were represented by a rude cross, 

 indicating that we wore hats. The representation of him- 

 self was a rude figure of a bear over a kind of cypher re- 

 presenting a hunting ground. The second figure was de- 

 signed to show that his wife was with him ; the device 

 was a boat with a squaw seated in it; over her head lines 

 were drawn in a zigzag direction, indicating that she was 

 the wife of White Thunder. The third was a boat with a 

 bear sitting at the helm, showing that an Indian of that 

 name had been seen on his way up the river, and had given 

 intelligence, where the party were. This paper he set up 

 at the mouth of Kickapoo creek, up which the party had 

 gone on a hunting trip."* 



* Major Long's MS. Journal of a voyage, &c. 1817, No. 1, folio 27. 

 Vol. I. 28 



