CUKItfG A SICK WOMAN. 



129 



You had a dream, said the conjuror, and when you 

 rose in the morning you promised to make an offering to 

 the Manitou ; you have forgotten your pledge, and you 

 are suffering in consequence of your neglect. 



The woman demanded what she had dreamt, and what 

 she promised, avowing her ignorance of both dream and 

 promise. The conjuror told her that when the buffalo 

 were around her tent last winter and no fear of starvation 

 before her eyes, she had dreamed that the buffalo would 

 always surround her, that famine and sorrow were always 

 to be strangers to her, and, in gratitude, had vowed to 

 make a sacrifice of her best robe. The woman, wearied 

 no doubt with the conjuror's unceasing drum and song, 

 probably, too, believing that a false confession was the 

 lesser evil, as it might bring the promised relief, acknow- 

 ledged that the conjuror was in the right. The penalty 

 she was told to pay consisted of the sacrifice of " throwing 

 away " two robes, or double the amount of the promise 

 she had made ; after which her health was to be restored. 



Scenes similar to the one just described may be wit- 

 nessed whenever several families are camping together ; 

 but the sacrifices required to be made depend upon the 

 ability of the deluded creatures to satisfy the demands of 

 the conjuror. 



" The happy hunting-grounds," the heaven of In- 

 dians, so often spoken of by writers of fiction, are an 

 actual reality in the imagination of Crees and Ojibways, 

 as well as of other north-western tribes. A Plain Cree 

 on the Qu'appelle gravely informed one of my men, that 

 he had once been dead and visited the spirit world. His 

 narrative was to the following effect : — " I was sick and 

 fell asleep. I awoke on the bank of a deep river, whose 

 waters were flowing swiftly and black from a great mist 

 on the south to a great mist on the north. Many other 



VOL. II. K 



