290 CALENDAR HISTORY OF THE KIOWA Iktr.anx. n 



became inspired or "crazy," as in the ghost dance, and prophesied that 

 something terrible was about to happen after the tainie had been 

 returned to its box. Hardly was the dance over and the t<(ime put 

 away when a man was attacked by this strange disease and died in 

 a few hours; then another became sick and died as suddenly, and 

 another, until in a few days the epidemic spread through the tribe, 

 killing great numbers, including an unusual proportion of medicine- 

 men. The Kiowa say that half their number x^erished during its preva- 

 lence; this is probably an exaggeration, but whole families and camps 

 were exterminated and their tipis were left standing empty and 

 deserted. Many in their despair committed suicide, but the survivors 

 saved themselves by scattering in different directions until the disease 

 had spent its faiy. 



The tribes of the lake region and those which had been recently 

 removed to Indian Territory generally escaped the disease, but among 

 the wild tribes of the plains, from the Dakota to the Comanche, the 

 ravages of the cholera during this season were as awful as among 

 the white population of the eastern states. The western 

 Dakota, who suffered severely, believed that the disease 

 had been deliberately introduced by the whites for their 

 more speedy extermination {Report, 78). The agent for 

 the Pawnee states that up to June of 1849 twelve hun- 

 dred and thirty-four persons, or nearly one-fourth of 

 the tribe, had already died, and the disease was still 

 Fig 104 -Cholera making fcarful ravages among them, while the survivors 

 (from the Da- weic in such dread of the terrible scourge that no per- 

 kota calendars), gy^sion could induce them to bury the dead, and within 

 a short distance of the agency it was not unusual to find the unburied 

 corpses partially devoured by wolves {Report, 79). 



In the spring of 1850 an attemi)t was made to assemble the tribes of 

 the southern plains for the purpose of making treaties with tliem to 

 insure the safety of the emigrant roads. The Comanche, however, 

 declined to attend on account of the cholera, which they said their 

 medicine-men had predicted would be communicated to them again by 

 the whites unless they kept at a proper distance until the grass had 

 died in the fall, when the cholera would die out with it, and they would 

 no longer be afraid to meet their white friends (Report, SO). This 

 caused a postponement of the negotiations, which resulted later in the 

 treaties of Fort Laramie in 1851 and Fort Atkinson in 1853. 



WIKTEK 1849-50 



The Kiowa killed several of the Pawnee and were received by their 

 friends with a dance on returning to camp. The figure over the winter 

 mark (figure 105) represents a Pawnee, as shown by the peculiar shaving 



