PREFACE V 



weeping on recalling the death of their loved ones in war or epidemics. 

 These were my interpreters, all of whom have long since died. 



My informants, too, have long since passed away, Crows Heart 

 being the last to die, about 13 years ago. Joe Ward, the younger son 

 of Hauy Coat (see pi. 2) who had come from Awatixa village on the 

 Knife River, was the first to die. In fact, the data he supplied I re- 

 corded while making the Mandan study during odd periods when no 

 Mandan informant was immediately available. He would have been 

 an easier informant than his brother, Bird-Lying-Down, as he was an 

 elder in one of the Christian churches at the time of his death. His 

 death made my work much more difficult, for, even at that late time, 

 some informants were reluctant to discuss the details of their various 

 ceremonial bundles and lore. 



Bears Arm (frontispiece) was a brilliant man with a tremendous 

 memory for detail, but, more important to me, he had given much 

 prior thought to the interrelationships of the various aspects of Hidatsa 

 culture. His home was near the Elbowoods Agency, and people from 

 the most distant ends of the Fort Berthold Reservation found a hearty 

 invitation to come in and spend the night with him. Sometimes these 

 old people would stay up all night telling of past events. He told 

 me, when I first discussed with him the matter of serving as an in- 

 formant, that he had long recognized how the younger people were 

 losing interest in the old ways and that the old people visiting at his 

 place were glad to find one who wanted to know everything about 

 the Hidatsa ways and history. I was very fortunate to find a man 

 of Bears Arm's understanding with whom to shape the design of this 

 study. His father, Old-Woman-Crawling, was born at Awaxawi vil- 

 lage and his mother. Many Growths, was from Awatixa village. I 

 addressed Bears Arm as "father" and he addressed me as "son.'' 



Wolf Chief was an old hand at dealing with anthropologists, for 

 he had been an informant for Dr. Gilbert L. Wilson, Dr. Robert H. 

 Lowie, and Edward S. Curtis. He lived at Independence and I had 

 come to know him beforehand as he claimed me as a fellow clansman 

 of the Prairie Chickens. Unlike Bears Arm, who was a man of great 

 dignity. Wolf Chief was easygoing and inclined to laughter. He 

 had a tremendous memory for details, but he was not the great syn- 

 thesizer Bears Arm was. He died during the spring of 1933 while 

 this field study was being made but after I had completed my work 

 with him. Thinking he would not live much longer, he had asked 

 me, if I were around when he died, to come to his funeral and shed 

 a tear on his grave, which I did. 



My experience with Four Dancers, of the Speckled Eagle clan, whom 

 I addressed as "older brother," was somewhat different from my 

 relationships with the others. He was the only male descendant of 



