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Show CHAP. II. THE SIOUX.-THE OJIBWA. 99 minishes. It has; been observed by missionaries that whenever an account of births and deaths has been kept in a village the former usually exceed the latter. The original numbers of the Prairie Indians have been greatly overestimated both by themselves and by strangers; the only practicable form of census is the rude proceeding of counting their " tipi," or skin tents. It is still a moot question how far the Prairie Indians have diminished in numbers, which can not be decided for some years.* The Dakotahs are mostly a purely hunting tribe in the lowest condition of human society: they have yet to take the first step, and to become a pastoral people. The most civilized are the Mdewakantonwans, who, even at the1 beginning of the present century, built log huts and "stocked" land with corn,'beans, and pumpkins. The majority of the bands hunt the buffalo within* their own limits throughout the summer, and in the winter pitch their lodges in the clumps or fringes of tree and underwood along the banks of the lakes and streams. The bark of the cotton-wood furnishes fodder for their horses during the snowy season, and to obtain it the creeks and branches have been thinned or entirely denuded of their beautiful groves. They buy many animals from the Southern Indians, who have stolen them from New Mexico, or trapped them on the plains below the Bocky Mountains. Considerable numbers are also bred by themselves. The Dakotah nation is one of the most warlike and numerous in the United States territory. In single combat on horseback they are described as having no superiors; a skill acquiredby constant practice enables them to spear their game at full speed, and the rapidity with which they discharge their arrows, and the accuracy of their aim, rival the shooting which may be made with a revolver. They are not, however, formidable warriors; want of discipline and of confidence in one another render them below their mark. Like the Moroccans in.their last war with Spain, they never attack when they should, and they never fail to attack when they should not. The Dakotahs, when first visited by the whites, lived around the head-waters of the Mississippi and the Bed Biver of the north. They have gradually migrated toward the west and southwest, guarded by their allies the Cheyennes, who have given names successively to the Cheyenne of Red River, to the Big Cheyenne of the Missouri, and to the section of the country between the Platte and the Arkansas which they now occupy. The Dakotah first moved to the land now occupied by the Ojibwa (anciently known as Chippewas, Orechipewa, or Sauteursf), which tribe in- * At the time of the first settlement of the country by the English no certain estimate was made; at the birth of the thirteen original states, the Indians, according to Dr. Trumbull, did not exceed 150,000. In 1860, the number of Indians within the limits of the United States was estimated by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs at 350,000. f The Rev. Peter Jones (Kahkewagquody), in his history of the Ojibwa Indians, |
