Indian Tribes of the Upper Missouri 15

Indian Tribes of the Upper Missouri 15

What are the general powers of chiefs in council? To explain this, it

will be necessary to describe a council as witnessed by me a few years

since. The camp when I was a visitor consisted of about 110 lodges and

in the neighborhood, say, 10 or 15 miles off were two other camps,

respectively 50 and 60 lodges, all being of the band Gens des Canots.

The council was held in the soldiers’ lodge, where, being a stranger, I

had a right to be, though having nothing to say regarding the question.

This question was, Will we make peace with the Crow Nation? A few days

previous the leading chief had received an intimation through me that

overtures for a peace were made to them by the Crow Nation, and that

the Crow tobacco sent for that purpose was in my possession at any

time the council assembled; also that a deputation of Crow Indians was

at the Fort, who had commissioned me to bear the tobacco with their

request and to await a reply prior to their visiting the camp in person.

 

To decide this runners were sent immediately to the two camps mentioned

with a message from the chief requesting the attendance of all chiefs,

counsellors, soldiers, and warriors who felt an interest in the affair

in question, who in due time arrived and took up their residence in

the different lodges around about until the hour for business arrived.

When it was ascertained that all or a sufficient number had come the

haranguer or public crier of the camp made the circle of the village,

speaking at the extent of his voice the object of the meeting and

inviting all soldiers, chiefs, and braves or warriors to attend and

hear what their chief would bring before them for their consideration.

This was repeated over and over again in different parts of the camp,

and shortly afterwards they began to assemble in the soldiers’ lodge.

Three skin lodges had been formed into one, making an area 24 feet in

diameter, which could with ease accommodate 60 to 80 persons. On this

occasion about 46 people presented themselves and when the whole had

entered the interior exhibited the form shown in Figure 31.

 

[Illustration: FIGURE 31.—Diagram of a council lodge, representing

the interior of a council lodge in which Mr. Denig met the Assiniboin

leaders to discuss peace overtures made by the Crow Indians to the

Assiniboin at the instigation of Mr. Denig. At a point directly

opposite the doorway Mr. Denig is seated with the proffered tobacco of

the Crow Indians lying in front of him, denoted by 3 parallel marks; at

Mr. Denig’s right sits the leading Assiniboin chief; to his right sit 6

other chiefs and councillors; next are seated 18 so-called “soldiers,”

i. e., official guards of the camp; the next 15 figures are 15 principal

young warriors. The small square figure with a central dot is a small

fire; and the small circlet beside the fire is a flagstaff running up

through the lodge top, flying a United States flag. The calumet pipe

lies in front of the leading chief.]

 

It was nearly sunset when they had assembled and no feast had been

prepared in this lodge, though after the council was over they were

feasted elsewhere. We have here the represented authority of 220

lodges, for the chiefs are largely connected, having from 10 to 20

or more lodges of their immediate relatives each. The soldiers are

the most respectable heads of families in camp, and the warriors are

the sons and relations of these and others of the camp. If this body

decides on carrying a point who are to object? Those about are also

related to those present and these being the principal leave only

young rabble, very old men, women, and children not represented, all

of whom combined could do nothing against the decision of this body.

We will now proceed with the ceremony. For nearly a half hour the pipe

was passed around in silence, it being filled with their own tobacco

and handed from mouth to mouth, making its circuit on the right-hand,

after which it was laid down by the leading chief and he opened the

meeting by thus stating its object, the words of whom and others were

taken down by us at the time and preserved. It will be necessary to

state here that the Crow Indians had massacred about 30 lodges of this

same band two years previous on the banks of the Yellowstone, yet had

succeeded in making a peace with some of the upper bands of Assiniboin

who had not suffered by them.

 

The leading chief spoke thus from where he sat:

 

“My children, I am a mild man. For upward of 20 years I have herded you

together like a band of horses. If it had not been for me, you would

long ago have been scattered like wolves over the prairies. Good men

and wise men are scarce; and, being so, they should be listened to,

loved, and obeyed. My tongue has been worn thin and my teeth loosened

in giving you advice and instruction. I am aware I speak to men as

wise as myself, many braver, but none older or of more experience. I

have called you together to state that our enemies (the Crows) have

sent tobacco, through the medium of the whites at the big fort, to me

and my children, to see if they could smoke it with pleasure, or if it

tasted badly. For my part I am willing to smoke. We are but a handful

of men surrounded by large and powerful nations, all our enemies. Let

us therefore by making a peace reduce this number of foes and increase

our number of friends. I am aware that many here have lost relatives

by these people, so have we by the Gros Ventres, and yet we have peace

with them. If it be to our interest to make peace all old enmities must

be laid aside and forgotten. I am getting old, and have not many more

winters to see, and am tired seeing my children gradually decrease by

incessant war. We are poor in horses—from the herds the Crows own we

will replenish. They will pay high and give many horses for peace.

The Crows are good warriors, and the whites say good people and will

keep their word. Whatever is decided upon let it be manly. We are men;

others can speak. I listen—I have said.”

