25 chapters
7 hour read
Selected Chapters
25 chapters
I. Hadakah, “The Pitiful Last”
I. Hadakah, “The Pitiful Last”
WHAT boy would not be an Indian for a while when he thinks of the freest life in the world? This life was mine. Every day there was a real hunt. There was real game. Occasionally there was a medicine dance away off in the woods where no one could disturb us, in which the boys impersonated their elders, Brave Bull, Standing Elk, High Hawk, Medicine Bear, and the rest. They painted and imitated their fathers and grandfathers to the minutest detail, and accurately too, because they had seen the rea
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II. Early Hardships
II. Early Hardships
ONE of the earliest recollections of my adventurous childhood is the ride I had on a pony’s side. I was passive in the whole matter. A little girl cousin of mine was put in a bag and suspended from the horn of an Indian saddle; but her weight must be balanced or the saddle would not remain on the animal’s back. Accordingly, I was put into another sack and made to keep the saddle and the girl in position! I did not object at all, for I had a very pleasant game of peek-aboo with the little girl, u
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III. My Indian Grandmother
III. My Indian Grandmother
AS a motherless child, I always regarded my good grandmother as the wisest of guides and the best of protectors. It was not long before I began to realize her superiority to most of her contemporaries. This idea was not gained entirely from my own observation, but also from a knowledge of the high regard in which she was held by other women. Aside from her native talent and ingenuity, she was endowed with a truly wonderful memory. No other midwife in her day and tribe could compete with her in s
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IV. An Indian Sugar Camp
IV. An Indian Sugar Camp
WITH the first March thaw the thoughts of the Indian women of my childhood days turned promptly to the annual sugarmaking. This industry was chiefly followed by the old men and women and the children. The rest of the tribe went out upon the spring fur-hunt at this season, leaving us at home to make the sugar. The first and most important of the necessary utensils were the huge iron and brass kettles for boiling. Everything else could be made, but these must be bought, begged or borrowed. A maple
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V. A Midsummer Feast
V. A Midsummer Feast
IT was midsummer. Everything that the Santee Sioux had undertaken during the year had been unusually successful. The spring fur-hunters had been fortunate, and the heavy winter had proved productive of much maple sugar. The women’s patches of maize and potatoes were already sufficiently advanced to use. The Wahpetonwan band of Sioux, the “Dwellers among the Leaves,” were fully awakened to the fact that it was almost time for the midsummer festivities of the old, wild days. The invitations were b
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II. AN INDIAN BOY’S TRAINING
II. AN INDIAN BOY’S TRAINING
IT is commonly supposed that there is no systematic education of their children among the aborigines of this country. Nothing could be farther from the truth. All the customs of this primitive people were held to be divinely instituted, and those in connection with the training of children were scrupulously adhered to and transmitted from one generation to another. The expectant parents conjointly bent all their efforts to the task of giving the new-comer the best they could gather from a long l
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I. Games and Sports
I. Games and Sports
THE Indian boy was a prince of the wilderness. He had but very little work to do during the period of his boyhood. His principal occupation was the practice of a few simple arts in warfare and the chase. Aside from this, he was master of his time. Whatever was required of us boys was quickly performed: then the field was clear for our games and plays. There was always keen competition among us. We felt very much as our fathers did in hunting and war—each one strove to excel all the others. It is
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II. My Playmates
II. My Playmates
CHATANNA was the brother with whom I passed much of my early childhood. From the time that I was old enough to play with boys, this brother was my close companion. He was a handsome boy, and an affectionate comrade. We played together, slept together and ate together; and as Chatanna was three years the older, I naturally looked up to him as to a superior. Oesedah was a beautiful little character. She was my cousin, and four years younger than myself. Perhaps none of my early playmates are more
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III: The Boy Hunter
III: The Boy Hunter
