pines that shadow their sides; the Red Bute, a central point by which the savages are continually passing, when emigrating to the west, or going up towards the north; the famous rock Independence, which is detached, like an outwork, from the immense chain of mountains that divide North America; it has been designated the Backbone of the world; it might also be called the great registry of the desert; for on it may be read in large characters the names of the several travellers who have visited the Rocky Mountains. My name figures amongst so many others as that of the first priest who has visited these solitary regions. In fact a fitter appellation could not be given to these enormous masses of granite, whose summit is elevated nearly twenty-four thousand feet above the level of the sea; they are but rocks piled upon rocks; one might think that he beheld the ruins of a world covered, if I may so speak, with a winding sheet of everlasting snow.

I shall here interrupt the recital of my journey, in order to give a short account of the different tribes of the mountains, and of the territory they inhabit. I shall join with my own personal observations the most correct information that I could possibly obtain.

The Soshonees, or Root diggers, appeared in great numbers at the common rendezvous, where the deputations from all the tribes assemble every year, in order to exchange the products of their rude industry. They inhabit the southern part of the Oregon, in the vicinity of California. Their population, consisting of about ten thousand souls, is divided into several parties, scattered up and down in the most uncultivated quarter of the west. They are called Snakes, because, in their indigence they are reduced, like such reptiles, to burrow in the earth and live upon roots. They would have no other food if some hunting parties did not occasionally pass beyond the mountains in pursuit of the buffalo, while a part of the tribe proceeds along the banks of the Salmon River, to make provision for the winter, at the season when the fish comes up from the sea. Three hundred of their warriors wished, in honor of the whites, to go through

a sort of military parade: they were hideously painted, armed with their clubs, and covered over with feathers, pearls, wolves' tails, the teeth and claws of animals, and the like strange ornaments, with which each of them had decked himself according to his caprice. Such as had received wounds in battle, or slain the enemies of their tribe, showed ostentatiously their scars, and had floating, in the form of a standard, the scalps which they won from the conquered. After having rushed in good order, and at full gallop upon our camp, as if to take it by assault, they went several times round it, uttering at intervals cries of joy; they at length dismounted, and came and gave their hands to all the whites in token of union and friendship.

Whilst I was at the rendezvous the Snakes were preparing for an expedition against the Black Feet. When a chief is about to wage war, he announces his intention to his young warriors in the following manner. On the evening before his departure, he makes his farewell dance before each cabin; and everywhere receives tobacco or some other present. His friends wish him great success, scalps, horses, and a speedy return. If he brings back women as prisoners, he delivers them as a prey to the wives, mothers, and sisters of his soldiers, who kill them with the hatchet or knife, after having vented against their unhappy captives, the most outrageous insults: "Why are we unable," howl these furies, "to devour the heart of thy children, and bathe in the blood of thy nation!"

At the death of a chief or other warrior, renowned for his bravery, his wives, children, and relatives cut off their hair: this is a great mourning with the savages. The loss of a parent would seem but little felt, if it only caused his family to shed tears; it must be deplored with blood; and the deeper the incisions, the more sincere is the affection for the deceased. "An overwhelming sorrow," they say, "cannot be vented unless through large wounds." know not how to reconcile these sentiments respecting the dead, with their conduct towards the living; would you believe that these men, so inconsolable in their mourn

I

ing, abandon, without pity, to the ferocious beasts of the desert, the old men, the sick, and all those whose existence would be a burden to them?

The funeral of a Snake warrior is always performed by the destruction of whatever he possessed; nothing, it seems, should survive him but the recollection of his exploits. After piling up in his hut all the articles he made use of, they cut away the props of the cabin, and set the whole on fire. The Youts, who form a separate people, although they belong to the tribe of the Soshonees, throw the body of the deceased upon the funeral pile, together with a hecatomb of his best horses. The moment that the smoke rises in thick clouds, they think that the soul of the savage is flying towards the region of spirits, borne by the manes of his faithful coursers; and, in order to quicken their flight, they all together raise up frightful yells. But in general, instead of burning the body, they fasten it upon his favorite charger, as on a day of battle; the animal is then led to the edge of a neighboring river; the warriors are drawn up in a semicircular form, in order to prevent his escape; and then, with a shower of arrows and a universal hurra, they force him to plunge into the current which is to engulf him. They next, with redoubled shouts, recommend him to transport his master without delay to the land of spirits.*

Although this sort of funeral is the most usual amongst the savages, it is not, however, common to all the Indian tribes. Amongst the people who live on the borders of lake Abbitibbi, in Lower Canada, as soon as a warrior happens to die, they wrap the body in a shroud, lower it into a grave about a foot and a half deep, and place alongside it a pot, a knife, a gun, and such other articles as are of prime necessity to the savage. Some days after the burial, the relations of the deceased assemble to smoke over his grave. They then hang presents upon the nearest tree, particularly tobacco for the soul of the deceased, which is to come occasionally and smoke upon the grave where the body is laid. They suppose that the poor soul is wandering not far from thence, until the body becomes putrified; after which it flies up to heaven. The body of a wicked man they say, takes a longer time to corrupt than that of a good man, which prolongs his punishment. Such, in their opinion, is the only punishment of a bad life.

