The Manitaries do not much differ in their personal appearance from the Mandans; but it strikes a stranger that they are, in general, taller. Most of them are well-formed and stout; many are very tall, broad-shouldered, and muscular; the latter may, indeed, be said of the greater proportion of the men. Their noses are more or less arched, and sometimes quite straight. I also met with several whose countenances perfectly resembled those of the Botocudos.[338] The women {396} are much like the Mandans; many are tall and stout, but most of them are short and corpulent. There are some pretty faces among them, which, according to the Indian standard of beauty, may be called handsome. As they have long lived in close connexion with the Mandans, the two nations have adopted the same costume, though there is, at the same time, a greater attention to neatness and adornment among the Manitaries than their neighbours. Their necklaces of bears' claws, for which they often give a high price, are very large and well finished: they often contain forty claws, are attached to each shoulder, and form a semicircle across the breast. Their lock of hair on the temples is often long and curiously entwined with ornaments, and fringed at the point with small red feathers, or strips of ermine. They wear their hair in long flat braids, hanging down upon the back like the Mandans; sometimes it is plastered over with clay, and not unfrequently lengthened by gluing false locks to it. The flat ornament in the shape of the rule hanging from the back, which I have mentioned in speaking of the Mandans, is often very tastefully ornamented with porcupine quills, set in neat patterns. They seldom wear leather shirts, like the Crows and Blackfeet, but, generally speaking, have nothing under the buffalo robe: frequently their arms and whole body are variously painted. Their leggins do not differ from those of the Mandans. The breechcloth generally consists of a piece of white woollen cloth with dark blue stripes. Their leather shoes are ornamented in various ways, sometimes with a long stripe, or a rosette of dyed porcupine quills. The girdle is of leather, into which the knife and sheath are stuck at the back. They often wear narrow bright steel bracelets at the wrists, which they purchase from the Company. Much taste and extravagance are lavished on the buffalo robe, the main article of their attire. The style in which they are painted is similar to that of the Mandans, and very high prices are paid for these robes. Many of the men are tattooed, especially on one side of the body only, for instance, the right half of the breast, and the right arm, sometimes down to the wrist; nay, the old chief, Addih-Hiddish, had the whole of his right hand tattooed in stripes.[339] They paint their body in the same manner as the Mandans.
The Manitari villages are similarly arranged as those of the Mandans, except that they have no ark placed in the central space, and the figure of Ochkih-Hadda is not there. In the principal village, however, is the figure of a woman placed on a long pole, doubtless representing the grandmother, who presented them with the pots, of which I shall speak more hereafter. A bundle of brushwood is hung on this pole, to which are attached the leathern dress and leggins of a woman. The head is made of wormwood, and has a cap with feathers. The interior of their huts is arranged as among the Mandans: like them the Manitaries go, in winter, into the forests on both banks of the Missouri, where they find fuel, and, at the same time, protection against the inclement weather. Their winter villages are in the thickest of the forest, and the huts are built near to each other, promiscuously, and without any attempt at order or regularity.[340] {397} They have about 250 or 300 horses in their three villages, and a considerable number of dogs.
When a Manitari invites his friends to a feast which is especially devoted to the table, each guest brings a dish, which is filled, and which he is expected to empty; if he is unable to do this, he passes it on to his neighbour, and, as a sort of reward, gives him some tobacco. If his neighbour accepts it, he undertakes thereby the often not pleasant task of emptying the dish. At a war feast each guest is obliged to eat whatever is placed before him.[341] When a child is to be named they proceed as follows: the father first sets out on a buffalo hunt, and returns with a good deal of game. He loads himself with ten or twelve large pieces of meat, at the top of which he places the child. Stooping and panting under the burden, he proceeds to the hut of the medicine man who is to give the name, and to whom he delivers the meat as a present or fee.
Like the Mandans, the Manitaries have their bands, or unions, which are distinguished by their songs, dances, and badges. Of these bands there are eleven among the men and three among the women.
Besides these bands, they have two distinct dances:—1st. The dance of the old men, which is executed only by those who are far advanced in years, and no longer take the field. 2nd. The scalp dance; this is danced by the women, who carry the scalps upon poles.[342] In their hands they likewise bear guns, hatchets, clubs, &c. Some among the men beat the drum and rattle the schischikué; the warriors, meanwhile, sitting in a row, and beating time with their feet.
