BUSHNELL] VILLAGES WEST OF THE MISSISSIPPI 159 
“Our visit to this village seemed to excite no great degree of atten- 
tion. Among the crowd, who surrounded us before we entered the 
village, we observed several young squaws rather gaily dressed, being 
wrapped in clean and new blankets, and having their heads orna- 
mented with wreaths of gnaphalium and the silvery leaves of the 
prosalea canescens. On the tops of the lodges we also saw some dis- 
play of finery, which we supposed to have been made on account of 
our visit. Flags were hoisted, shields, and bows, and quivers, were 
suspended in conspicuous places, scalps were hung out; in short, the 
people appeared to have exposed whatever they possessed, in the 
exhibition of which, they could find any gratification of the vanity. 
Aside from this, we received no distinguished marks of attention 
from the Grand Pawnees.” (James, (1), 1, pp. 427-487.) 
The camp of the expedition was a little more than a mile from the 
village of the Grand Pawnee, and the intervening prairie must have 
presented an animated sight, being “ covered with great numbers of 
horses, intermixed with men, women, and children.” Nearer the 
village were groups of squaws “busily engaged in dressing the skins 
of the bison for robes.” During the afternoon many Indians arrived 
at the camp, men wishing to trade horses, the women endeavoring to 
trade various articles. And on the following morning, June 11, 1820, 
many groups of women were seen leaving the village, accompanied by 
their dogs, bound for their fields of corn situated a few miles away. 
The expedition next arrived at the village of the Republican 
Pawnee, 4 miles from that of the Grand Pawnee. Both villages stood 
on the immediate bank of the stream. Remaining there but a short 
time, they continued on to the Loup village. Here they encamped 
during the night of June 12, leaving early on the following morning. 
On the morning of the 13th many squaws were again observed mak- 
ing their way to the cornfields, with their small children. Some 
stopped to admire the “novel appearance” of the members of the 
expedition, many brought various vegetables, jerked buffalo meat and 
tallow to exchange for whatever they could obtain. 
“The three Pawnee villages, with their pasture grounds, and in- 
significant enclosures, occupy about ten miles in length of the fertile 
valley of the Wolf river. The surface is wholly naked of timber, 
rising gradually to the river hills, which are broad and low, and from 
a mile to a mile and a half distant.” (James, (1), I, p. 447.) 
During the latter part of the summer of 1833 the small party 
under the leadership of Commissioner Henry L. Ellsworth reached 
the Pawnee towns, and in the narrative of the expedition are to be 
found many references to the customs of the people whose habita- 
tions were the primitive earth-covered lodges. The second morning 
after arriving at the village of the Grand Pawnee several members 
