Rocky Mountains. 271 



The husband, incensed at what appeared to him to be non- 

 sense and imposition, kicked over the kettle of holy water, 

 and drove the squaws home to their lodges; but the magician 

 having received the presents, which were the objects of his 

 swindling cunning, pretended that his incantations had had 

 the desired effect with the Wahconda, inducing him to 

 spare their lives. 



Many are the impostures which these priests practise on 

 the credulity of the people. And although they are fre- 

 quently defeated in their attempts to deceive, and justly 

 punished for their hypocritical villainy, yet the advantage of 

 experience seems to profit them little, and deception, prac- 

 tised under a new garb, often attains its ends. How can we 

 wonder at this facility, with which a simple people are blind- 

 ed, through the medium of their superstitious faith, when 

 we know that infinitely more monstrous absurdities obtain 

 the inconsiderate assent, or excite the fears of thousands of 

 civilized men, in the most populous and enlightened cities 

 of Europe, and America, and that the horse-shoe, even at 

 this day, is frequently seen, attached to the threshold of a 

 door, as a security against the entrance of a witch? 



One of these magi acquired a high repute in several of the 

 Missouri nations, by impressing them with the belief, that 

 his body was indestructible to human power, and that if cut 

 into a thousand fragments, and scattered to the winds, these 

 portions would all promptly assemble together again, and 

 become revivified, so that he would receive no injury 

 from the operation. Trusting to his fame, on some slight 

 provocation, he killed a squaw in the midst of her own peo- 

 ple, and with the most unbounded confidence, surrendered 

 himself to her exasperated relatives, declaring with exulta- 

 tion that they possessed not the power to harm him. 



Unexpectedly, however, they put his vaunted supernatural 

 constitution to the test, by dividing his body into pieces, and 

 scattering them about the vicinity of the village. 