In Columbia we find that a different custom prevails. There, so soon as the person expires, his eyes are bound with a necklace of glass beads; his nostrils filled with aiqua (a shell used by the Indians in place of money), and he is clothed in his

The Sampeetches are the next neighbors of the Snakes. There is not, perhaps, in the whole world, a people in a deeper state of wretchedness and corruption; the French commonly designate them "the people deserving of pity," and this appellation is most appropriate. Their lands are uncultivated heaths; their habitations are holes in the rocks, or the natural crevices of the ground, and their only arms, arrows and sharppointed sticks. Two, three, or at most four of them may be seen in company roving over

best suit and wrapped in a winding sheet. Four posts, fixed in the ground, and joined by crossbeams, support the aerial tomb of the savage: the tomb itself is a canoe, placed at a certain height from the ground, upon the beams I have just mentioned. The body is deposited therein, with the face downwards, and the head turned in the same direction as the course of the river. Some mats thrown upon the canoe finish the ceremony. Offerings, of which the value varies with the rank of the deceased, are next presented to him; and his gun, powder-horn, and shot bag are placed at his sides.

Articles of less value, such as a wooden bowl, a large pot, a hatchet, arrows, &c., are hung upon poles fixed around the canoe. Next comes the tribute of wailing, which husbands and wives owe to each other, and to their deceased parents, and also to their children: for a month, and often longer, they continually shed, night and day, tears, accompanied with cries and groans, that are heard at a great distance. If the canoe happen to fall down in course of time, the remains of the deceased are collected, covered again with a winding-sheet, and deposited in another canoe.-Extract of a Letter from M. Demer, Missionary amongst the Savages.

Some of the other tribes, seen by Father de Smet on his tour, are the following: The Kootenays and the Carriers, with a population of four thousand souls, the savages of the Lake, who are computed at about five hundred, the Cauldrons six hundred, the Okinoganes one thousand one hundred, the Jantons and Santees three hundred, the Jantonnees, four thousand five hundred, the Black-Feet Scioux one thousand five hundred, the Two-Cauldrons eight hundred, the Ampapas two thousand, the Burned two thousand five hundred, the Lack-Bows one thousand, the Minikomjoos two thousand, the Ogallallees one thonsand five hundred, the Saoynes two thousand, the Unkepatines two thousand, the Mandans, Big-Bellies, and Arikaras, who have formed of their remnants one tribe, three thousand, the Pierced Noses two thousand five hundred, the Kayuses two thousand, the Walla-Wallas five hundred, the Palooses three hundred, the Spokanes eight hundred, the Pointed-hearts seven hundred; and in fine, the Scioux, the Crows, the Asiniboins, the Ottos, the Pawnees, the Santees, the Foxes, the Aouays, the Kikapoux, the Delawares, and the Skawanons, whose numbers are unknown. The following are the names of the principal chiefs, who received the Missionary in their tents:-The Big-Face and Walking-Bear, the Patriarchs of the Flat-Heads and Ponderas; the Iron-Crow, the GoodHeart, the Dog's-Hand, the Black-Eyes, the Man that does not eat cow's flesh, and the Warrior who walks barefooted; the last-named is chief of the Black-Feet.

their sterile plains in quest of ants and grasshoppers, on which they feed: when they find some insipid root, or a few nauseous seeds, they make, as they imagine a delicious repast. Credible persons have assured me, that for want of other sustenance, they eat the dead bodies of their relatives, and that they even eat their own children. They are so timid, that it is difficult to get near them; the appearance of a stranger alarms them; and conventional signs quickly spread the news amongst them. Every one, thereupon, hides himself in a hole; and in an instant this miserable people disappears and vanishes like a shadow. Sometimes, however, they venture out of their hiding-places, and offer their newly-born infants to the whites in exchange for some trifling articles.

