680 THE GHOST-DANCE RELIGION [eth.ann.14 



the tribe the Ojibwa gathered in great numbers, to dance the dances 

 and sing the songs of the new ritual, until a message was received 

 from the prophet inviting them to come to him at Detroit, where he 

 would explain in person the will of the Master of Life. This was in 

 1808. The excitement was now at fever heat, and it was determined 

 to go in a body to Detroit. It is said that 150 canoe loads of Ojibwa 

 actually started on this pilgrimage, and one family even brought with 

 them a dead child to be restored to life by the prophet. They had pro- 

 ceeded a considerable distance when they were met by an influential 

 French trader, who reported, on the word of some who had already 

 visited the prophet's camp and returned, that the devotees there were 

 on the brink of starvation — which was hue, as the great multitude 

 had consumed their entire supply of provisions, and had been so occu- 

 pied with religious ceremonies that they had neglected to plant their 

 corn. It was also asserted that during the prophet's frequent periods 

 of absence from the camp, when he would disappear for several days, 

 claiming on his return that he had been to the spirit world in converse 

 with the Master of Life, that he was really concealed in a hollow log in 

 the woods. This is quite probable, and entirely consistent with the 

 Indian theory of trances and soul pilgrimages while the body remains 

 unconscious in one spot. These reports, however, put such a damper 

 on the ardor of the Ojibwa that they returned to their homes and 

 gradually ceased to think about the new revelation. As time went on 

 a reaction set in, and those who had been most active evangelists of the 

 doctrine among the tribe became most anxious to efface the remem- 

 brance of it. One good, however, resulted to the Ojibwa from the 

 throwing away of the poisonous compounds formerly in common use 

 by the lower order of doctors, and secret poisoning became almost 

 unknown. ( Warren, 2.) 



When tin' celebrated traveler Catlin went among the prairie tribes 

 some thirty years later, he found that the prophet's emissaries — he says 

 the prophet himself, which is certainly a mistake — had carried the living 

 fire, the sacred image, and the mystic strings (see portrait and descrip- 

 tion) even to the Blackfeet on the plains of the Saskatchewan, going 

 without hindrance among warring tribes where the name of the Sha- 

 wano had never been spoken, protected only by the reverence that 

 attached to their priestly character. There seems no doubt that by 

 this time they had developed the plan of a confederacj for driving back 

 the whites, and Catlin asserts that thousands of warriors among those 

 remote tribes had pledged themselves to light under the lead of Tecum- 

 tha at the proper time. His account of the prophet's methods in the 

 extreme northwest agrees witli what Tanner has reported from the 

 Ojibwa country. {Catlin, I.) But disaster followed him like a shadow. 

 Rivals, jealous of his success, came after him to denounce his plans as 

 visionary and himself as an impostor. The ambassadors were obliged 

 to turn back to save their lives and retrace then way in haste to the far 

 distant Wabash, where the fatal battle of Tippecanoe and the death of 

 his great brother, Tecumtha, put an end to all his splendid dreams. 



