THE GEORGE CATLIN INDIAN GALLERY. 639 



own native shields and lances, and bows, and even the saddles and trappings for their 

 horses, they all mounted upon their backs, in the midst of their amusements, and dash- 

 ing off at full speed, illustrated their modes of drawing the bow as they drove their ar- 

 rows into the target, or made their warlike feints at it with their long lances as they 

 passed. 



This formed the most attractive part of their exhibition, and thousands flocked there 

 to witness their powers of horsemanship and skill in prairie warfare. This exciting ex- 

 hibition which pleased the visitors, I could have wished might have been less fatiguing, 

 and even dangerous, to the limbs of the Indians than it actually was from the awkwardness 

 and perverseness and fright of the horses, not trained to Indian modes. With all these 

 difficulties to contend with, however, they played their parts cheerfully and well, and 

 the spectators seemed highly pleased. Amidst the throngs who visited them here we 

 could discover most of their old standard friends and admirers, who came to see them 

 on horseback, and in the beautiful game of ball, in the open grounds of Vauxhall, where 

 they could more easily approach and converse with them. 



Several weeks were spent in their daily exhibitions in Vauxhall, and, as one can easily 

 imagine, much to the satisfaction of the Indians, and, I believe, much to the amusement 

 of the visitors who came to see them. Within the last week of their exhibition I ad- 

 mitted from charity schools thirty-two thousand children, with their teachers, free of 

 charge; to all of whom I gave instructive lectures on the position of the tribe, their con- 

 dition, their customs and character; and explained also the modes, which were acted 

 out by fourteen living Indians before their eyes; and but one of these schools ever com- 

 municated with me after, to thank me for the amusement or instruction; which might 

 not have been a curious omission, but I thought it was at the time. 



With the amusements at Vauxhall ended my career in London; and contemplating a 

 tour to several of the provincial towns, in company with the Indians, I took my little 

 family to Brighton, and having left them comfortably situated and provided for, I joined 

 the party in Birmingham, where they had arrived and taken lodgings. The idea oi 

 moving about pleased the Indians very much, and I found them all in high spirits when 

 I arrived, delighted to have found that the chickabobboo was the same there as in Lon- 

 don, and was likely to continue much the same in all parts of the kingdom to which 

 they should go. There was an unfortunate offset to this pleasing intelligence, however, 

 which seemed to annoy them very much, and of which they were making bitter com- 

 plaint. On leaving London for the country they had spent some days, and exercised 

 all their ingenuity, in endeavoring to clean their beautiful skin dresses, which the soot 

 of London had sadly metamorphosed ; and on arriving in Birmingham they had the ex- 

 treme mortification to anticipate, from appearances, an equal destruction of that soft 

 and white surface which they give to their skin dresses, and which (though it had been 

 entirely lost sight of during the latter part of their stay in London) had, with great 

 pains, been partially restored for a more pleasing appearance in the country. 



ME. CATLIN'S ARRIVAL AT BIRMINGHAM. 



Though I had several times passed through Birmingham, and on one occasion stopped 

 there a day or two, I entered this time a total stranger, and in rather a strange and 

 amusing manner. On my journey there by the railway I had fallen in company and 

 conversation with a very amusing man, who told me he was a commercial traveler, and 

 we had had so much amusing chat together that when we arrived, at a late hour at 

 night, I was quite happy to follow his advice as to the quarters we were to take up in 

 the town, at least for the night. He said it was so late that the hotels would be closed, 

 and that the commercial inn, where he was going, was the only place open, and I should 

 find there everything to make me comfortable, and a very nice sort of people. We took 

 an omnibus for town, and a3 there was only room for one inside, he got upon the top, 

 and so we went off; and getting, as I supposed, into or near the middle of the town, the 



