148 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [LULL. 77 
the middle of each side,” will tend to recall the similar arrangement 
as indicated on the drawing of the ancient Mahican village about 
two centuries before. (Bushnell, (1), p. 26.) 
In the autumn of 1853, just 20 years after Maximilian was 
among the Hidatsa, an peices passed down the Missouri from Fort 
Benton to St. Louis, thence to continue to Washington, where he 
arrived November 21. In his journal are several brief references to 
the Hidatsa, or, as he designated the tribe, the Gros Ventres. To 
quote from the journal: “October 8... a fine region, full of 
game, and occasionally speaking a hunting party of Gros Ventres 
out after buffalo.” The next day the small party arrived at Fort 
Berthold, late in the afternoon. Then, so the journal continues: “We 
received many visits from the Gros Ventres, and gave them a few 
presents. The Gros Ventres have a large village of mud houses— 
very unsightly outside, but within warm and comfortable.” The fol- 
lowing morning, October 10, 1853, “I visited some of the lodges of 
the Gros Ventres, and found-them exceedingly comfortable and ca- 
pable of accommodating comfortably a hundred persons. One part 
of the lodge is appropriated to the horses, dogs, cattle, and chickens, 
and another to their own sleeping apartments. They all seemed to 
live sociably and comfortable together during the long cold winters 
of this cold latitude . . . We left Fort Berthold early; but, before 
we had advanced far, were driven ashore by a strong wind, which 
continued throughout the day. The smoke from the burning prairies 
is so dense as to almost hide the sun. The fires, burning in every 
direction, present at night a beautiful and magnificent, though ter- 
rible appearance.” (Saxton, (1), pp. 264265.) What a vivid, 
though brief, description of conditions in the Upper Missouri Valley 
when all was in a primitive state. 
During the years following the visits of Catlin and Maximilian 
many changes took place in the native villages standing on the banks 
of the upper Missouri and its tributaries. Writing of a period about 
40 years after Maximilian’s stay among the Mandan and Hidatsa, 
the winter of 1833-84, Dr. Matthews said: “The Hidatsa, Min- 
netaree, or Grosventre Indians, are one of the three tribes which at 
present inhabit the permanent village at Fort Berthold, Dakota 
Territory, and hunt on the waters of the Upper Missouri and Yellow- 
stone Rivers, in Northwestern Dakota and Eastern Montana.” De- 
scribing the village, he continued: “ The village consists of a number 
of houses built very closely together, without any attempt at regu- 
larity of position. The doors face in every possible direction; and 
there is great uniformity in the appearance of the lodges; so it is a 
very difficult matter to find one’s way among them.” In a footnote 
to this paragraph is given the number of structures standing there 
