BUSHNELL] VILLAGES WEST OF THE MISSISSIPPI 149 
in the year 1872. The note reads: “In the fall of 1872, Dr. C. E. 
McChesney, then physician at the Berthold agency, counted, with 
great care, the buildings in the village and, in a letter, gave me 
the following results: 
Old-style_(Tound))MOdSestot Ces sss are es Oe a ee 43 
IO L-CADINS ROE ECC Ste eee een ee ene ee ee ee 28 
MotalenumMpervolshOuSes OLwReGGS =n Nes seeds hee Se Se Sie Be ey (ak 
Old-style lodges of Grosventres and Mandans___-____________-_---_-_- 35 
iLee-cabins of Grosventres and Mandans= 22-72) -- = se 69 
Total number of houses of Grosventres and Mandans______________ 104 
oOtalsotwHOUSeS ils willagee ss es ws See wh ee Ne oe SE 175 
The note states that “ owing to the stupidity of the interpreter ” 
it was not possible to separate the Grosventres from the Mandans, 
which was to be regretted. 
The “old-style lodges” were the earth-covered lodges, and Mat- 
thews follows with an excellent description of how they were con- 
structed. He tells of the building of the frame, “covered with 
willows, hay, and earth,” and over the opening in the center of the 
top “of many of the lodges are placed frames of wicker-work, on 
which skins are spread to the windward in stormy weather to keep 
the lodges from getting smoky. Sometimes bull-boats are used for 
this purpose.” (Matthews, (1), pp. 3-6.) A comment on the work 
of the early artists is worthy of being mentioned at this time: “ Prince 
Maximilian’s artist [Karl Bodmer] usually sketches the lodge very 
correctly; but Mr. Catlin invariably gives an incorrect representa- 
tion of its exterior. Whenever he depicts a Mandan, Arickaree, or 
Minnetaree lodge, he makes it appear as an almost exact hemisphere, 
and always omits the entry.” (Op. cit., p. 6.) 
Game, especially the buffalo, was becoming less plentiful in the 
vicinity of the villages, and Matthews told how, “ Every winter, until 
1866, the Indians left their permanent village, and, moving some dis- 
tance up the Missouri Valley, built temporary quarters, usually in 
the center of heavy forests and in the neighborhood of buffalo. . . 
The houses of the winter-villages resembled much the log-cabins of 
our own western pioneers. They were neatly built, very warm, had 
regular fire-places and chimneys built of sticks and mud, and square 
holes in the roofs for the admission of light.” About that time some 
cabins of this sort were erected “in the permanent village at Fort 
Berthold; every year since, they are becoming gradually more numer- 
ous and threaten to eventually supplant the original earth-covered 
lodges.” And in 1877 “ game has recently become very scarce in their 
country, they are obliged to travel immense distances, and almost 
