Fig. 191.
Fig. 191, 1808-’09.—The Dakota who had killed the Ree shown in this record for 1806-’07 was himself killed by the Rees. He is represented running, and shot with two arrows, blood dripping. These two figures, taking in connection, afford a good illustration of the method pursued in the chart, which was not intended to be a continuous history, or even to record the most important event of each year, but to exhibit some one of special peculiarity. There was some incident about the one Ree who was shot when, in fancied security, he was bringing down an eagle, and whose death was avenged by his brethren the second year afterward. It would, indeed, have been impossible to have graphically distinguished the many battles, treaties, horse-stealings, big hunts, etc., so most of them were omitted and other events of greater individuality and better adapted for portrayal were taken for the year count, the criterion being not that they were of historic moment, but that they were of general notoriety, or perhaps of special interest to the recorders.
Fig. 192.
Fig. 192, 1809-’10.—A chief, Little-Beaver, set fire to a trading store, and was killed. The character simply designates his name-totem. The other interpretations say that he was a white trapper, but probably he had gained a new name among the Indians.
Fig. 193.
Fig. 193, 1810-’11.—Black-Stone made medicine. The expression medicine is too common to be successfully eliminated, though it is altogether misleading. The “medicine men” have no connection with therapeutics, feel no pulses, and administer no drugs, or, if sometimes they direct the internal or external use of some secret preparation, it is as a part of superstitious ceremonies, and with main reliance upon those ceremonies. Their incantations are not only to drive away disease, but for many other purposes, such as to obtain success in war, avert calamity, and were very frequently used to bring within reach the buffalo, on which the Dakotas depended for food. The rites are those known as shamanism, noticeable in the ethnic periods of savagery and barbarism. In the ceremonial of “making medicine,” a buffalo head, and especially the head of an albino buffalo, held a prominent place among the plains tribes. Many references to this are to be found in the Prince of Wied’s Travels in the Interior of North America. Also see infra, Chap. [XIV]. The device in the chart is the man figure, with the head of an albino buffalo held over his own.
