THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 467 



A QUEER ADVENTURE; THE DEER MOUSE. 



Since writing the above I have passed through many vicissitudes, and witnessed 

 many curious scenes worthy of relating, some of which I will scribble now, and leave 

 the rest for a more leisure occasion. I have witnessed many of the valued games and 

 amusements of this tribe, and made sketches of them ; and also have painted a num- 

 ber of portraits of distinguished warriors and braves, which will be found in my col- 

 lection. 



I have just been exceedingly amused with a formal and grave meeting which was 

 called around me, formed by a number of young men, and even chiefs and doctors of 

 the tribe, who have heard that I was great medicine, and a great chief, took it upon 

 themselves to suppose that I might (or perhaps must) be a man of influence amongst 

 the " pale faces," and capable of rendering them some relief in a case of very great 

 grievance, under which they represented that they were suffering. Several most pro- 

 found speeches were made to me, setting forth these grievances, somowhat in the fol- 

 lowing manner : They represented that about five or six years ago an unknown, small 

 animal, not far differing in size from a ground squirrel, but with a long, round tail, 

 showed himself slily about one of the chief's wigwams, peeping out from under the 

 pots and kettles, and other such things, which they looked upon as great medicine — 

 and no one dared to kill it, but hundreds came to watch and look at it. On one of 

 these occasions one of the spectators saw this strange animal catching and devour- 

 ing a small "deer mouse," of which little and very destructive animals their lodges 

 contained many. It was then at once determined that this had been an act of the 

 Great Spirit, as a means of putting a stop to the spoliations committed by these little 

 sappers, who were cutting their clothing and other manufactures to pieces in a lam- 

 entable manner. Councils had been called and solemn decrees issued for the coun- 

 tenance and protection of this welcome visitor and its progeny, which were soon 

 ascertained to be rapidly increasing, and calculated soon to rid them of these thou- 

 sands of little depredators. It was soon, however, learned from one of the fur-traders, 

 that this distinguished object of their superstition (which my man Ba'tiste familiarly 

 calls Monsieur Ratapon), had, a short time before, landed himself from one of their 

 keel boats, which had ascended the Missouri River for the distance of 1,800 miles, 

 and had taken up its residence, without introduction or invitation, in one of their 

 earth-covered wigwams. 



This information, for a while, curtailed the extraordinary respect they had for 

 some time been paying to it; but its continual war upon these little mice, which it 

 was using for its food, in the absence of all other nutriment, coutinued to command 

 their respect, in spite of the manner in which it had been introduced ; being unwill- 

 ing to believe that it had come from that source, even, without the agency in some 

 way of the Great Spirit. 



Having been thus introduced and nurtured, and their numbers having been so 

 wonderfully increased in the few last years that every wigwam was infested with 

 them — that their caches, where they bury their corn and other provisions, were 

 robbed and sacked, and the very pavements under their wigwams were so vaulted 

 and sapped that they were actually falling to the ground; they were now looked 

 upon as a most disastrous nuisance, and a public calamity, to which it was the ob- 

 ject of this meeting to call my attention, evidently in hopes that I might be able to 

 designate some successful mode of relieving them from this real misfortune. I got 

 rid of them at last, by assuring them of my deep regret for their situation, which was, 

 to be sure, a very unpleasant one, and told them that there was really a great deal 

 of medicine in the thing, and that I should therefore be quite unwilling to have any- 

 thing to do with it. Ba'tiste and Bogard, who are yet my daily and almost hourly 

 companions, took to themselves a great deal of fun and amusement at the end of this 

 interview, by suggesting many remedies for the evil, and enjoying many hearty 

 laughs ; after which, Ba'tiste, Bogard, and I took our hats, and I took my sketch- 



