246 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 194 



of the older men who were respected by both groups went back and forth between 

 the groups trying to work out a solution. The young men of Bobtail Bull's 

 group thought that the other chiefs kept them back, even though they had more 

 horses and war honors than the others who were always giving medicine feasts. 

 They thought that it would be better to live by themselves. 



During the night, Bobtail Bull agreed to be their chief in another village if 

 they would move peacefully, but he would not serve as their leader if any fights 

 broke out to discredit his Earthnaming bundle or the other tribal bundles containing 

 the sacred objects. He told the people that once before in their history most of 

 the people were destroyed by fire when two brothers quarreled ^^ and that there 

 was no place that he could take them safely if war broke out, for it would be 

 like brothers fighting since the clans were all mixed up in the village. 



That night he walked through the village with his medicine pipe and reassured 

 the people. When morning came the people packed their things and prepared 

 for the long march to the mouth of the Yellowstone. Those who had more 

 things than they could carry left them in the care of their relatives. Even the 

 lodges were given to their relatives. Some even borrowed horses of relatives 

 at Fishhook. 



When the time came to leave, some families decided to remain at Fishhook 

 while others decided at the last minute to go along. Those who went west lived 

 well, for there were many buffaloes and the young men were hired by the Army 

 to be scouts. The two village groups visited back and forth a great deal and 

 helped each other in the ceremonies. Some famiUes would live in one village 

 for a while and then they would go back to the other one to live. They got along 

 well together. Even today we live on this end of the reservation apart from the 

 others but we visit back and forth and our young people marry into the other 

 group. Still we think of ourselves as a separate group and have our own leaders. 



When we left the old village, we did not have so many of the old ceremonies, 

 for most of the people with the rights stayed back. The old people thought we 

 would have bad luck. The young men fasted much and had their own bundles. 

 Some would go back to the old village to buy bundles. But, in time, we thought 

 that the gods one got fasting were as powerful as those one bought through the 

 fathers, for our young men got more horses and war honors than the young men 

 of the other village. Then we would tease our joking relatives in the other village. 



Crow-FHes-High became the head war chief without owning any of the tribal 

 bundles. His father owned an Old- Woman- Who-Never-Dies bundle at Hidatsa 

 but the bundle was put away when he died of smallpox in 1837. Crow- Flies-High 

 was reared by relatives but he never undertook to take up his father's gods until 

 he was an old man and after he had won his position. As a young man he fasted 

 one night at Short Missouri where he dreamed of the eastern Old- Woman- Who- 

 Never-Dies. His clan fathers told him that she was instructing him to give the 

 4-day rites to take up his father's gods but he did not follow their instructions for 

 he was poor and did not have many relatives to assist him. Instead he made up 

 a personal bundle of the things he saw in his dream. 



Another time during the winter he fasted at Sack Butte on the Big Bend. At 

 that time some buffaloes were crossing the Missouri with their calves following 

 behind. In his dreams he saw that the calves could not get up onto the bank 

 so he went to help. At first the calves were afraid of him. He pushed each one 

 up over the bank out of the water and then he went back to his fasting. Then 

 the buffaloes came and took him to Porcupine Butte on the Little Missouri near 



M See "The Legendary Period" (pp. 297-308) for this Incident. 



