Some time before I was married I bought into the Mosquito society when
they sold out to the Pigeons. It was this way with us: There were nine
societies for men, of different rank as follows; Mosquitoes, Braves,
All-brave-dogs, Front-tails, Raven-bearers, Dogs, Kit-foxes, Catchers,
and Bulls. Lower than all was a boy’s society, the Pigeons. To enter
these societies you first bought into the Pigeons; that is, you gave
presents to an older member who in return transferred his membership
to you. Every four years each of the nine men’s societies sold to
the next lower; so one might finally, if he lived to be an old man,
become a member of the Bulls. These societies were spoken of as the
All-comrades. Each had its own songs, dances, regalia, and ritual. When
the whole tribe came together for the summer hunt and the sun dance,
these societies were called upon to guard and police the camp. Their
parades and dances through the camp were very impressive. As all the
members of a society were near the same age, these organizations are
often called age-societies by the white people.
In time I passed through all of the societies and became a Bull. When
in the Raven-bearers we gave a dance at a trading post where Fort
Benton now stands and two strange white men watched us. One of them
drew a picture of us and afterwards the older man asked questions of me
through an interpreter and wrote something in a book. I heard that he
came from across the great water as did the first white people, but I
never saw him again.[3]
When with my comrades in the Bulls we sold out to the Catchers, I
became one of the old men to sit in council and advise the people.
There are two leaders for each society. I was never a leader, because
the leaders of one always sold to the leaders of the lower, and it
so happened during my life that the same two men lived to reach the
Bulls. So there was no chance for anyone else to lead. But we are now
far ahead of my story, I must begin with my life as one of the young
married men.
After I came back with my woman to live in my band, old Medicine-bear
often sat in our tepee. (My woman soon tanned skins from my hunting and
made a large fine tepee of our own.) He wished me to become a shaman
like himself. You see I had experienced a real vision, few men who
fasted received such power as came to me. I had the power to become a
shaman, but I held to my vow to be a warrior. I was poor. So I led war
parties against the Cree, Assiniboin, Snake, and Crow. Many horses and
guns I took. Coups I counted and took three scalps from the Crow. But I
meditated often upon the powers in the air, water, and earth. They are
the great mysteries. Everything is done by them. About this time two
things happened to me that turned my thoughts from war.
Our chief led a party against the Cree and invited me to go. The chief
was jealous of me. As I told you, he was a bad man, but I could not
refuse. Medicine-bear, the shaman, went with us to give us power. When
we reached the Cree country I was ordered out as a scout. It was dark.
As I went along I saw a tepee all by itself. I went up to it quietly
and looked in. There was no one in the tepee except a man, his wife,
and a little child. The little child could just walk and was amusing
itself by dipping soup from the kettle with a small horn spoon. The man
and his wife were busy talking and paid no attention to the child. Now
the child looked up and saw me peeping through the hole, toddled over
to the kettle, dipped up some soup in the spoon and held it to my lips.
I drank and the child returned to the kettle for more. In this way the
child fed me for many minutes. Then I went away. As I went along to
my own party, I thought to myself, “I do not like to do this, but I
must tell my party about this tepee. When they know of it, they will
come and kill these people. This little child fed me even when I was
spying upon them, and I do not like to have it killed. Well, perhaps
I can save the child; but then it would be too bad for it to lose
its parents. No, I do not see how I can save them, yet I cannot bear
to have them killed.” I sat down and thought it over. After a while,
I went back to the tepee, went in, and sat down. While my host was
preparing the pipe, the child began to feed me again with the spoon.
After we had smoked, I talked to the man in the sign-language, told him
all about it, how I had come as a scout to spy upon them, how I was
about to bring up my war party, but that they had been saved by the
little child. Then I directed the man to go at once, leaving everything
behind him in the tepee.
The man was very thankful and offered to give me a medicine bundle and
a suit of clothes; but I refused, because I knew that my party would
suspect me. Then the man suggested that he might place the bundle near
the door, behind the bedding, so that when the war party came up and
dashed upon the tepee, I would be the first to capture the bundle.
(All the important property of the tepee is always kept at the back,
opposite the door, and, when a war party rushes in, the swiftest runs
to this place.)
Then I reported to my chief, telling him that I had discovered a camp
of the enemy but that I had not been up to it or seen anyone. He
started out at once, all of us following. When we had surrounded the
tepee, we gave a whoop and rushed upon it. I kept behind and while
the others were busy counting coup upon the things in the back of the
tepee, I seized the bundle by the door. The chief was angry, but said
nothing. When we were again in camp old Medicine-bear began to unwrap
his war medicine pipe to make a thank offering for our success. Then
the chief faced me and denounced me as a traitor, accused me of warning
the enemy and secreting the medicine bundle. My anger rose, I drew my
knife, but at that moment old Medicine-bear sprang between us, holding
the holy pipe in both hands. This is the custom, no one can fight over
a holy pipe. The shaman made us each take the pipe and vow to put away
our anger and hold our silence. So it was.
Never have I forgotten that little child. Some great power was guarding
it. Its medicine was strong. Many times have I prayed to that power and
sometimes it helped me, but I do not yet know what power it is. Yet
somehow I took little interest in war, the child’s medicine did that to
me.
