significant names of their chiefs, subscribed to a treaty with the United States. Lewis and Clarke appear to have considered the Rapid, Fall, or Paunch Indians, sometimes also called "Minetares of the Prairies," as belonging to the same family. But all the subsequent accounts agree in assigning to them an entirely distinct language.

The southern Sioux consist of eight tribes, speaking four or at most five kindred dialects. Their territory originally extended along the Mississippi, from below the mouth of the Arkansas to the forty-first degree of north latitude. They were, and still are, bounded on the north by the Dahcotas, on the west by the Pawnees, on the south by the Washitta and Red River tribes, on the southwest by erratic nations. Their huntinggrounds extend as far west as the Stony Mountains; but they all cultivate the soil, and their most westerly village on the Missouri is in about the one hundredth degree of west longitude.

The three most southerly tribes are the Quappas or Arkansas, at the mouth of the river of that name, and the Osages and Kansas, who inhabited the country south of the Missouri and of the river Kansas. Both the Osages and the Arkansas were first seen by the French, in the year 1673, and they always remained in alliance with them. It is not known whether Quappa was the true name of the whole nation, or of only one of its tribes; and it may be that they are those called Pacahas in the relation of De Soto's expedition. The residue of the Arkansas is now known only by that name (Quappas). They consist of only five hundred souls, and still live on the lower parts of the Arkansa.

The Osages, properly Wausashe, were more numerous and powerful than any of the neighbouring tribes, and perpetually at war with all the other Indians, without excepting the Kansas, who speak the same dialect with themselves. They were originally divided into Great and Little Osages; but about forty years ago almost one half of the nation, known by the name of Chaneers or Clermont's Band, separated from the rest, and removed to the river Arkansa. The villages of those several subdivisions are now on the head waters of the river Osage, and of the Verdegris, a northern tributary stream of the Arkansa. They amount to about five thousand souls, and have ceded a portion of their lands to the United States, reserving to themselves a territory on the Arkansa, south of the thirtyeighth degree of north latitude, extending from the ninety-fifth

to the hundredth degree of west longitude, on a breadth of forty-five to fifty miles. The territory allotted to the Cherokees, the Creeks, and the Choctaws, lies south of that of the Osage, extending in longitude from 94° 20′ to 100°, and in latitude from the thirty-seventh degree to the Red River, the course of which in that quarter is east and west, between the thirtythird and thirty-fourth degrees of north latitude.

The Kansas, who have always lived on the river of that name, have been at peace with the Osage for the last thirty years, and intermarry with them. They amount to fifteen hundred souls, and occupy a tract of about three millions of acres, in about the thirty-ninth degree of north latitude, and ninety-sixth to ninety-eighth degree of west longitude.

The five other tribes of this subdivision are the Ioways or Pahoja, (Grey Snow), the Missouris or Neojehe, the Ottoes or Wahtootahtah, the Omahaws or Mahas, and the Puncas. The Osages consider themselves the aborigines; but the tradition of these five tribes is, that at a distant epoch they, together with the Winnebagoes, came from the north; that the Winnebagoes stopped on the banks of Lake Michigan, while they, continuing their course southerly, crossed the Mississippi, and occupied the seats in which they were found by the Europeans.

The Ioways are mentioned, perhaps erroneously, by the first French missionaries, as living east of the Mississippi. It is certain that they were driven away from the banks of that river by the Sauks and Foxes, with whom they have contracted an alliance which borders on submission. Their principal seats are north of the river Des Moines; but a portion have joined the Ottoes, and are said, though the fact is not fully ascertained, to speak the same dialect.

The Missouris were originally settled at the junction of the river of that name with the Mississippi. They were driven away by the Illinois, were found in the year 1724 by M. Bourgmont settled on the Missouri, about two hundred miles above its mouth, near the place where the French fort Orleans stood, and have since joined the Ottoes, with whom they are intermixed, and speak the same dialect.

The Ottoes and the Omahaws, after several changes in their villages, now occupy the territory on the southwest side of the Missouri, above and below the mouth of the river Platte; the Omahaws on the north, and the Ottoes on the south side of that river. They speak kindred though different dialects. The

Puncas, who are settled on the Missouri one hundred and fifty miles above the Omahaws, speak the same dialect.

The population of the loways is estimated at twelve hundred; that of the Ottoes and Missouris at sixteen hundred, and that of the Omahaws and Puncas at two thousand; making, with the Quappas, Osages, and Kansas, an aggregate of eleven or twelve thousand souls. All the nations speaking languages belonging to the Great Sioux Family may therefore be computed at more than fifty thousand souls.

The vocabularies of the Quappas and of the Osages are in Mr. Duponceau's collection; the first was transmitted to him by General Izard, and is spelt according to the French orthography; he received that of the Osages from Dr. Murray of Kentucky, and we have another of the same language published by Mr. Bradbury.* Those of the Ottoes and of the Omahaws were taken by Dr. Say. We have not that of the loways; but nineteen words, supplied by Governor Cass, seem to leave no doubt of its identity with the Ottoes.

