150 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 43 



and that his legs were very cold. I offered him part of a half bottle of brandy 

 which I had brought from White Earth, He accepted it, and we went together 

 to the house of Yalcstalchil," second war cliief of the Flour village, who lived 

 in the great village near the temple. After having drunk, as night approached 

 I passed to the house of the great chief of war,^ who, seeing me with a bottle 

 in my hand, asked me if there was brandy in it. I said " no," and that I had 

 drunk it with Yakstalchil and the Frenchman who guarded his brother. He 

 said to me in his language, " Eat and sleep on my bed." At the same time he 

 presented me some ollogale,'' a kind of grain prepared like millet, which the 

 savages stir up with a little water on the fire, after which they pound it 

 and have it cooked. It is eaten steeped m water, and it is very good. In offer- 

 ing me this dish the great chief said to me. " I have nothing but that. Since my 

 brother is sick my people do not go hunting. As for me I eat nothing." I ate 

 a little, for it is very rude to refuse them. It is a great mark of contempt 

 among them. After I had eaten he said to me again, indicating to me his bed, 

 " Lie down there. For my part I am going to see my brother." While I was 

 asleep the great chief reentered and shook me by the arm, saying to me, " It is 

 done. He is dead." I asked him, " Who?" He did not answer at all and went 

 to crouch in a corner of the cabin, holding his head in his two hands like a man 

 afflicted with the deepest grief. At the same time his wife began to weep. 

 Immediately I heard two discharges of four or five guns, shot off with some 

 interval between, and I guessed that this must be to inform the other Natchez 

 villages of the death of the great chief. It was also the signal for a concert of 

 frightful cries and howls, which at once made themselves heard. For my part 

 I did not consider it at all expedient to rise and returned to sleep. 



The next day, Saturday, the 2d of the month, I went down to the foot of the 

 great chief's mound. I asked the whereabouts of the Frenchman who had 

 guarded the Tattooed-serpent. They told me that they did not know anything 

 about him. At the same time I saw a juggler with the chief of the grain,*^ who 

 sang and prostrated themselves toward the rising sun opposite the cabin of the 

 deceased. The latter was in his cabin, where he had been painted and where 

 his hair had been dressed. He was clothed and provided with shoes. All of 

 the things which had belonged to him, coffers, mats, beds, vessels, etc., had been 

 thrown out of his cabin pellmell. I also saw his wife, who did not weep at all 

 and only had her hair disheveled, contrary to custom. Nor did her children 

 weep, but all the people in the village were dissolved in tears, and wept in a 

 manner to make one laugh. However, the nearest relatives of the dead man 

 were occupied, some in removing the bark from a great pole, about 20 feet 

 long and a foot in circumference, and in painting it red ; others in putting that 

 which belonged to the defunct into a chest. No one thought of preparing to 

 eat. In the entire village there was not even enough fire to light one's pipe. 



After having been a witness of this spectacle I returned to White Earth to 

 bring the news to the Sieur P.rontin. director of this grant. I found there the 

 war chief of the Tioux, who, having learned of the death of the Tattooed- 

 serpent, said to me in the Mobilian language: "If it is true, as you say, that 

 the Tattooed-serpent is dead, his brother, the great war chief, will kill himself, 

 for they have promised each other that if the great chief of war died first his 

 brother would not weep, but would kill himself with a knife, and if, on the 

 contrary, the Tattooed-serpent died first the great chief of war would not weep, 



o Chil=cll, big. 



"■ Really that of the great Sun. 



<■ Apparently the same as widlocjouill ; see p. 76. 



"^ It is this one who takes care to have the sowing and the harvesting done. — 



[DUMONT.] 



