104 THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 



Of the Blackfeet -whom I mentioned, * * * and whose portraits are now stand- 

 ing in my room, there is another of whom I mnst say a few words — Peh-t6-pe-kiss, 

 the Eagle's Ribs (No. 152 also). This man is one of the extraordinary men of the Black- 

 foot tribe; though not a chief, he stands here in the fort and deliberately boasts of 

 eight scalps, which he says he has taken from the heads of trappers and traders with 

 his own hand. His dress is really superb, almost literally covered with scalp-locks 

 of savage and civil. 



I have painted him at full length, with a head-dress made entirely of ermine skins 

 and horns of the buffalo. This custom of wearing horns beautifully polished and 

 surmounting the head-dress is a very curious one, being worn only by the bravest of 

 the brave; by the most extraordinary men in the nation. Of their importance and 

 meaning I shall say more in a future epistle. When he stood for his picture he also 

 held a lance and two "medicine bags" in his hand. — G. C, ibid. 



161. ( ) , a medicine-man, or doctor, performing his medi- 



cines or mysteries over a dying man, with the skin of a yellow bear and 

 other curious articles of dress thrown over him, with his mystery rattle 

 and mystery spear, which, he supposes, possess a supernatural power in the 

 art of healing and curing the sick. Painted in 1832. (See " Medicine-man"" 

 and his functions, herein.) 



(Plate No. 19, page 40, vol. 1, Catlin's Eight Years.) 



ALGONKIN — BLACKFEET. 



(See Dacota Sioux, herein.) 



A splendid series of photographs, Nos. 252 to 259, inclusive, and Ko. 

 920, of Blackfeet Sioux, is noted in Hay den's Catalogue, page 39. 



Mil. CATLIN'S NOTES ON THE BLACKFEET INDIANS. 



There is no tribe, perhaps, on the continent who dress morercoinfortably and more 

 gaudily than the Blackfeet, unless it be the tribe of Crows. There is no great differ- 

 ence, however, in the costliness or elegance of their costumes, nor in the materials of 

 which they are formed, though there is a distinctive mode in each tribe of stitching 

 or ornamenting with the porcupine quills, which constitute one of the principal orna- 

 ments to all their fine dresses, and which can be easily recognized by any one a little 

 familiar with their modes as belonging to such or such a tribe. 



The Blackfeet are, perhaps, one of the most, if not entirely the most, numerous 

 and warlike tribes on the continent. They occupy the whole of the country about 

 the sources of the Missouri from this place to the Rocky Mountains, and their num- 

 bers, from the best computations, are something like forty or fifty thousand — they 

 are (like all other tribes whose numbers are sufficiently large to give them boldness) 

 warlike and ferocious, i. e., they are predatory, are roaming fearlessly about the 

 country, even into aud through every part of the Rocky Mountains, and carrying 

 war amongst their enemies, who are, of course, every tribe who inhabit the country 

 about them. 



The women in all these upper and western tribes are decently dressed, and many 

 of thein with great beauty and taste ; their dresses are all of deer or goat skins, ex- 

 tending from their chins quite down to the feet : these dresses are in many instances 

 trimmed with ermine, and ornamented with porcupine quills and beads with exceed- 

 ing ingenuity. The Crow and Blackfeet women, like all others I ever saw in any In- 

 dian tribe, divide the hair on the forehead, and paint the separation or crease with 

 vermilion or red earth. For what purpose this little, but universal, custom is ob- 

 served, I never have been able to learn. 



The men amongst the Blackfeet tribe, have a fashion equally simple, and probably 



