e together. They disengage themselves as suddenly, yet
keeping their hold of each other's hands during all the different
revolutions and changes in the dance, which, as they explain it,
represents the chain of friendship." This writer, who is in general
very indifferent authority for what concerns the Indians, and must
have made up his book from the relations of very careless or very
stupid observers, never, I think from his own observation, differs
very much in his account of this dance from Charlevoix, whose book
generally is by far the best which has treated of the North American
savages. He says, (vol. ii. p. 68) "They were young people equipped as
when they prepare for the march; they had painted their faces with all
sorts of colours, their heads were adorned with feathers, and they
held some in their hands like fans. The calumet was also adorned with
feathers, and was set up in the most conspicuous place. The band of
music and the dancers were round about it, the spectators divided here
and there in little companies, the women separate from the men. Before
the door of the commandant's lodging, they had set up a post, on
which, at the end of every dance, a warrior came up, and gave a stroke
with his hatchet; at this signal there was a great silence, and this
man repeated, with a loud voice, some of his great feats, and then
received the applause of the spectators. When the dance of the calumet
is intended, as it generally is, to conclude a peace, or a treaty of
alliance against a common enemy, they grave a serpent on one side of
the tube of the pipe, and set on one side of it a board, on which is
represented two men of the two confederate nations, with the enemy
under their feet, by the mark of his nation."

Of the two accounts which, it may be seen, differ essentially, I
prefer Loskiel's. I think Charlevoix mistook another dance for the
calumet dance, especially as he confesses they did him (the
commandant) none of the honours which are mentioned. "I did not see
the calumet presented to him, and there were no men holding the
calumet in their hands."

The _war dance_, held either before or after a campaign, is their
greatest dance. It is a dreadful spectacle, the object being to
inspire terror in the spectators. No one takes a share in it, except
the warriors themselves. They appear armed, as if going to battle. One
carries his gun or hatchet, another a large knife, the third a
tomahawk, the fourth a large club,