The summer huts are very cool, and, generally speaking, have no unpleasant smell. Mr. Say gives a very good description, and a tolerably accurate print, of a Konza lodge, or hut,[233] and, with {345} some slight differences, the mode of building resembles, in the main, those of the Mandans, Manitaries, and Arikkaras. Among these differences are the mats which are fastened all round in the first hut, and which I did not observe among the tribes that I visited. The beds, too, are arranged in a different manner. The Mandans and Manitaries are seen in their huts, sitting round the fire, employed in all kinds of domestic labour. The man has, generally, no clothing except the nokka, and is often merely smoking, but the women are never idle. In winter, that is, at the beginning or middle of November, these Indians remove, with the greater part of their effects, to the neighbouring forest, where their winter huts are situated. These consist of precisely similar huts, of rather smaller dimensions. Their departure from the summer huts is determined by the weather, but, as before-said, is generally about the middle of November; and their return, in the spring, is usually about the latter end of February, or the beginning of March, so that we may reckon that they may pass above eight months in their summer quarters. Inside of the winter huts is a particular compartment, where the horses are put in the evening, and fed with maize. In the daytime they are driven into the prairie, and feed in the bushes, on the bark of poplars. There are, probably, above 300 horses in the two Mandan villages; some of the people, indeed, do not possess any, while others, again, have several. The Mandans and Manitaries, like all the other Indians of this country, sometimes make what are here called caches, or hiding-places, in the vicinity of their villages. These caches are holes, or magazines, underground, often so artfully contrived that it is very difficult to discover them.[234] The Indians frequently go from their winter to their summer village, to fetch any articles they may happen to want, as they invariably leave part of their property behind. When they quit their huts for a longer period than usual, they load their dogs with the baggage, which is drawn in small sledges, made of a couple of thin, narrow boards, nine or ten feet in length, fastened together with leather straps, and with four cross-pieces, by way of giving them firmness. Leather straps are attached in front, and drawn either by men or dogs. The load is fastened to the sledge by straps.[235] When the snow is deep, they use snow-shoes,[236] which are described by Captain Franklin, only those of the Mandans are much smaller, about two feet and a half long; whereas in the north their length is from four to six feet. The Mandans and Manitaries have not, by any means, so many dogs as the Assiniboins, Crows, and Blackfeet. They are rarely of the true wolf's colour, but generally black, or white, or else spotted with black and white. Among the nations further to the north-west they more nearly resemble the wolf, but here they are more like the prairie wolf (Canis latrans).[237] We likewise found, among these animals, a brown race, descended from European pointers, hence the genuine bark of the dog is more frequently heard here, whereas among the western nations they only howl. The Indian dogs are worked very hard, have hard blows, and hard fare; in fact, they are treated just as this fine animal is treated among the Esquimaux.
{346} The Mandans are hospitable, and often invite their acquaintance to come and see them. Their pipes are made of the red-stone, or of black clay. They obtain the red pipe-heads chiefly from the Sioux; sometimes they have wooden heads lined with stone; the tube is plain, long, round or flat, on the whole, of the same shape as among the Sioux, but they are not so fastidious about ornamenting their pipes as other tribes. They smoke the leaves of the tobacco plant, which is cultivated by them; the bark of the red willow (Cornus sericea), which they obtain from the traders, is sometimes mixed with the tobacco, or the latter with the leaves of the bearberry (Arbutus uva ursi). The tobacco of the Whites, unmixed, is too strong for the Indians, because they draw the smoke into their lungs; hence they do not willingly smoke cigars.
The meals of the Mandans are served in wooden dishes. The spoons are generally large and deep; they are made of the horn of the bighorn;[238] sometimes they are yellow, or else they are shallow, made of black buffalo's horn. They have a considerable variety of dishes. The Indians residing in permanent villages have the advantage of the roving hunting tribes, in that they not only hunt, but derive their chief subsistence from their plantations, which afford them a degree of security against distress. It is true, these Indians sometimes suffer hunger when the buffalo herds keep at a great distance, and their crops fail; but the distress can never be so great among the Missouri Indians, as in the tribes that live further northwards. The plants which they cultivate are maize, beans, French beans, gourds, sunflowers, and tobacco (Nicotiana quadrivalvis), of which I brought home some seeds, which have flowered in several botanic gardens.
Of maize there are several varieties of colour, to which they give different names. The several varieties are:—1. White maize. 2. Yellow maize. 3. Red maize. 4. Spotted maize. 5. Black maize. 6. Sweet maize. 7. Very hard yellow maize. 8. White, or red-striped maize. 9. Very tender yellow maize.[239]
The beans are likewise of various sorts—small white beans, black, red, and spotted beans. The gourds are—yellow, black, striped, blue, long, and thick-shelled gourds.