 

This speech was received by a slight response by some of Hoo-o-o-o

and by the majority in silence. After a few minutes’ interval he

was replied to by another chief, the third or fourth from where he

sat. This was a savage, warlike, one-eyed Indian, and his speech was

characteristic. He said: “He differed from all the old chief had said

regarding their enemies. Individually as a man and as their leader he

liked his father, the chief, but he must be growing old and childish to

advise them to take to smoke the tobacco of their enemies, the Crows.

Tell the whites to take it back to them. It stinks, and if smoked

would taste of the blood of our nearest relations. He thought (he

said) his old father (the chief) should make a journey to the banks of

the Yellowstone, and speak to the grinning skulls of 30 lodges of his

children, and hear their answer. Would they laugh? Would they dance?

Would they beg for Crow tobacco or cry for Crow horses? If horses were

wanted in camp, let the young men go to war and steal and take them

as he had done—as he intended to do as long as a Crow Indian had a

horse. What if in the attempt they left their bones to bleach on the

prairie? It would be but dying like men! For his part it always pleased

him to see a young man’s skull; the teeth were sound and beautiful,

appearing to smile and say, ‘I have died when I should and not waited

at home until my teeth were worn to the gums by eating dried meat.’ The

young men (he said) will make war—must have war—and, as far as his

influence went, should have war. I have spoken.”

 

This speech was received with a loud and prolonged grunt of approbation

by more than two-thirds of the assembly.

 

Other speeches followed on both sides of the question, some long, some

short, until the council became somewhat heated and turbulent; not,

however, interrupting one another, but mixing a good deal of private

invective and satire with the question in their speeches. At a point

of violent debate and personal abuse, two soldiers advanced to the

middle of the lodge and laid two swords crosswise on the ground, which

signal immediately restored order and quiet. The debate was carried on

with spirit for about two hours but it was easily to be perceived long

before it terminated, by their responses and gestures, that the war

faction greatly predominated. The chief, after asking if all had spoken

and receiving an affirmative answer, remarked they could go and eat the

feast that had been prepared for them. The warriors gave a loud yell

and when out commenced singing their war song. We asked the old chief

what was the decision. He said, “It is plain enough; listen to that war

cry.” He then desired me to send the Crow tobacco back without delay

and tell them to leave the fort immediately and go home. A few days

after a large war party started to the Crow village. The morning after

the council’s decision was made known by the haranguer or public crier,

at the break of day, walking through the village and crying it out at

the top of his voice. From the foregoing it will be seen that the chief

only expressed his opinion as the others, yet the large majority or

rather the feeling evinced for war by the leaders of the war parties,

warriors, heads of families, soldiers, and all who could make war, left

none to contend with.

 

Had the same general exhibition for peace prevailed, the same powers

could make it, or rather force would be unnecessary when a unanimity of

such a body prevailed. Had the parties or feeling been equally manifest

the question would have been laid aside for another time, perhaps

years, and each went to war or remained at home as he pleased.

 

Most councils have this feature and termination, that is, if the

measure is not at once visibly popular, it is abandoned. This precludes

the necessity of vote and none is taken. Besides, except for camp

regulations, hunting, etc., they are not obliged to decide. Time is

not valuable to them. There is no constituent power in the rest of the

band, whose voices are not asked, nor required, to force a decision,

nor actual power to operate against any measures, that may be decided

upon by their parents, and soldiers of the camp. Wherever force is

necessary, however, to carry out these decisions, as in hunting

regulations, the soldiers are pledged to act in a body to effect it,

even at the risk of their lives. But should the decision be for a peace

and afterwards a war party be raised to go against the nation with

which peace has been made, the soldiers would not use force to prevent

it. They have too much good sense to strike or kill any of their own

people to benefit their enemies, and in this case the peace party being

the most numerous, and consequently the richer, would pay the partisan,

or leader of the party, to remain at home and a collection of horses,

guns, and other property made among them for that purpose, which being

handed the partisan and by him divided among his warriors, stops the

expedition.

 

This is done often among them, particularly at this time when “peaces”

have become tolerably general through the Laramie treaty. There are

cases, however, where force is necessary, and the soldiers are brought

to act, which we will shortly mention. To present any idea of their

government so that it can be understood, we must first proceed to

describe the component parts of a large camp, after which it will be

easy to perceive their principles of government. The regulations kept

up in the following description is only in large camps: Smaller ones,

from 10 to 20 lodges, hunt, every man when he pleases, and, as there

are but few persons to feed, they can always have meat in this way; but

where the camp is composed of from 50 to 100 or 200 lodges this is not

the case, as will presently appear.

 

COMPONENT PARTS OF A LARGE CAMP

 

1. The leading chief.

2. The other chiefs.

3. Chief of the soldiers.

4. Cook of the soldiers’ lodge.

5. The soldiers.

6. The elderly men.

7. The haranguer.

8. The master of the Park.

9. Warriors and hunters.

10. Partisans.[13]

11. Doctors and conjurors.

12. Very old men.

13. Young women.

14. Old women.

15. Middle-aged women.

16. Boys and girls.

17. Very small children.