44 ANNUAL. REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, I^IQ'. 
tious awe. The transcribing of the wi'-gi-es from the dictaphone 
records and the translation of the words from the Osage into the 
English language were laborious and tedious tasks. This rite will 
soon be entirely forgotten, as it has been abandoned now for a num- 
ber of years, and the rescuing of it for preservation has been timely. 
This rite, which will make the first part of the volume now being 
completed for publication, covers 182 typewritten pages without the 
illustrations, maps, and diagrams. 
The office of hereditary chief has been abandoned and since 1881 
has been elective. 
Upon the completion of The Eite of the Chiefs, the work of ar- 
ranging for publication the ritual entitled Ni'-ki Wa-tho", Song of 
the Sayings of the Ancient Men, was taken up. This ritual tells of 
the origin of the people of the Ho^'-ga subdivision of the Ho'^'-ga 
great tribal dual division. The story of their descent from the sky 
to the earth and of their subsequent movements is put into wi'-gi-e 
form and recited at the initiatory ceremonies. Each gens has its own 
version of the story and has in it a proprietary right, a right that in 
olden times was not infringed upon by the others. 
Mr. LaFlesche was fortunate in becoming acquainted with an 
Osage by the name of Xu-tha'-wa-to"-i" and of winning his friend- 
ship. This man belonged to the Tsi'-zhu Wa-no'' gens of the Tsi'-zhu 
great tribal dual division. Without the slightest hesitation he recited 
for Mr. LaFlesche the Ni'-ki Wi'-gi-e of his own gens, and he also 
gave with it some of the shorter wi'-gi-es that accompany certain 
ceremonial acts of the ritual. 
These origin rituals when completed will cover more than 220 type- 
written pages, to which two short wi'-gi-es of a like character, nearly 
ready, will be added. These pages added to those of The Rite of the 
Chiefs will bring the number of typewritten pages, without the illus- 
trations, close to 430. 
The Fasting Ritual, which was completed some time ago, and 
covers 492 pages, exclusive of the illustrations, and the two rituals 
above referred to, will make the first volume of a projected work on 
the Osage tribe. 
On July 1, Dr. Truman Michelson, ethnologist, visited Tama, 
Iowa, and completed his field work on the grammatical analysis of 
the text of " The Owl Sacred Pack of the Fox Indians." On his 
return to Washington he worked out a practically exhaustive list of 
verbal stems and submitted a manuscript for publication. He also 
observed mortuary customs under peculiarly fortunate conditions 
and obtained a number of texts written in the current syllabary on 
mortuary customs, eschatology, etc. He restored phonetically and 
translated, with a few exceptions, 310 personal names. He verified a 
previous discovery that certain gentes have their own peculiar names 
