“Let him. He will see some of the biggest fighting that he has ever seen yet. We shall be fighting for our religion, our homes, and all that is dear to us; and when men get that way, they generally stay until all are killed. Now I will lay down and have my sleep out.”
“Are you not going in the dance?”
“I shall go in about the third day. By that time some of the men will grow tired and drop out, and I will take their place and stay till it ends.”
“Must I stay in here all the time?”
“Oh, no. You can go out and sit down where you were before, but you had better take this blanket along with you and wrap it around your head so that you will be taken for an Indian. Now mind you, don’t attempt any more nonsense. These women know when you ought to come in, and the next time one of them takes you by the arm and motions toward the tepee you had better start. If you don’t, I’ll be after you.”
Carl took the blanket and went out; and for five long days, except the time he took to eat his meals and to sleep, he sat there with his blanket wrapped around his head and watching the Ghost Dance. To his surprise he could see nothing about it to excite so much admiration in the Sioux. When the braves got ready to begin the dance, a neatly-dressed young squaw walked up to the pole with a bow and four arrows in her hand. The arrows she shot to four different points of the compass—north, south, east and west. The warriors then separated and hunted up the arrows, which were bound into a bundle and tied to the pole. After that a medicine man made his appearance, and surrounded by the warriors, of whom there were a dozen in all, began making a speech to them. This was called the small circle, the other Indians not having completed their “purification,” which they did by going through the sweat-box.
The medicine man occupied nearly an hour in making his speech—they were at so great a distance from Carl that he could not understand what was said—and then somebody else took his place. It was a brave who had passed into a trance during their last dance. He must have seen some wonderful things while he was in the spirit world, for he occupied their attention for another hour, and then he, too, gave way to another. There was no yelling, except what the speakers made themselves, but all seemed to be deeply interested.
Finally the braves who had been in the sweat-box began to come out and join those about the pole, and at last the large circle was formed, and then began the dancing. They took hold of hands and began moving around the circle from right to left, and this thing was kept up until the people grew so tired that they could scarcely walk. The old Indians, knowing that this was to be a dance of endurance, barely lifted their feet, while the young braves bounded into the air and tried in various ways to show their enthusiasm. In a short time the dust raised by the feet of the dancers arose in clouds so thick that Carl could hardly see the circle at all. When one showed signs of giving out the others would jerk him around the circle, until at last he sank down from utter exhaustion.
“Well, if this is all there is of the Ghost Dance I am going to bed,” said Carl about twelve o’clock that night. “It makes me tired to look at them.”
Carl had not neglected to keep his eye on the women, who had sat all that day watching the Ghost Dance, and he saw that they were watching him too. When he arose and went into the tepee they got up and followed him. The squawman was still stretched out on his bed slumbering heavily, and Carl wondered if he were trying to make up for the sleep he would lose during the two days that he expected to pass in the dance.