The next year I felt sad and gloomy. So I decided to go to war anyway.
I led out a party of my own against the Crow. The fourth night I went
out to scout. It was cloudy and rather dark. As I was stealing along a
marshy place, a star rose out of the earth and stood before me. It was
the Smoking-star. Something in me said, “Follow.” Then the star led
off slowly; gradually it took me to the back trail and then swiftly
faded away, as it moved toward my woman’s tepee at home. I sat down and
prayed. In my mind the Smoking-star was telling me to go back.
When dawn came I returned to my party. I told my story. All agreed
that we should go home for the signs were against us. When I got into
our camp I saw many people standing about my woman’s tepee and heard
a doctor’s drum. My son, my first born, was very ill. Three doctors
had been called, one after the other. I gave them all my horses. As
is their way, when they feared the sick one would die, they departed.
At last, I went out to the top of a hill to cry to the Smoking-star.
Surely, I thought, he would help me, but clouds overcast the sky and
there was no answer to my appeal. That morning the boy died.
In the afternoon the body was wrapped in a robe and placed in a tree
near our camp. As he died in the tepee, we could not use it again so we
placed it at the foot of the tree. I cropped my hair and mourned many
days. Now I was poor. All my horses went to the doctors. My woman’s
tepee was gone and once again we lived with our poor old grandmother in
her little ragged tepee; but in a few days my woman’s relatives gave
her another tepee and after a time we again accumulated horses.
About this time Medicine-bear became a beaver bundle owner. My
misfortunes turned my mind more and more to the mysteries of the powers
around us and I began to learn the songs and the teachings of the
beaver men. The ritual for the beaver bundle is long and difficult.
There are more than three hundred songs to be learned before one
can lead the ceremony of the beaver. In the bundle are the skins of
beavers, otters, and many kinds of birds and water animals. With each
of these there are songs, for each brought some power to the man who
first saw it in a vision. My people did not plant corn, as did the
Mud-houses (Mandan and Hidatsa), but the beaver men planted tobacco.
At the planting and the gathering of the tobacco, the beaver bundle
is opened and the ritual sung. The garden and the plants are sacred,
for tobacco must be offered to all the powers of the earth, and of the
water. A beaver man must keep count of the days, the moons, and the
winters. For this he keeps a set of sticks like those sometimes found
in a beaver’s house. At all times he must be ready to tell the moon and
the day; he must say when it is time to go on the spring hunt, to hold
the sun dance, etc. Then he must watch the sun, moon, stars, winds, and
clouds so that he may know what the weather will be. If he is holy and
good, he will have visions and dreams of power and so become a shaman.
So after my son died I often sat with the beaver men. In time I learned
many of the beaver songs and became chief assistant to Medicine-bear in
the ceremonies. When I was an old man, Medicine-bear died; it was the
year before I sold out of the Bull society (the year we saw the first
steamboat). Then I became the leading beaver man, as I am still.
When I first began to study the beaver medicine, I spent hours on
the hilltops and near the waters, meditating and watching the birds,
animals, and the heavens. Yet such solemn thoughts did not occupy all
my time as a young married man.
There was much sport in the winter camps. Many men played the wheel and
arrow game and again the hand game. These were the favorite gambling
games. The first was for two players, but the latter permitted team
playing. Some men gambled away all their belongings and even their
women. I never went so far. Once I remember two young men played the
wheel game until one lost all his possessions except his moccasins and
his breechcloth, finally losing these, to the great merriment of the
whole camp.
My band had a great reputation for jokes. In this I was a leader. Once
in the spring we fooled a man named Bow-string. This man had a favorite
race horse which he guarded very carefully, picketing him outside
his tepee. One day I dressed myself to look like a Crow, and while
Bow-string was inside playing the hand game, untied his horse and led
him off up the hills across the creek. Then a confederate gave the
alarm. All ran out to see a Crow going off with the horse in broad day.
Of course, everyone knew the trick, but Bow-string. Care had been taken
to send all the other horses of the camp out to pasture with a herder.
So Bow-string took a gun and set out with a pursuing party, afoot.
Everybody in camp appeared to be greatly frightened, women screamed,
and all the dogs began to bark. As the supposed Crow, I sprang upon the
horse, waved a defiance and dashed over the hill.
Once out of sight I rode quickly around the hills and got back to camp
after the pursuers had passed over the ridge. After a fruitless search
for the trail, the party came back, Bow-string looking very sad. But
there stood his horse tied as before! Then there was great uproar and
jesting.
A favorite trick of mine was often played upon visiting strangers,
especially upon dignified old men. I would invite the guest to my tepee
to feast with a few of my friends. Then I would pretend to quarrel
with my woman and we would fall to fighting. The others would try to
separate us and so all begin to struggle, taking care to fall upon and
thoroughly muss up the puzzled visitor.
Our people were fond of liquor, which could be had when we went to
the trading posts in summer. At such times there was much fighting.
We all wanted liquor because we believed that some mysterious power
could be had in that way. Some men had visions while drunk, that made
them shamans or doctors according to the powers that were given them.
