92 BULLETIN OF THE 



his saccessors, whereby confusion was prevented, was both 

 original and ingenious, showing more of scientifie method than 

 has often been attributed to the nomadic tribes. This is also 

 true of the practical arrangement, by which the distinctly sepa- 

 rate characters follow from right to left in an outward spiral, 

 starting from a central point, allowing every date to be deter- 

 mined by counting backward or forward from any other that 

 might be known, yet wholly dispensing with the use of numbers 

 to note the years. It seems unlikely t)iat this device, so different 

 from that used by the whites, should have been prompted by 

 them. 



A number of the designs on the chart are purely arbitrary, 

 but the greater part are graphic illustrations, which, indeed, are 

 used whenever the nature of the event allowed. The appearance 

 of the smallpox (in 1801), represented by a man figure covered 

 with red blotches ; the first capture of wild horses (in 1812), by 

 a lasso ; the great meteoric shower of Nov. 12, 1833, and several 

 other symbols, are so suggestive as not to require any assistance 

 in their interpretation. In the method of selecting occurrences 

 it is clear that the criterion was not their own importance, but 

 their character for incident or particularity in connection also 

 with notoriety. A good example is in the signs for 1806 and 

 1808. In the first, an Arickaree is killed by a Sioux as he is in 

 the act of shooting an eagle, and in the latter the Sioux who 

 killed him is himself killed by the Arickarees. War then raging 

 between the Dakotas or Sioux, and several tribes, doubtless 

 many on both sides were killed in feach of these years ; but there 

 was some incident and probably much gossip about theRee, who 

 was shot, just when in fancied security he was bringing down 

 an eagle, and whose death was avenged by his brethren the 

 second year afterwards: hence the selection of these trivial occur- 

 rences It would, indeed, have been impossible to have graphi- 

 cally distinguished by separate signs the many battles, treaties, 

 stampedings of horses, eventful hunts, etc., so most of them 

 were omitted, and other commonly known incidents, of greater 

 individuality, and better adapted for portrayal, were often taken 

 for the calendar, though they were of absolutely no national 

 or tribal consequence. A notable feature of the chart is the 

 effort of the author to make each symbol, emblem, or character 

 distinguishable from all the others; and he is unsuccessful in but 

 two instances, while even in those the error appears due to the 

 copyist. This feature is not observed in the pictured histories 

 or biographies found, in which repetitions both of figures and 

 subjects are frequent. 



Mr. HiLGARD remarked on the custom, even in the most highly 

 civilized nations, of fixing dates by special or notable events. 