IT will be no exaggeration to say that the life of the Indian hunter was a life of fascination. From the moment that he lost sight of his rude home in the midst of the forest, his untutored mind lost itself in the myriad beauties and forces of nature. Yet he never forgot his personal danger from some lurking foe or savage beast, however absorbing was his passion for the chase. The Indian youth was a born hunter. Every motion, every step expressed an inborn dignity and, at the same time, a depth
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IV. Hakadah’s First Offering
IV. Hakadah’s First Offering
“HAKADAH, coowah!” was the sonorous call that came from a large teepee in the midst of the Indian encampment. In answer to the summons there emerged from the woods, which were only a few steps away, a boy, accompanied by a splendid black dog. There was little in the appearance of the little fellow to distinguish him from the other Sioux boys. He hastened to the tent from which he had been summoned, carrying in his hands a bow and arrows gorgeously painted, while the small birds and squirrels tha
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I: A Visit to Smoky Day
I: A Visit to Smoky Day
SMOKY DAY was widely known among us as a preserver of history and legend. He was a living book of the traditions and history of his people. Among his effects were bundles of small sticks, notched and painted. One bundle contained the number of his own years. Another was composed of sticks representing the important events of history, each of which was marked with the number of years since that particular event occurred. For instance, there was the year when so many stars fell from the sky, with
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II. The Stone Boy
II. The Stone Boy
“Ho, mita koda!” (welcome, friend!) was Smoky Day’s greeting, as I entered his lodge on the third day. “I hope you did not dream of a watery combat with the Ojibways, after the history I repeated to you yesterday,” the old sage continued, with a complaisant smile playing upon his face. “No,” I said, meekly, “but, on the other hand, I have wished that the sun might travel a little faster, so that I could come for another story.” “Well, this time I will tell you one of the kind we call myths or fa
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I: Evening in the Lodge
I: Evening in the Lodge
I HAD been skating on that part of the lake where there was an overflow, and came home somewhat cold. I cannot say just how cold it was, but it must have been intensely so, for the trees were cracking all about me like pistol shots. I did not mind, because I was wrapped up in my buffalo robe with the hair inside, and a wide leather belt held it about my loins. My skates were nothing more than strips of basswood bark bound upon my feet. I had taken off my frozen moccasins and put on dry ones in t
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II. Adventures of My Uncle
II. Adventures of My Uncle
IT was a beautiful fall day—‘a gopher’s last look back,’ as we used to say of the last warm days of the late autumn. We were encamped beside a wild rice lake, where two months before we had harvested our watery fields of grain, and where we had now returned for the duck-hunting. All was well with us. Ducks were killed in countless numbers, and in the evenings the men hunted deer in canoes by torchlight along the shores of the lake. But alas! life is made up of good times and bad times, and it is
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VII. THE END OF THE BEAR DANCE
VII. THE END OF THE BEAR DANCE
IT was one of the superstitions of the Santee Sioux to treat disease from the standpoint of some animal or inanimate thing. That person who, according to their belief, had been commissioned to become a medicine man or a war chief, must not disobey the bear or other creature or thing which gave him his commission. If he ever ventured to do so, the offender must pay for his insubordination with his life, or that of his own child or dearest friend. It was supposed to be necessary that the supernatu
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VIII. THE MAIDENS’ FEAST
VIII. THE MAIDENS’ FEAST
THERE were many peculiar customs among the Indians of an earlier period, some of which tended to strengthen the character of the people and preserve their purity. Perhaps the most unique of these was the annual “feast of maidens.” The casual observer would scarcely understand the full force and meaning of this ceremony. The last one that I ever witnessed was given at Fort Ellis, Manitoba, about the year 1871. Upon the table land just back of the old trading post and fully a thousand feet above t
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I: A Legend of Devil’s Lake
I: A Legend of Devil’s Lake
AFTER the death of Smoky Day, old Weyuha was regarded as the greatest story-teller among the Wahpeton Sioux. “Tell me, good Weyuha, a legend of your father’s country,” I said to him one evening, for I knew the country which is now known as North Dakota and Southern Manitoba was their ancient hunting-ground. I was prompted by Uncheedah to make this request, after the old man had eaten in our lodge. “Many years ago,” he began, as he passed the pipe to uncle, “we traveled from the Otter-tail to Min
