270 PICTURE-WRITING OF THE AMERICAN INDIANS. 
nation only partially apprehended or remembered. He would tell that ~ 
it was a map of the United States; would probably be able to point out 
with some accuracy the state or city where he lived; perhaps the cap- 
ital of the country; probably the names of the states of peculiar posi- 
tion or shape, such as Maine, Delaware, or Florida. So the Indian 
examined would often point out in Lone-Dog’s chart the year in which 
he was born, or that in which his father died, or in which there was 
some occurrence that had strongly impressed him, but which had no 
relation whatever to the significance of the character for the year in 
question. It had been pointed out to him before, and he had remem- 
bered it, while forgetting the remainder of the chart. 
On comparing all the Winter Counts it is found that they often corre- 
spond, but sometimes differ. In a few instances the differences are in 
the succession of events, but they are usually due to an omission or to 
the selection of another event. When a year has the same name in all 
of them, the bands were probably encamped together, or else the event 
fixed upon was of general interest; and when the name is different 
the bands were scattered, or nothing of general interest occurred. 
Many of the recent events are fresh in the memory of the people, as 
the warriors who strive to make their exploits a part of the tribal tra- 
ditions proclaim them on all occasions of ceremony, count their coups, 
as the performance is called. Declarations of this kind partake of the 
nature of affirmations made in the invoked presence of a supposed 
divinity. War shirts, on which scores of the enemies lilled are kept, 
and which are carefully transmitted from generation to generation, 
help to refresh their memories in regard to some of the events. 
The study of all the charts renders plain some points remaining in 
doubt while the Lone-Dog chart was the only example known. It be- 
came clear that there was no fixed or uniform mode of exhibiting the 
order of continuity of the year-characters. They were arranged spirally 
or lineally, or in serpentine curves, by boustrophedon or direct, start- 
ing backward from the last year shown or proceeding uniformly for- 
ward from the first year selected or remembered. Any mode that 
would accomplish the object of continuity with the means of regular 
addition seemed equally acceptable. So a theory advanced that there 
was some symbolism in the right-to-left circling of Lone-Dog’s chart 
was abandoned, especially when an obvious reproduction of that very 
chart was made by an Indian with the spiral reversed. It was also 
obvious that when copies were made, some of them probably from 
memory, there was no attempt at Chinese accuracy. It was enough to 
give the graphic or ideographic character, and frequently the character. 
is better defined on one of the charts than on the others for the corre- 
sponding year. One interpretation would often throw light on the 
others. It also appeared that, while different events were selected by 
the recorders of the different systems, there was sometimes a selection 
of the same event for the same year and sometimes for the next, such 
