VIEWS OP LOUISIANA, 
5*0 
Within a few years past, however, they have been rapidly kk 
creasing. Notwithstanding the formidable list here present¬ 
ed, these people are scattered over so wide a country as scarce¬ 
ly to be noticed in it. One may travel for days without meet¬ 
ing a living soul; I descended the Missouri one thousand, miles 
without once seeing a human being that was not of our party. 
The only fixed or agricultural villages on the Missouri, are 
those of the Osage, Maha’s, Poncas, Pani’s, Ankara’s, and Man- 
dan’s; and all on the S. W side of the river. On the Blue earth 
river, and in the forks of the Kansas, there are several villages 
of the nation of that name, the Pani villages below the mouth of 
W ; olf river, and a village of Olio’s and Missouri’s. Yet ever* 
some of these, are abandoned for a great part of the summer sea¬ 
son, and their inhabitants wander through the plains; geneially 
en masse , and carrying with them all thtir property, excepting 
their corn, and a few bulky articles which they deposit in hiding 
places. Their oaggage is more cumbrous, than would be imagin¬ 
ed, and employs a great number of dogs and horses in transport¬ 
ing it from place to place. 
All the other notions lead a life similar to that of the shep¬ 
herds of Asia; it is true they do not drive domestic herds to 
places where the best pasturage may be found, but what 
amounts nearly to the same thing, they follow the instinctive mi¬ 
grations of the BufFaloe,feed upon his flesh and kindle their fires 
with his ordure The great object ol serious employment in 
these nations, the ruling passion, is a thirst fur mutual destruc¬ 
tion. The great distance to which their war parties wander in 
pursuit of this darling gratification is indeed surprising; eight 
hundred or a thousand miles is not an unusual journey. It is 
only, however, on women and children, and on parties taken by 
surprise that their attacks prove really bloody and destructive. 
In their more regular engagements, or battles, where there is 
something like equality in the adverse parties, they engage, ge¬ 
nerally on horseback, in a maneuvering fight, in which they 
display wonderful activity and skill on both sides so much so, 
that they do each other very little harm A battle between three 
or four hundred men on each side, will continue a whole day, 
and be at length terminated by the death of two or three and as 
