Such are the battles traced upon the robe of Mah-to-toh-pa or four bears, interpreted by J. Kipp from the words of the hero while sitting upon the robe, explaining each battle as represented.
[3] The reader will see in [plate 65], an accurate drawing of this curious robe, which now hangs in the Indian Gallery, and on the following pages, each group numbered, and delineated on a larger scale, which are fac-similes of the drawings on the robe.
[4] This celebrated weapon with the blood of several victims dried upon its blade, now hangs in the Indian Gallery, with satisfactory certificates of its identity and its remarkable history, and an exact drawing of it and its scabbard can be seen in [plate 99], a.
LETTER—No. 22.
MANDAN VILLAGE, UPPER MISSOURI.
Oh! “horribile visu—et mirabile dictu!” Thank God, it is over, that I have seen it, and am able to tell it to the world.
The annual religious ceremony, of four days, of which I have so often spoken, and which I have so long been wishing to see, has at last been enacted in this village; and I have, fortunately, been able to see and to understand it in most of its bearings, which was more than I had reason to expect; for no white man, in all probability, has ever been before admitted to the medicine-lodge during these most remarkable and appalling scenes.
Well and truly has it been said, that the Mandans are a strange and peculiar people; and most correctly had I been informed, that this was an important and interesting scene, by those who had, on former occasions, witnessed such parts of it as are transacted out of doors, and in front of the medicine-lodge.
Since the date of my last Letter, I was lucky enough to have painted the medicine-man, who was high-priest on this grand occasion, or conductor of the ceremonies, who had me regularly installed doctor or “medicine;” and who, on the morning when these grand refinements in mysteries commenced, took me by the arm, and led me into the medicine-lodge, where the Fur Trader, Mr. Kipp, and his two clerks accompanied me in close attendance for four days; all of us going to our own quarters at sun-down, and returning again at sun-rise the next morning.