768 THE GHOST-DANCE RELIGION [eth.anvH 



white people could read them. Jn a casual way I then offered to show 

 liiin the pictures of some of my Indian friends across the mountains, 

 and brought out the photos of several Arapaho and Cheyenne who I 

 knew had recently come as delegates to the messiah. This convinced 

 him that I was all right, and he became communicative. The result 

 was that we spent about a week together in the wikiups (lodges of tide 

 rushes), surrounded always by a crowd of interested Paiute, discussing 

 theold stories and games, singing Paiute songs, and sampling the seed 

 mush and roasted piflou nuts. On one of these occasions, at night, a 

 medicine-man was performing his incantations over a sick child on one 

 side of the lire while we were talking on the other. When the ice was 

 well thawed, 1 cautiously approached the subject of the ghost songs 

 and dance, and, as confidence was now established, I found no diffi- 

 culty in obtaining a number of the songs, with a description of the 

 ceremonial. 1 then told Charley that, as I had taken part in the dance, 

 I was anxious to see the messiah and get from him some medicine-paint 

 to bring back to his friends among the eastern tribes. lie readily 

 agreed to go with me and use his efforts with his nephew to obtain 

 what was wanted. 



It is 20 miles northward by railroad from Walker River agencj in 

 Walmska, and 11' miles more in a southwesterly direction from there 

 to the Mason valley settlement. There we met a young white man 

 named Dyer, who was well acquainted with Jack Wilson, and who also 

 spoke the Paiute language, and learned from him that the messiah was 

 about 12 miles farther up the valley, near a place called Pine Grove. 

 Enlisting his services, with a team and driver, making four in all, we 

 started up toward the mountain. It was New Year's day of 1892, and 

 there was deep snow on the ground, a very unusual thing in this part 

 of the country, and due in this instance, as Charley assured us, to the 

 direct agency of .lack Wilson. It is hard to imagine anything more 

 monotonously unattractive than a sage prairie under ordinary circum- 

 stances unless it be the same prairie when covered by a heavy fall of 

 snow, under which the smaller clumps of sagebrush look like prairie-dog- 

 mounds, while the larger ones can hardly be distinguished at a short 

 distance from wikiups. However, the mountains were bright in front of 

 us, the sky was blue overhead, and the road was good under foot. 



Soon after leaving the settlement we passed the dance ground with 

 the brush shelters still standing. We met but few Indians on the 

 way. After several miles we noticed a man at some distance from the 

 road with a gun across his shoulder. Dyer looked a moment and then 

 exclaimed, " I believe that's .lack now!" The Indian thought so, too 

 and pulling up our horses he shouted some words in the Paiute 

 language. The man replied, and sure enough it was the messiah, 

 hunting jack rabbits. At his uncle's call he soon came over. 



As he. approached 1 saw that he was a young man, a dark full-blood, 

 compactly built, and taller than the Paiute generally, being nearly (> 



