288 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 4:3 



'' an abdominal flux."' He was accompanied by a Jesuit priest, who, 

 on their return journey, left his servant here to build a church." This 

 priest was probably the Father du Rut referred to by Gravier as 

 having built the Houma church in the spring of 1700, and which 

 was already completed when he visited the place. This account of 

 Gravier's is one of the best we have, and is as follows : 



We left that village of the Natchez on the 24th, and on the 25th of November 

 we discovered the hills of the Houmas to the south of the Mississippi, which 

 forms a bay that one enters by leaving the main channel to the right. There 

 is a good league and a half from the point of disembarkation to the village of 

 the ITonnias, over a very bad road, for one has to ascend and descend, and 

 walk half bent through the canes. The village is on the crest of a steep 

 mountain, precipitous on all sides. Thei'e are SO cabins in it, and in the middle 

 of the village is a fine and vei'y level space, where, from morning to night, 

 young men exercise themselves. They run after a flat stone, which they 

 throw in the air from one end of the square to the other, and try to make it 

 fall on two cylinders, which they roll wherever they think the stone will fall. 



There is nothing flue about the temple except the vestibule, which is em- 

 bellished with the most pleasing and best executed grotesque figures that one 

 can see. These are four satyrs, two of which are in relief, all four standing 

 out from the wall, and having on their heads, their hands, and their legs — for 

 fillets, bracelets, garters, baldrics, and belts — snakes, mice, and dogs. The 

 colors are black, white, red, and yellow, and are applied so well and with such 

 absence of confusion that they constitute an agreeably surprising spectacle. 

 The old man who keeps up the fire — the name of which, he told us was loualc 

 or lougM, the ' sacred fire ' — showed us the bones of the woman chief who died 

 last year. That woman had so distinguished herself by the blows that she 

 inflicted upon their enemies, having in person led several war parties, that she 

 was looked upon as an Amazon and as the mistress of the whole village. 

 Greater honor was paid to her than to the great chief, for she occupied the 

 first place in all councils, and when she walked about was always preceded by 

 four young men, who sang and danced the calumet to her. She was dressed 

 as an Amazon ; she painted her face and wore her hair like the men. In this 

 village they know nothing of all the yells that are usually uttered among the 

 Natchez when they pass before the temple, opposite which is a chapel 50 feet 

 long that Father du Ru caused to be built last spring, also a great cross 35 or 

 40 feet high, that he caused to be erected in the public place of the village. 

 Father de Limoges had arrived there three days before, in order to settle 

 there and to labor for the conversion of the Houmas, who seemed to me to be 

 very docile. The great chief is very reasonable, and says that he acknowledges 

 but one Spirit who has made all. I counted 70 cabins in the village, which I 

 visited with Father de Limoges, who chose to give me the first fruits of his 

 mission in the baptism that I administered to a child 3 days old. I gave him 

 the name of St. Francis Xavier, the patron of the mission. God took him to 

 paradise a few days afterward, there to labor for the conversion of his parents 

 and of his countrymen. 



On the 3d of December we celebrated the festival of that great saint as 

 solemnly as we could, and I chanted the first high mass that was ever heard 

 in the village. I was surprised at the little curiosity that they manifested. 

 If the Mississippi country be settled, and this mission be not taken from us, 

 there is. reason to hope that we shall do well there on account of the docility 



"Mai-Rry, D^covivcrtes, iv, 418. 



