SOURCE OP ST. Peter's river. 159 



souls all are treated according to their merits. Those who 

 have been good men are free from pain ; they have no du- 

 ties to perform ; their time is spent in dancing and singing, 

 and tiiey feed upon mushrooms which are very abundant. 

 The souls of bad men are haunted by the phantoms of the 

 persons or things that they have injured ; thus, if a man 

 has destroyed much property, the phantoms of the wrecks 

 of this property obstruct his passage wherever he goes ; if 

 he has been cruel to his dogs or hoi'ses, they also torment 

 him after death; the ghosts of those, whom during his life- 

 time he wronged, are there permitted to avenge their in- 

 juries. They think that when a soul has crossed the 

 stream it cannot return to its body, yet they believe in ap- 

 paritions, and entertain the opinion that the spirits of the 

 departed will frequently revisit the abodes of their friends, 

 in order to invite them to the other world, and to forewarn 

 them of their approaching dissolution. 



The usual mode of disposing of their dead consists in 

 interring them. It has been observed that the Chippewa 

 graves are always dug very deep, at least six or eight 

 feet ; whereas the Dacotas make but shallow graves. 

 Great respect is paid by the Chippewas to the corpses of 

 their distinguished men ; they are wrapped up in cloths, 

 blankets, or bark, and raised on scaffolds. We heard of a 

 very distinguished chief of theirs, who died upwards of 

 forty years since, and was deposited on a scaffold near Fort 

 Charlotte, the former grand depot of the North-west Com- 

 pany. When the company were induced to remove their 

 depot to the mouth of the Kamanatekwoya, and construct 

 Fort William, the Indians imagined that it would be un- 

 becoming the dignity of their friend to rest any where but 

 near a fort ; they therefore conveyed his remains to Fort 

 William, erected a scaffold near it. and upon it they placed 