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II. Manitoshaw’s Hunting
II. Manitoshaw’s Hunting
IT was in the winter, in the Moon of Difficulty (January). We had eaten our venison roast for supper, and the embers were burning brightly. Our teepee was especially cheerful. Uncheedah sat near the entrance, my uncle and his wife upon the opposite side, while I with my pets occupied the remaining space. Wabeda, the dog, lay near the fire in a half doze, watching out of the corners of his eyes the tame raccoon, which snuggled back against the walls of the teepee, his shrewd brain, doubtless, con
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I: Life in the Woods
I: Life in the Woods
THE month of September recalls to every Indian’s mind the season of the fall hunt. I remember one such expedition which is typical of many. Our party appeared on the northwestern side of Turtle mountain; for we had been hunting buffaloes all summer, in the region of the Mouse river, between that mountain and the upper Missouri. As our cone-shaped teepees rose in clusters along the outskirts of the heavy forest that clothes the sloping side of the mountain, the scene below was gratifying to a sav
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II. A Winter Camp
II. A Winter Camp
WHEN I was about twelve years old we wintered upon the Mouse river, west of Turtle mountain. It was one of the coldest winters I ever knew, and was so regarded by the old men of the tribe. The summer before there had been plenty of buffalo upon that side of the Missouri, and our people had made many packs of dried buffalo meat and cached them in different places, so that they could get them in case of need. There were many black-tailed deer and elk along the river, and grizzlies were to be found
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III. Wild Harvests
III. Wild Harvests
WHEN our people lived in Minnesota, a good part of their natural subsistence was furnished by the wild rice, which grew abundantly in all of that region. Around the shores and all over some of the innumerable lakes of the “Land of Sky-blue Water” was this wild cereal found. Indeed, some of the watery fields in those days might be compared in extent and fruitfulness with the fields of wheat on Minnesota’s magnificent farms to-day. The wild rice harvesters came in groups of fifteen to twenty famil
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IV. A Meeting on the Plains
IV. A Meeting on the Plains
WE were encamped at one time on the Souris or Mouse river, a tributary of the Assiniboine. The buffaloes were still plenty; hence we were living on the “fat of the land.” One afternoon a scout came in with the announcement that a body of United States troops was approaching! This report, of course, caused much uneasiness among our people. A council was held immediately, in the course of which the scout was put through a rigid examination. Before a decision had been reached, another scout came in
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V. An Adventurous Journey
V. An Adventurous Journey
IT must now be about thirty years since our long journey in search of new hunting-grounds, from the Assiniboine river to the Upper Missouri. The buffalo, formerly so abundant between the two rivers, had begun to shun their usual haunts, on account of the great numbers of Canadian halfbreeds in that part of the country. There was also the first influx of English sportsmen, whose wholesale methods of destruction wrought such havoc with the herds. These seemingly intelligent animals correctly proph
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XI. The Laughing Philosopher
XI. The Laughing Philosopher
THERE is scarcely anything so exasperating to me as the idea that the natives of this country have no sense of humor and no faculty for mirth. This phase of their character is well understood by those whose fortune or misfortune it has been to live among them day in and day out at their homes. I don’t believe I ever heard a real hearty laugh away from the Indians’ fireside. I have often spent an entire evening in laughing with them until I could laugh no more. There are evenings when the recogni
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XII. FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF CIVILIZATION
XII. FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF CIVILIZATION
I WAS scarcely old enough to know anything definite about the “Big Knives,” as we called the white men, when the terrible Minnesota massacre broke up our home and I was carried into exile. I have already told how I was adopted into the family of my father’s younger brother, when my father was betrayed and imprisoned. We all supposed that he had shared the fate of those who were executed at Mankato, Minnesota. Now the savage philosophers looked upon vengeance in the field of battle as a lofty vir
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