Ex. Doc. No. 41. 423 



manent habitationSj and of living like the whites,. by tilling the 

 ground and raising cattle. 



The next morningj Sunday, August 30, was a day of rest, The^ 

 constant repairing of the wagons that were daily coming in from 

 Fort Leavenworth, kept the people here very busy. The ring of 

 the blacksmith's hammer, and the noise from the wagoner's shop 

 were incessant, so we all hailed the day with gladnessj those who 

 labored, as a day of repose, those who did not labor, as a day of 

 quiet- 



During the day Ah-mah-nah-co paid me a visit, bringing a pre- 

 sent of a pair of moccasins, ornamented with porcupine quills, 

 worked into a figure' resembling a squawj this ornament seems pe- 

 cirliar to the Cheyennes. *^ Nah-moust," or "Big left hand," also 



came to see me; he is one of the largest Indians of the tribe, measur- 

 ing 6 feet 2^ inches in height, and is very stout and broad shoul- 

 dered. He has grown so large that he has been obliged to give up 

 hunting, of which he was fond in his more youthful days, for few 

 Indian horses could sustain his weight through a buffalo chase. He 

 is extremly ingenious, and handles his knife with great skill, and 

 is considered the best arrow-maker in the village. The young men, 

 when going to hunt or to war, call on the skillful " Nah-mousf' to 

 obtain their arrows, and his lodge receives, when they return suc^ 

 cessful, a fair partition of the fruits of the chase, or the spoils of 

 the Indian foray. 



August 31. — While walking around and endeavoring to recruit 

 my strength by exercise, I was struck with the countenance of a 

 strange Indian. Upon inquiry I learned that he was called "Mi- 

 ah-tose," and the whites had given him the sobriquet of "slim-face." 

 Not long ago he made a visit to St. Louis, Missouri. It is curious 

 to hear with what close scrutiny he regarded every thing that 

 chanced to meet his eye. Being a man of great influence, and the 

 often chosen partizan of war parties, his companions do not fail to 

 give credit to his narrations, which to them are truly marvellous. 

 The weight of his character, or more probably the fear of his 

 anger, as he is a great warrior, forbids their daring to utter a doubt. 



He seems to have been best pleased with the riding and the horses 

 that he saw one evening at a circus. He recollects perfectly every 

 horse that appeared, and gives an account of the colors, marks, and 

 trappings of each one of them, with extraordinary exacti 

 minuteness of detail. To see the whites ride so well, was to him 

 almost incomprehensible, and was the only superiority thkt he 

 would admit that the civilized man had derived from his civiliza- 

 tion, when compared with his own rude manners of life. He won- 

 dered much, too, to see so many people living in one town, so far 

 from any hunting grounds. Wishing one day to ascertain exactly 

 the number of inhabitants, he procured a long square stick, and set 

 himself down on the pavement to note the passers by, cutting a 

 notch in his stick for each one; in a little while his stick had no 

 place left for another notch, and he commenced counting, and 

 counted, and counted, but as the busy stream of the multitude 

 flowed on undiminished, the Indian was obliged to give up his in- 



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ess 



