Rocky Mountains. 357 



The Pawnee Loups heretofore exhibited the singular 

 anomaly, amongst the American natives, of a people addict- 

 ed to the inhuman, superstitious rite, of making propitiatory 

 offerings of human victims to Venus, the Great Star. The 

 origin of this sanguinary sacrifice is unknown ; probably it 

 existed previously to their intercourse with the white tra- 

 ders. This solemn ceremony was performed annually, and 

 immediately preceded their horticultural operations, for the 

 success of which it appears to have been instituted. A 

 breach of this duty, the performance of which they believed 

 to be required by the Great Star, it was supposed would be 

 succeeded by the total failure of their crops of maize, beans, 

 and pumpkins, and the consequent total privation of their 

 vegetable food. 



To obviate a national calamity so formidable, any person 

 was at liberty to offer up a prisoner of either sex, that by his 

 prowess in war he had become possessed of. 



The devoted individual was clothed in the gayest and most 

 costly attire; profusely supplied with the choicest food, 

 and constantly attended by the magi, who anticipated all his 

 wants, cautiously concealed from him the real object of their 

 sedulous attentions, and endeavoured to preserve his mind in 

 a state of cheerfulness, with the view of promoting obesity, 

 and thereby rendering the sacrifice more acceptable to their 

 Ceres. 



When the victim was thus sufficiently fattened for their 

 purpose, a suitable day was appointed for the performance 

 of the rite, that the whole nation might attend. 



The victim was bound to a cross, in presence of the as- 

 sembled multitude, when a solemn dance was performed, 

 and after some other ceremonies, the warrior, whose prisoner 

 he had been, cleaved his head with the tomahawk, and his 

 speedy death was insured by numerous archers, who pene- 

 trated his body with their arrows. 



A trader informed us that the squaws cut pieces of flesh 