The sunflower is a large helianthus, which seems perfectly to resemble that cultivated in our gardens. It is planted in rows between the maize. There are two or three varieties, with red, and black, and one with smaller seeds. Very nice cakes are made of these seeds. The tobacco {347} cultivated by the Mandans, Manitaries, and Arikkaras, attains a great height, and is suffered to grow up from the seeds, without having any care whatever bestowed upon it. It is not transplanted. When it is ripe the stalks are cut, dried, and powdered; or the leaves, with the small branches, are cut into little pieces. The taste and smell are disagreeable to an European, resembling camomile rather than tobacco. The plant is not now so much cultivated as formerly, being superseded by the more pleasant tobacco of the Whites; but the species is still preserved.[240] It is only on solemn occasions, for instance, in negotiations for peace, that this tobacco is still smoked; the seed is, therefore, preserved in the medicine bag of the nation, that the plant may never be lost. When they mean to smoke this tobacco, a small quantity of fat is rubbed on it.
The cultivation of the maize and other fields, of which each family prepares three, four, or five acres, takes place in the month of May. Rows of small furrows are made, into which the grains of maize are thrown singly, and covered with earth. Three times in the summer the plants are hoed, and the earth heaped up against them, that the moisture may have better access to them. The harvest takes place in October, when men, women, and children, each lend a helping hand. At present the women use, in their field labour, a broad iron hoe, with a crooked wooden handle, which they obtain from the merchants. Charbonneau recollected the time when they used the shoulder blade of the buffalo for this purpose. The fields are never fenced, but lie quite open and exposed.
The wild plants of the prairie are used by the Mandans, and other people of the Upper Missouri; and to those before-mentioned, I can only add the feverolles (Faba minor equina), a fruit resembling the bean, which is said to grow in the ground, but which I did not see; there are many other roots in the prairie, which are used for food. The gourds are eaten fresh as well as dry. The beans are seldom eaten of one kind, but many sorts are mixed together. The maize is boiled or roasted, then pounded, mixed with fat, and made up into small cakes and baked. There are, of course, many other ways of dressing it. The sweet maize has a very pleasant taste, especially when it is in what is called the milky state; it is then boiled, dried, and laid by for use.
All kinds of animals serve the Mandans for food; the bear, when it is young and fat, the wolf, the fox, in short, everything except the horse; the ermine is not eaten by many; and of birds they dislike the turkey-buzzard, and the raven, because they feed on the dead bodies deposited on the stages. They have a great aversion from serpents, but eat the turtle; the buffalo is the chief object of their chase, as it supplies them with skins, meat, tallow, marrow-bones, sinews, and many other necessaries. Next to the buffalo the beaver is the most indispensable to them, since it not only furnishes them with valuable skins, but supplies them with delicate food, the fat tail, especially, being considered quite a dainty morsel by the Indians. Pemmican,[241] {348} which is so favourite a dish among the northern Indians, is not much in use among the Mandans. Their only drink is water, for they are unacquainted with the method of preparing fermented liquors. They did not obtain any spirits, either from the American Fur Company, or the agents of Messrs. Soublette and Campbell; hence an intoxicated person is scarcely ever seen. They are extremely fond of sugar, and likewise of salt, which they procure from their lakes, and, if the supply is insufficient, purchase from the Whites. They are likewise fond of coffee and tea, well sweetened. It has been affirmed, that several North American nations, especially those which speak the Algonquin language, are cannibals, and more particularly the Chippeways and the Potawatomis; but I found no trace of this unnatural custom among the Missouri nations.[242]
Two, and sometimes three, families usually live together in an Indian hut, commonly the father, with his married sons or sons-in-law. Polygamy is everywhere practised, and the number of wives differs; however, they have very seldom more than four, and, in general, only one.[243] The women are very skilful in various kinds of work, particularly in dyeing and painting the buffalo robes. They extract a red colour from the roots of the savoyenne, or from buffalo berries; yellow from a lichen of the Rocky Mountains; black from helianthus, as well as from a black stone or clay; blue and green they extract from European substances. Among the Mandans, Manitaries, and Arikkaras, the women, as Lewis and Clarke relate, manufacture beads from coloured glass. They powder those which they have obtained from the traders, and mould them into different shapes.[244] This custom is, however, no longer common. The dyeing of the skins, of which many travellers have spoken, employs a great portion of the women's time. These three nations understand the manufacture of earthen pots and vessels, of various forms and sizes. The clay is of a dark slate colour, and burns a yellowish-red, very similar to what is seen in the burnt tops of the Missouri hills. This clay is mixed with flint or granite, reduced to powder by the action of fire. The workwoman forms the hollow inside of the vessel by means of a round stone which she holds in her hand, while she works and smooths the outside with a piece of poplar bark. When the pot is made, it is filled and surrounded with dry shavings, and then burnt, when it is ready for use. They know nothing of glazing.[245] With respect to their boats, the North Americans are far more expert than the Brazilians, Patagonians, and other South Americans, who live on the banks of rivers, and yet have contrived no means to pass them. The Chippeways and other northern nations have handsome vessels of birch bark; the Esquimaux makes his kiack, which is curiously covered with seal skin; and on the Missouri, especially among the Mandans, there are boats of buffalo skin, which are represented in the plates accompanying this work.[246] They are very light, of a circular form, stretched on a frame of several pieces of wood crossing each other, and may be carried on the shoulder of a single individual.