THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. . 117 



assimilating to the modes of their patrons and protectors. Amongst their vague and 

 various traditions they have evidently some disjointed authority for the manner in 

 which they came here, but no account of the time. They say, that they came poor — 

 without wigwams or horses — were nearly all women, as their warriors had been 

 killed off in their flight ; that the Mandans would not take them into their village, 

 nor let them come nearer than where they are now living, and there assisted them to 

 build their villages. From these circumstances their wigwams have been constructed 

 exactly in the same manner as those of the Mandans which I have already described, 

 and entirely distinct from any custom to be seen in the Crow tribe. 



Notwithstanding the long familiarity in which they have lived with the Mandans, 

 and the complete adoption of most of their customs, yet it is almost an unaccountable 

 fact that there is scarcely a man in the tribe who can speak half a dozen words of 

 the Mandan language, although, on the other hand, the Mandans are most of them 

 able to converse in the Minataree tongue, leaving us to conclude either that the 

 Minatarees are a very inert and stupid people or that the Mandan language (which 

 is most probably the case), being different from any other language in the country, is 

 an exceedingly difficult one to learn. 



The Minatarees, as I have before said, are a bold, daring, and warlike tribe, quite 

 different in these respects from their neighbors the Mandans, carrying war continu- 

 ally in their enemies' country, thereby exposing their lives and diminishing the num- 

 ber of their warriors to that degree that I find two or throe women to a man through 

 the tribe. 



The name by which these people are generally called (Gros Ventres) is one given 

 them by the French traders, and has probably been applied to them with some de- 

 gree of prox^riety or fitness, as contradistinguished from the Mandans, amongst whom 

 these traders were living ; and who are a small race of Indians, being generally at or 

 below the average stature of man, whilst the Minatarees are tall and heavily built. 

 There is no tribe in the we^-ern wilds, perhaps, who are better entitled to the style 

 of warlike than the Minatarees, for they, unlike the Mandans, are continually carry- 

 ing war into their enemies' country, oftentimes drawing the poor Mandans into un- 

 necessary broils, and suffering so much themselves in their desperate war executions 

 that I find the proportion of women to the number of men as two or three to one 

 through the tribe. 



PRESENT LOCATION AND CONDITION. 



See, also, titles " Sioux and Blackfeet" herein, as the general history 

 of the Gros Ventres is similar to and identified with them. They were 

 made reservation Indians after 1866. 



In June, 1884, the Gros Ventres at Fort Berthold Agency, Dakota, 

 numbered 397 ; on August 18. 1885, 435. They are on both sides of the 

 Missouri River, living with the Mandans and Arickarees. 



A band of 200 Gros Ventres and Mandans are also reported as being 

 near Fort Buford. 



The Gros Ventres at Fort Belknap Agency, Montana, August, 1884, 

 numbered 1,150; August 5, 1885, 852. 



This reservation is along and adjacent to the line of British Columbia. 



They are blanket Indians, and are slowly decreasing. Total in 1884, 

 1,547 ; total in 1885, 1,287. 



CREES (KNI8-TE-NEU). 



A small tribe of 3,000, in Her Majesty's dominions, neighbors of the Blackfeet, and 

 always at war with them; desperate warriors; small and light in stature. Half of 

 them have recently died of the small-pox since I was amongst them. 



