and the mimic engagement, the advance and the retreat, are all exhibited to his nation as they really occurred.  There is no exaggeration, no misrepresentation.  It would be infamous for a warrior to boast of deeds he never performed.  If the attempt were made, some one would approach and throw dirt in his face saying, “I do this to cover your shame; for the first time you see an enemy, you will tremble.”  But such an indignity is rarely necessary:  and, as the war parties generally, contain many individuals, the character and conduct of every warrior are well known.  Shouts of applause accompany the narration, proportioned in duration and intensity to the interest it excites.  His station in the circle is then resumed by the actor, and the dance proceeds, till it is interrupted in a similar manner.

“In the poem of Ontwa, a scene like this is so well described, that we cannot resist the temptation to transfer it to our pages.  Of all who have attempted to embody in song, the “living manners” of the Indians, the anonymous author of that poem has been the most successful.  His characters, and traditions and descriptions, have the spirit and bearing of life; and the whole work, is not less true to nature than to poetry.

  A hundred warriors now advance,
  All dressed and painted for the dance;
  And sounding club and hollow skin
  A slow and measured time begin: 
  With rigid limb and sliding foot,
  And murmurs low the time to suit;
  Forever varying with the sound,
  The circling band moves round and round. 
  Now slowly rise the swelling notes
  When every crest more lively floats;
  Now tossed on high with gesture proud,
  Then lowly mid the circle bow’d;
  While clanging arms grow louder still,
  And every voice becomes more shrill;
  Till fierce and strong the clamor grows,
  And the wild war whoop bids it close. 
  Then starts Skunktonga forth, whose band
  Came from far Huron’s storm-beat strand,
  And thus recounts his battle feats,
  While his dark club the measure beats.”

Major Long of the U.S. army, in his Expedition up the Missouri, gives an account of a council which he held, at Council Bluff, with a party of one hundred Ottoes, seventy Missouries, and fifty or sixty Soways.  The Otto nation is known by the name of Wah-toh-ta-na.  Their principal village is situated on the river Platte, about forty miles above its junction with the Missouri.  At the period of this visit, these Indians had held little if any intercourse with the whites.  After the council was over, they performed a dance, in honor of their visitors, the description of which will convey to the reader a very vivid picture of this ceremony.  We give it, in Major Long’s own words.