ual
practice alone makes him master of the art of wood-craft. Physical
training and dieting were not neglected. I remember that I was not
allowed to have beef soup or any warm drink. The soup was for the old
men. General rules for the young were never to take their food very hot,
nor to drink much water.

My uncle, who educated me up to the age of fifteen years, was a strict
disciplinarian and a good teacher. When I left the teepee in the
morning, he would say: "Hakadah, look closely to everything you see";
and at evening, on my return, he used often to catechize me for an hour
or so.

"On which side of the trees is the lighter-colored bark? On which side
do they have most regular branches?"

It was his custom to let me name all the new birds that I had seen
during the day. I would name them according to the color or the shape
of the bill or their song or the appearance and locality of the nest--in
fact, anything about the bird that impressed me as characteristic. I
made many ridiculous errors, I must admit. He then usually informed me
of the correct name. Occasionally I made a hit and this he would warmly
commend.

He went much deeper into this science when I was a little older, that
is, about the age of eight or nine years. He would say, for instance:

"How do you know that there are fish in yonder lake?"

"Because they jump out of the water for flies at mid-day."

He would smile at my prompt but superficial reply.

"What do you think of the little pebbles grouped together under the
shallow water? and what made the pretty curved marks in the sandy bottom
and the little sand-banks? Where do you find the fish-eating birds? Have
the inlet and the outlet of a lake anything to do with the question?"

He did not expect a correct reply at once to all the voluminous
questions that he put to me on these occasions, but he meant to make me
observant and a good student of nature.

"Hakadah," he would say to me, "you ought to follow the example of the
shunktokecha (wolf). Even when he is surprised and runs for his life,
he will pause to take one more look at you before he enters his final
retreat. So you must take a second look at everything you see.

"It is better to view animals unobserved. I have been a witness to their
courtships and their quarrels and have learned many of their secrets in
this way. I was once the unseen spectator of a thrilling battle between
a pair of grizzly bears and three buffaloes--a rash ac