125 



to burn their village and become a wandering 

 people. They were then deserted by traders ; 

 and a deficiency of arms and ammunitions, invited 

 aggression from their neighbours, which further 

 reduced them to one hundred and fifty warriors. 

 They rove principally on the head waters of 

 Wolf river, and on the river Quicurre, or Rapid 



.river. This country is high, level, and open, 

 well watered, and a good soil. They are good 

 hunters, and well disposed towards the whites. 

 They were lately attacked by the Tetons Bois 

 Brule, who killed and took about sixty of them. 



Poncars are the remnant of a nation, once res- 

 pectable for its numbers. Their former residence 

 was on a branch of the Red river, of Lake Win- 



1 nipie ; but being oppressed by the Sioux, they 

 removed to the southward, and took up their res- 

 idence on Poncar river, west of the Missouri, 

 where they built and fortified a village, and, re- 

 mained some years. At length their implacable 

 enemy, the Sioux, pursued them ; reduced them . 

 to about fifty warriors, and two hundred people 5 

 and compelled them to join and reside with the 

 Mahas, whose language they speak. 



The Ricaras are the remains of ten large tribes 

 of the Panis, who have been reduced by the small 

 pox and the Sioux, to about five hundred warri- 

 ors, and two thousand souls, They live in for- 

 tified villages, claim no land, except that on which- 

 their villages stand, and the fields they improve % 

 and hunt immediately in their own neighbour- 

 11* 