Their games, too, are like those of the Mandans, for if there were any with which they were not originally acquainted they have since adopted them. These people likewise set a high value on the hide of a white buffalo cow, for which they often give fifteen horses, guns, cloth, blankets, robes, and other articles of considerable value.[343] The owner having proclaimed, from the top of his hut, to the whole assembled village, that he has obtained such a robe, keeps it for about four years. The members of the family sometimes wear it on state occasions, and narrow strips are cut off and used as ornaments, especially as head bands. When this time is elapsed the hide is offered to one of the divinities, a medicine man being hired to perform the necessary ceremonies. During {398} the four years, valuable articles of all kinds, such as those before-mentioned, have been collected and are kept in readiness. A hut is built, to be used as a sudatory (as will be related below). A large quantity of food is distributed among the spectators; a bundle of brushwood is fastened to the top of a long pole, and the beautiful white hide is wrapped round it. It is then set up in some spot chosen by the owner, and there left to rot. The medicine man who performs the ceremonies receives, for his trouble, the valuables which have been mentioned—sometimes 150 robes, and other things, part of which he distributes among the persons present. Sometimes they ride, with the white hide, into the prairie, spread on the ground a blue or red blanket, and lay the hide upon it. If it is intended to offer a horse at the same time, they bind his feet together, put a muzzle on his mouth, and leave all together in this situation. If another Indian were to steal the horse, they would say he is a fool for robbing the lord of life. Other mysteries (medicines) and superstitions of the Manitaries are so interwoven with their early traditions and legends, that it is necessary to premise something on the subject.
Formerly there existed water only, and no earth: a large bird, with a red eye, dived. The man who does not die, or the lord of life (Ehsicka-Wahaddish, literally the first man),[344] who lives in the Rocky Mountains, had made all, and sent the great bird to fetch up earth. Another being, worthy of veneration, is the old woman whom they call grandmother, and who roams about all over the earth. She, too, has some share in the creation, though an inferior one, for she created the sand-rat and the toad. She gave the Manitaries a couple of pots, which they still preserve as a sacred treasure, and employ as medicines, or charms, on certain occasions. She directed the ancestors of these Indians to preserve the pots, and to remember the great waters, from which all animals came cheerful, or, as my old narrator expressed it, dancing. The red-shouldered oriole (Psaracolius phoeniceus) came, at that time, out of the water, as well as all the other birds which still sing on the banks of the rivers. The Manitaries, therefore, look on all these birds as medicine for their plantations of maize, and attend to their song. At the time when these birds sing, they were directed by the old woman to fill these pots with water, to be merry, to dance and bathe, in order to put them in mind of the great flood. When their fields are threatened with a great drought they are to celebrate a medicine feast with the old grandmother's pots, in order to beg for rain: this is, properly, the destination of the pots. The medicine men are still paid, on such occasions, to sing for four days together in the huts, while the pots remain filled with water.
The sun, or, as they call it, "the sun of the day," is likewise considered as a great medicine. They do not know what it really is, but that it serves to sustain and to warm the earth. When they are about to undertake some enterprise, they make offerings to it, as well as to the moon, which they call "the sun of the night." The morning star, Venus, they consider the child of the moon, and account it likewise a special medicine. They affirm that it was originally a {399} Manitari, and is the grandson of the old woman who never dies. The "great bear" is said to be an ermine, the several stars of that constellation indicating, in their opinion, the burrow, the head, the feet, and the tail of that animal. They likewise call the "milky way" the ashy way; and, like the Mandans, believe that thunder is occasioned by the flapping of the wings of the large bird, which causes rain, and that the lightning is the glance of his eye, in search of prey. The rainbow is called by the Manitaries "the cap of the water," or "the cap of the rain." Once, say they, an Indian caught, in the autumn, a red bird, which mocked him; this gave offence to the man, who bound the feet of his prisoner together with a fish line, and then let him fly. The bird of prey saw a hare and pounced upon it, but the hare crept into the skull of a buffalo which was lying in the prairie, and as the line, hanging from the claws of the bird, formed a semicircle, they imagine that the rainbow is still thus caused.
The old chief, Addih-Hiddish, gave me the following account of the situation of men after death:—There are two villages, one large and the other smaller, whither the Manitaries go when they die. The wicked, or cowardly, go to the small village; the good, or brave, to the larger one.[345] A party of Manitaries once went to war, and one of their number, a chief, was killed by the enemy; he was buried and his grave covered with large trunks of trees. After his death he went to the large village, from whence a great many men came to meet him and to escort him into it. He was alarmed when he saw them coming towards him, and turned back, wounded as he was. A white man had given him, in that country, a paper, by means of which he was enabled to return to his own village on earth, and live there many years; but my informant was quite unable to tell me the contents of this paper. After this, when he played at what they call billiards, he rubbed his hands with the talisman, and nobody could ever win a game from him; he was always called by his fellows "the dead man."
When the Manitaries were created by the first man they formed one nation with the Crows. A medicine woman among them had three sons, each of whom built a village. The eldest went, with his people, down the Missouri, and it is not known what became of them. The second went to the mountains, and founded the village now inhabited by the Crows. The third established the tribe now called Manitaries by the Mandans, which tribe subsequently erected the three villages now existing. At that time their total number was only 1000 men.