The Pawnees speak a language altogether different from that of the Sioux tribes, or of any other Indians known to us; unless that of the Panis or Towiaches of Red River should be found to be the same. They consist of two nations, the Pawnees proper, and the Ricaras or Aricaras, sometimes also I called Black Pawnees.

The Pawnees proper inhabit the country on the river Platte, west of the Ottoes and Omahaws: their three villages, two of which are distinguished by the names of Loup Pawnees and Republican Pawnees, are now in the same vicinity on the river Loup, a northern tributary of the river Platte, about sixty miles above the confluence of those two rivers. They raise corn and other vegetables, but apply still less to agriculture than the Ottoes and Omahaws. They hunt southerly as far as the Arkansa, and westerly to the sources of the river Platte. They were seen by Bourgmont, in 1724, in the same country which they now occupy, but were not known to us before the acquisition of Louisiana. Their number, by the concurrent accounts of General Pike and Major Long, amounts to six

The words in the appended vocabulary of the Osage, taken from those two sources, have accidentally been confounded.

thousand five hundred souls; their vocabulary was taken by Dr. Say.

The Ricara villages are situated on the Missouri, about one hundred and fifty miles below the Mandanes, in latitude 461°. They cultivate the soil, and are, like the Mandanes, always exposed to the attacks of the erratic tribes. They accordingly had formerly united with them, and were settled together twenty miles below the present site of the Mandane villages. They quarrelled and separated, since which time they have had also a short war with the United States. They appear now to be at peace with their neighbours, and are computed at three thousand souls. All the accounts of the Indians and of the interpreters agree in the fact of their speaking Pawnee, but we have no vocabulary of their language.

We have now enumerated all the Indian tribes west of the Mississippi which cultivate the soil; and it has been seen, that north of the Red River they consist only of the Sauks and Foxes, who are Algonkins; of the Pawnees; and, amongst the Sioux tribes, of those only which belong to the southern group, and of the Mandanes and stationary Minetares. The six western tribes of the Dahcotas, the Assiniboins, the Crows, and all the other tribes not yet enumerated, whether east or west of the Rocky Mountains, cultivate nothing whatever; and those east of the Rocky Mountains subsist principally on the meat of the buffalo. But whether erratic, or agricultural, there is a marked difference between the habits and character of all the Indians, who dwelt amidst the dense forest which extends from the Atlantic to the Mississippi, and those of the inhabitants of the western prairie. These are everywhere less ferocious than those on the eastern side of the Mississippi. Like all savages, they put to death the prisoners taken in battle; but the horrid practice of inflicting on them the most excruciating torture for days together, does not appear to have prevailed anywhere beyond the Mississippi. These observations seem, however, to apply more forcibly to the southern. cultivating tribes of the Sioux family and to the Pawnees. Dr. Say, during his residence amongst the Omahaws, collected some important facts, which are equally applicable to their neighbours on the south of the Missouri, of either of those two families.

They reside in their villages at most five months of the year, principally for the purpose of planting, cultivating, and gathering

maize and a few other vegetables. Two winter months are employed by the men in hunting beaver and other fur animals. During the rest of the year, the whole population remove to the buffalo grounds, subsist on its meat, and preserve a portion of it.

They address prayers to Wahconda, the Creator and Preserver of the world, to whom they ascribe infinite power and omnipresence. But, although they believe in a future life, it cannot be said that this vague belief has any important influence over their conduct. Like all the other Indians, they put more faith in their dreams, omens, and jugglers, in the power of imaginary deities of their own creation, and of those consecrated relics to which the Canadians have given the singular appellation of medicine.

*

The Missouri Indians of the male sex exceed in height the ordinary average of the Europeans; but the women are in proportion shorter and thicker. The average facial angle is 780, (that of the Cherokees 75°); the transverse line of direction of the eyes is rectilinear; the nose aquiline; the lips thicker than those of the Europeans; the cheek-bones prominent, but not angular. The recently born infants are of a reddish brown color, which after a while becomes whiter, and then gradually assumes that tint, which is not perfectly uniform amongst all the Indians, and which, for want of a better approximation, we call copper color. They designate that of the European by words which mean white or pale. Theirs is not the effect of exposure, as all parts of the body present the same appearance.† The women marry very young, bear children from the age of thirteen to forty, and have generally from four to six.

The Indians who cultivate the soil, are perpetually exposed to the attacks of the wandering tribes. Those of the Missouri had also for enemies the Sauks and Foxes, who have acted too much in that quarter the same part as the Five Nations in

The superiority of this family of Indians struck the French, who called the Arkansas Beaux Hommes. The Osages, who visited Washington and New York twenty-five years ago, were the finest race of Indians ever seen in our Atlantic cities, and answered the description of the Omahaws given by Dr. Say. That gentleman omits another uniform physical character, straight black hair and black eyes.

Captain Clavering says, that an Eskimau boy of East Greenland, after being thoroughly washed, was of a copper color.