SCALP DANCE. SIOUX SCALP. 



123 



more than sufficient to press home the conviction that the 

 fiendish passions so faithfully described by Cooper, still 

 find expression in violent gesture, loud vociferation, 

 triumphant song and barbarous feasting, with undiminished 

 strength and bitterness, even after a century's intercourse 

 with civilized man. 



Some of the incidents narrated in the following pages 

 will show how far old superstitions and customs prevail 

 among the Indians occupying the country between Eed 

 Eiver and the South Branch of the Saskatchewan. 



Early in the spring of 1858 the warlike bands of 

 Ojibways called the Lac la Pluie Indians, were thrown 

 into a state of savage excitement by the arrival of mes- 

 sengers from their friends on Eed Eiver, with tidings that 

 two Sioux had been killed and scalped in the Plains. In 

 testimony of this triumph, they brought with them two 

 fingers severed from the hands of the unfortunate Sioux. 

 The announcement of the intelligence that the scalps 

 would be sent, after their Eed Eiver brethren had cele- 

 brated war dances over them, was received with wild 

 clamour and shouting. After the scalps had been carried 

 from hand to hand and the victory that won them 

 triumphed over with dancing, singing, and feasting, they 

 would be returned to the warriors who took them, and 

 finally suspended over the graves of relatives or friends 

 mourning the loss of any of their kindred by the hands 

 of the Sioux. 



The Crees, Ojibways, and Swampys, belonging to the 

 great body of Wood Indians, assemble in the spring of 

 the year to celebrate their medicine feasts and other cere- 

 monies, which are generally determined by the arrival of 

 migratory birds, or the time when the sturgeon begin to 

 ascend the rivers. The day on which the annual goose 

 dance takes place is regularly entered in the journals of 