I have had the consolation of baptizing some of those unfortunate beings, who have related to me the sad circumstances which I have just mentioned. It would be easy to find guides amongst these new converts, and to be introduced by them to their fellow countrymen, in order to announce to them the gospel, and thus to render their condition, if not happy, at least supportable through the hope of a better futurity. If God allows me to return to the Rocky mountains, and my superiors approve of it, I shall feel happy to devote myself to the instruction of these pitiable people.

The country of the Utaws is situated to the east and south-east of the Soshonees, at the sources of the Rio Colorado. The popu

lation consists of about four thousand souls. Mildness, affability, simplicity of manners, hospitality towards strangers, constant union amongst themselves, form the happy traits in their character. They subsist by hunting and fishing, and on fruits and roots; the climate is warm, and the land very fit for cultivation.

I shall join to this account a brief exposition of the belief of the savages. Their religious tenets are composed of a few primitive truths and of gross errors: they believe in the existence of a Supreme Being, the source of every good, and consequently that He alone is adorable; they believe that he created whatever exists, and that his providence rules the principal events of life, and that the calamities which befall the human race are chastisements inflicted by his justice on our perversity. They suppose, that with this their God, whom they call the Great Spirit, there exists an evil genius, who so far abuses his power as to oppress the innocent with calamities. They also believe in a future life, where every one shall be treated according to his works; and that the happiness reserved for the virtuous will consist in the enjoyment of such goods as they most anxiously desired upon earth; and that the wicked shall be punished by suffering, without consolation, the torments invented by the spirit of evil. According to their opinion, the soul, upon its entry into the other world, resumes the form which our bodies have had in the present life.

ORIGIN, PROGRESS, AND PROSPECTS OF THE CATHOLIC MISSION TO THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS. It is now about twenty-nine years since the Indian nation of the Flat Heads acquired a slight knowledge of Christianity through the means of four poor Iroquois Indians, who had wandered to the other side of the Rocky Mountains. Anxious to obtain missionaries to instruct them, they sent, about twenty years ago, a deputation of three of their chiefs to St. Louis. All three died of sickness. As their deputies did not return, they appointed five others. These were massacred in passing through the territory of the Scioux. In 1834, a third delegation arrived, an Iroquois accompanied it, bringing his two children along through a dangerous desert of three thousand miles, for no other purpose than to get them baptized. They only met with promises, on account of the scarcity of missionaries at that time. Not dissatisfied by this new refusal, they deputed in 1839, other messengers to communicate to the bishop of St. Louis, the desire of the nation to obtain priests. I was then deputed by the bishop and my superiors to accompany the deputies on their return, in order to ascertain the dispositions of the nation, and the possibility of success, should a mission be eventually established amongst them. After travelling a distance of more than three thousand miles, we reached the place where the nation was encamped.

I found them all most favorably disposed to embrace the faith, and was soon convinced that the prospects of a successful mission went far beyond what the most sanguine mind could ever have imagined. It was the wish of every heart to be instructed in the faith-there was not in the whole band of the Flat Heads, a single individual who could not cry out with the Prophet David-" My heart is ready, O Lord! my heart is ready!" My mission was one of investigation and inquiry-it was a mere preparatory visityet such were the admirable dispositions of these poor people-so perfectly were their hearts prepared by the action of divine grace, that we can date from this moment, the conversion of the nation. I remained about three months with them, instructing them, teaching them their prayers, the commandments of God-the essential points of religion-baptizing the small chil

dren, who had not yet attained the use of reason, and the aged persons, who, I feared, might be carried off before my return.

Among the chiefs there was one whom I cannot refrain from mentioning in a particular manner. He had always been a brave warrior and an upright man, he was then upwards of eighty years of age, but still healthy and vigorous. He was anxious to receive baptism, and I was deputed to confer it upon him. As soon as he was sufficiently instructed, I endeavored to excite in his breast sentiments of contrition for all the sins and offences he might have committed against his Maker. doubt," said he, "I have done many things that have offended the Great Spirit-but it was unknowingly; I never in my life did any thing which I knew to be evil; from my childhood it has been my constant endeavor to avoid sin, and I never did a second time any action, when I was told that it was wrong." He was baptized under the name of Peter.

"No

I returned to St. Louis in December, 1840, and in the following spring set out again for the Rocky Mountains with two other fathers, and three brothers. After journeying four months we reached the Flat Head camp.

It was then, properly speaking, that our mission commenced. I shall now relate its progress.

