mousey] THE PRAYER-STICK 699 



the surface of the wood, polished from lonj,' use. One side is carved 

 with the symbolic figures already mentioned, while the other is smooth. 

 In all its details it is a neat specimen of Indian workmanship. Accord- 

 ing to the tradition of the Armstrong family, its former owners, the 

 small square in the lower left-hand corner represents hell or the final 

 abode of the wicked, while the house with the four pine ( ?) trees, at 

 the top, symbolizes the spiritual home of the devout followers of the 

 prophet. As is well known, four is the sacred number of many Indian 

 tribes. The significance of several other lines above and below is 

 unknown. Along the shaft of the stick from bottom to tup are the 

 prayer characters, arranged in three groups of five each, one group 

 being near the bottom, while the others are along the upper portion of 

 the shaft and are separated one from the other by a small circle. The 

 characters bear some resemblance to the old black letter type of a 

 missal, while the peculiar arrangement is strongly suggestive of the 

 Catholic rosary with its fifteen "mysteries" in three groups of five 

 each. It will be remembered that the earliest and most constant mis- 

 sionaries among the Kickapoo and other lake tribes were Catholic, and 

 we may readily see that their teachings and ceremonies influenced this 

 native religion, as was afterward the case with the religions of Smo- 

 halla and the Ghost dance. Neither three nor five are commonly known 

 as sacred numbers among the Indians, while three is distinctly Chris- 

 tian in its symbolism. It is perhaps superfluous to state that the ideas 

 of heaven and hell are not aboriginal, but were among the first incor- 

 porated from the teachings of the white missionaries. The characters 

 resembling letters may be from the alphabetic system of sixteen char- 

 acters which it is said the Ojibwa invented for recording their own 

 language, and taught to the Kickapoo and Sauk, and which resembled 

 somewhat the letters of the Roman alphabet, from which they appar- 

 ently were derived. [Hamilton, 1.) 



This prayer-stick or "bible," as it has been called, was obtained by 

 Mr Bartlett from Mr R. V. Armstrong, of Mill Creek, Indiana, who 

 stated that it was the only remaining one of a large number which had 

 been in possession of the family for many years. The story of the 

 manner in which it was originally obtained, as told by Mr Armstrong, 

 is interesting. "His father, Reverend James Armstrong, was a Meth- 

 odist minister and missionary who had been sent to northern Indiana 

 in the early part of this century. In 1830, while, living on Shawnee 

 prairie, 3 miles from the present site of Attica, Indiana, a large baud 

 of Kickapoo Indians came to his house to visit the missionary, and 

 apparently regarded the interview as of great importance to them- 

 selves. They declared that they were from beyond the Mississippi 

 river, that they had heard of Mr Armstrong and his missionary labors, 

 and that they believed him to be the one for whom their people had 

 long been looking. Each Indian held in his hand one of these wooden 

 crosses, and as they knelt on the grass in front of the missionary's 