Sometimes I drank liquor too. Once when my woman was drunk also, we
quarreled and I threatened to tomahawk her smallest child, but she
snatched a burning stick from the fire and thrust the glowing end
against my neck; you see the scar. After that I did not drink much. I
was glad when the Great Father stopped the trading of liquor, it did us
much harm.
Once a year in summer all the bands of our tribe camped together. A
great circle of tepees was formed and the societies had charge of the
camp. At this time the sun dance was held. It was very sacred and
lasted many days. No man was wise enough to know how all parts of it
were conducted, so many medicine men were needed for the different
rituals. Some men would vow to torture themselves at this time. I
once gave a finger to the sun, but that is not the real sacrifice.
Those who made the vow have holes cut in the skin of their breasts and
shoulders, through which sticks are thrust and cords attached. The ends
of these cords are fastened to the center pole in the sun dance lodge,
where these devotees dance and cry for power until they tear themselves
free or fall in a swoon: I never made this sacrifice. I was afraid, for
it is very holy. Yet many times have I given bits of my skin to Natos
(the sun) as the scars upon my body show. These were not given in the
sun dance, but when I was fasting alone in the hills.
A good and virtuous woman may often save the lives of her relatives by
making a vow to take the tongues at the sun dance. My woman did this
in the year known as “Gambler-died-winter” (about 1845, according to
most tribal counts). Her brother was about to die. So she went outside,
looked up at the sun, and said, “I will take the tongue at the sun
dance.” Her brother got well. If she had not been a pure and good
woman, he would have died. In due time old Medicine-bear, the beaver
bundle man, was given a horse and called in to prepare her for the
ordeal. During the spring a hundred buffalo tongues were sliced and
dried. Only true women are permitted to slice them. If a woman cuts
her finger or cuts a hole in her slice, she is turned out because she
has not been true to her husband. At the proper time in the sun dance,
as the sun is setting, the women who have vowed to take the tongues go
forward and in turn, take up a piece of tongue and holding it up to the
sun, declare their purity. It is the duty of any man, who knows the
claim to be false to come forward with a challenge. My woman was not
challenged. Everyone knew her to be pure and good.
Once she was the holy woman to give the sun dance. It was in the
deep snow winter (about 1851) that she became ill. Many people were
starving, for the buffalo had drifted far before the snowstorms. Then
my woman addressed the sun, saying that she would give the sun dance,
next year. Soon the people found buffalo and she got well.
A woman cannot give the sun dance alone, her man must also be good and
brave. Both must fast four days and sit in the holy tepee. The holy
natoas bundle must be opened and the woman wear its sacred headdress,
with the prairie turnip and carry the digging-stick used by the
Woman-who-married-a-star. That winter we were camped on the Missouri.
The following summer we went to Yellow River to give the sun dance.
Now, it is our way, that the woman who vows to give the sun dance
must buy a natoas bundle. The power and right to the ritual thus come
to her. For this, many horses, robes, and dried meat must be given.
When we came to bring our bundle all the people of our band and our
relatives in other bands were called upon to help us by gifts. After
the sun dance we kept the natoas bundle in our tepee and cared for it
as the ritual required. My woman was now a medicine woman. She did not
sell her bundle. In the Blood-fought-among-themselves winter she died
(about 1858). I put the bundle in her robe, set up her tepee on a high
hill and left her there. That is our custom.
She was a good and true woman. After that I went to live with my son,
as you now see. I never took another woman because the Smoking-star
appeared to me in a dream and forbade it.
In the course of time everyone came to look upon me as a shaman. No
one will now walk before me as I sit in a tepee. In my presence all
are dignified and orderly and avoid frivolous talk. Four times in my
life the Smoking-Star has stood before me. All visions are sacred, as
are some dreams, but when a vision appears the fourth time, it is very
holy. Even a shaman may not speak of it freely. Many times have I gone
to lonely places and cried out to the powers of the air, the earth,
and the waters to help me understand their ways. Sometimes they have
answered me, but all the truly great mysteries are beyond understanding.
In the year of the Camp-at-bad-waters-winter the Bull society sold
out as I have said. That was the end of that society; there were but
three of us left when we sold to the Catchers and those to whom we sold
soon died. The ways of the white man were coming among us and many
things were passing away. I was now an old man, fit only for sitting in
council. I could no longer run buffalo, no longer go to war. So we have
come to the last fork in the trail. I have smoked many pipes. I have
sat in many councils, I have made many speeches to restrain our young
men from rash and unjust actions. We are near the end. The Smoking-star
will soon pass down in the west. Soon it will lead me to the sand hills
where my spirit will wander about among the ghosts of buffalo, horses,
and men. Your way is not our way, but you have loved us. Perhaps your
spirit also may return to wander with us among the sand hills of our
fathers. I pray that it may be so. Now, it is finished.
* * * * *
Thoughtfully I left that fireside to find my blankets. As I passed
out through the night, I saw the “Smoking-star” sinking in the west.
It shone to me with a new light. The next winter my old friend passed
into the beyond. His body was laid on a tree scaffold near the favorite
haunts of his band on Two Medicine River.