Our mission, as may be conjectured from what I have already said, commenced under the most favorable auspices. These poor people had come above five hundred miles to meet us. How joyful and happy was this meeting! Nothing could exceed their joy when they beheld us. They had been faithful to the instructions I had given them; twice a day they had assembled to pray--and three times on Sundays. But before entering upon the regular functions of our mission, it was necessary to look out for a situation, offering a sufficient extent of good land, for the erection of a village, and the sustenance of the Indians. We wandered about for many days among these barren mountains, without meeting with any suitable spot. At length, on the feast of the Patronage of the Blessed Virgin, we descried the valley of the Bitter-root river-a beautiful valley of tolerably rich and good soil, and protected from the northern winds by two high ridges of mountains. All agreed to settle there.

We gave it the name of St. Mary's valley, and took solemn possession of it by the erection of a cross. After the Indians had pitched their camp we chose a site for the church, and immediately set to work to build it. The women hewed down the timber, assisted by their husbands, with the greatest alacrity and expedition, and in a few weeks we had constructed a log church capable of holding nine hundred persons. To ornament the interior, the women platted mats of a species of long grass, which were hung on the roof and sides of the church, and spread over the floor, it was then adorned with festoons, formed of branches of cedar and pine. Here we daily celebrated the holy sacrifice of the altar, said morning and evening prayers, catechised and instructed the poor Indians. Nothing could exceed the joy of these poor creatures at having the house of the Great Spirit, (as they call a church) a house of prayer on their soil.

They talked incessantly of the goodness of the Great Spirit, and excited each other by the consideration of his goodness to avoid all evil, to be faithful to the prayer (religion). Their docility filled us with consolation. The recollection of an extraordinary event which they related to us, contributed to increase their joy and their fervor. The church had been completed for several days, when one of them suddenly exclaimed: "Why, this is the very spot on which little Mary said the church would be built!" The circumstance was this: During my absence, one of the huntingbands had encamped in this valley, and a little girl of twelve or fourteen years of age had here fallen sick and died. But previous to her death she had earnestly asked for baptism. I had instructed two or three Indians among the most intelligent how to administer baptism in case of necessity. Baptism was administered to her by an Iroquois. Overjoyed at having received the sacrament of regeneration, the poor child thanked God with all her heart, and invited the others to join with her they did so-suddenly she cried out: "O! there is no happiness in this world,— happiness is only to be found in heaven!

I see

the heavens opened and the mother of Jesus Christ inviting me to go up to heaven." Then turning to the astonished Indians she added: 'Listen to the black-gowns when they comethey have the true prayer-do all they tell you-they will come—and on this very spot where I die, they will build the house of prayer!" After these words she expired. The circumstances had been forgotten, and it now suddenly recurred to their minds.

By the 3d of December, Feast of St. Francis Xavier, two hundred and two catechumens were

ready for baptism. I was absent at the time of this consoling ceremony, being on a mission to the Pends-d'oreilles, where, on the same day, I baptized one hundred and sixty. On Christmas day I had the pleasure of baptizing one hundred and fifty others.

The eve of this solemnity was rendered remarkable by an extraordinary event.

A boy of about twelve years of age, who had for several months attended catechism, finding himself incapable of learning the prayers, gave up in despair, and discontinued his attendance. On the Eve of Christmas, his mother said to him-" Paul, the Great Spirit will be angry with you, and will never admit you into heaven if you do not learn your prayers." "Mother," answered the boy, "the Great Spirit will take pity on me I tried to learn my prayers, and I have been unable to do it. However, I will go again and try. He then directed his steps towards the lodge of one of the catechists. On opening the door, he saw a person standing about two feet from the ground, in the midst of bright rays of light, dressed all in white: under the person's feet was a sphere, a half moon, and a serpent, with a strange fruit in its mouth. Above the person's head was a bright star-the heart was visible, and rays of light proceeded from it. At first he was afraid, and was on the point of running away. But on taking a second glance at the person, he perceived a smile on his countenance, which filled him with confidence; he kneeled and begged of the person to teach him his prayers. Suddenly he felt his mind clear and his heart warm-such are the child's own expressions and he recited the whole of the prayers without difficulty. He returned immediately, and told his mother he knew his prayers. She could not believe it-he recited them in her presence, and knew them so accurately, that he corrected his sister, who mistook in two or three words. He then related the story; it soon became the subject of conversation among the Indians; none could imagine who the person was, nor could they ever decide whether it was a man or a woman-unable to solve the problem themselves, after the lapse of several days, they came to us-I showed Paul an image of an apparition of the B. V. He recognized her immediately; with this difference, that he saw her only with one star, with her hands joined before her breast, and with her heart visible. The circumstance of the single star coincided singularly with the festival of Christmas.

The candor, the simplicity, the piety of the child-the perfect consistency of his answers to all the questions put to him, and above all, the