Part 10

And the poor boy became a great doctor in the tribe, and got rich.

Before this the Pawnees had always had a woman chief, but when the woman who was chief died, she named the poor boy as her successor, and the people made him head chief of the tribe.

HOW THE DEER LOST HIS GALL.

A long time ago, the deer and the antelope met upon the prairie. At that time both of them had dew-claws, and both had galls. After they had talked for a little while, each one of them began to boast about how fast he could run. Each one, the deer and the antelope, claimed that he could run faster than any other animal, and at length they became very angry in their dispute, and determined that they would have a race.

They staked their galls on the race, and it was run on the prairie. The antelope ran the faster, and won, and took the deer's gall. The deer felt very badly that he had lost it, and he seemed so miserable that the antelope felt sorry for him, and to cheer him up, he took off his dew-claws and gave them to him.

Since that time the deer has had no gall, and the antelope no dew-claws.

* * * * *

Note.--A story somewhat similar to this is current among the Blackfeet tribes of the northern country. In this tale the antelope won the deer's gall, as in the Pawnee story. Then the deer said, "You have won, but that race was not a fair one, for it was over the prairie alone. We ought to run another race in the timber to decide which is really the faster." They agreed to run this second race, and on it they bet their dew-claws. The deer ran the faster through the thick timber and over the logs, and beat the antelope, and took his dew-claws. Since then the antelope has had no dew-claws, and the deer no gall.

YELLOW FOX.

A long time ago, while the Pawnees were on their winter hunt, a young boy, _Kiwuk-u lah´-kahta_ (Yellow Fox), went out alone to hunt, to see if he could kill a deer. When he left the camp in the morning, it was warm and pleasant, but in the middle of the day a great storm of wind and snow came up, and the flying snow hid everything, and it grew very cold. By and by the ground was covered with snow, and the whole look of the prairie was changed, and the boy became lost, and did not know where he was, nor what way to go to get to the camp. All day he walked, but he saw nothing of the camp, nor of any trail and as it became colder and colder, he thought that he would surely freeze to death. He thought that he must die, and that there was no hope of his ever seeing his people again. As he was wandering along, numbed and stiffened by the cold, and stumbling through the deep snow, he heard behind him a curious singing sound, and in time with the singing was the noise made by some heavy animal, running. The sounds came nearer, and at last, close by the boy, ran a great big buffalo bull. And as he ran near the boy, he sang a song, and as he sang, the sound of his hoofs on the ground kept time to the measure of the song. This is what he sang:

_A-ti-us ti-wa-ko Ru-ru! Teh-wah-hwa´-ko,_ My Father says, Go on! He keeps saying,

_Ru-ru-hwa´-hwa´, Wi-ruh-rê._ Keep going on. It will be well.

The boy's heart became strong when he heard that the Father had sent the bull, and he followed him, and the bull led him straight to the camp.

_NOTES ON THE PAWNEES._

NOTE.

The notes on the origin, customs and character of the Pawnees, which follow, have been gathered during twenty years' acquaintance with this people. They are what they profess to be; not a history of the people, but a series of notes bearing on their mode of life in the old wild days, an attempt to give some clues to their habits of thought, and thus to indicate the character of the people. Such notes may be of use to some future historian who shall have the time and the inclination to trace out more fully the history of the Pawnees, and to tell, as it ought to be told, the story of a people who once were great. I could wish that it might be my privilege to undertake this congenial task, but the constantly increasing pressure of other duties forbids me to hope that I shall be able to do so. I feel satisfaction, however, in being able to record the observations here set down.

In the collection of this material I had for years the assistance and coöperation of the late Major Frank North, who always placed at my disposal his great store of Pawnee lore. Luther H. North, his brother, has given me a vast deal of assistance, and last spring accompanied me to the Pawnee reservation. Without his aid this book would never have been written. Mr. John B. Dunbar has been most kind in reading over the chapter on the Pawnees, and has aided me with many suggestions, besides giving me help on certain linguistic points.

Nothing is said in this volume about the Pawnee language--a subject which is sufficiently important to deserve a volume by itself.

To every intelligent student of North American aborigines it must be a matter of keen regret that nothing is known of the language of this people. That a distinct linguistic stock like the Pawnee should pass away unrecorded would be a serious misfortune, and the Bureau of Ethnology of the Smithsonian Institution ought certainly to take some steps to preserve a record of the Pawnee language.

Major Frank North was undoubtedly more conversant with the spoken Pawnee tongue than any other white man has ever been. Since his death, there is no one who is so familiar with the language as Mr. John B. Dunbar, who has devoted much time to its study, and has made himself acquainted not only with its vocabulary, but also with its grammar. Born and reared among the Pawnees, familiar with them until early manhood, a frequent visitor to the tribe in later years, he is well fitted by interest and association to undertake the task of recording in permanent form the unwritten speech of this people. Add to this a long training as a student of language and history and a keen logical mind, and we have in Mr. Dunbar the man more than all others best fitted to undertake this difficult but most delightful task. The Director of the Bureau of Ethnology could not easily perform a greater service to aboriginal linguistics than to intrust to Mr. Dunbar the labor of preparing an extended work on the Pawnee language.

THE PAWNEES.

I. RELATIONSHIPS.

Until within a few years the home of the Pawnees was in southern Nebraska and northern Kansas. This group of tribes may be called the main stock of the family; from them it took its name; they are its best and longest known members. In the earlier accounts of this people, the Pawnee Picts or Wichitas are often confounded with their more northern relatives.

The Pawnees proper consisted at one time of three bands or tribes, federated under a single head chief. These bands, in the order of their importance, were: The Chau-i, the Kit-ke-hahk´-i and the Pita-hau-erat. To these three was subsequently added--after the northern migration of the tribes, and their settlement in northern Kansas and Nebraska, but probably long anterior to the advent of the whites, and by conquest--the large, powerful and intelligent allied tribe, known as the Skidi or Pawnee Loups. These four have always been known in the writings of the earlier explorers in the West as respectively the Grand, the Republican, the Tapage and the Wolf Pawnees, and they constituted the Pawnee Nation.

The three tribes first named have always been together, and their Pawnee names, according to Major North, denoted the relative situations of the three villages. Thus Kit-ke-hahk´-i means "on a hill;" Chau-i, "in the middle;" Pita-hau-erat, "down the stream," or east; and in the olden times these were the relative positions of the different villages when the three bands were camping together. The Kit-ke-hahk´-i village was always the westernmost of the three, the Chau-i were next to them, and the Pita-hau-erat were furthest east. After the incorporation of the Skidi with the Pawnees, the village of that tribe was always placed furthest to the west, and it was spoken of as the Upper Village, while the other bands were termed the Lower Village Tribes.

Of the three original bands, the Chau-i has always been first in importance, and the head chief has been chosen from it. The Kit-ke-hahk´-i band in numbers, importance and intelligence appear to rank about with the Chau-i, while, on the other hand, the Pita-hau-erat are regarded as less intelligent, responsible and worthy than the other bands.

The Skidi are usually looked upon as more intelligent than the Pawnees, and also as fiercer in their nature, and as making better soldiers. The Skidi traditions, though such testimony, of course, is not of much value, speak rather contemptuously of the prowess of the other bands in war, and the superiority of the Skidi is grudgingly acknowledged by the others. This is contrary to the view held by Mr. J. B. Dunbar, who speaks of the Skidi as more intelligent than the other bands, but as not being so good as warriors.

Besides this main group of tribes, the members of the Pawnee family, as given by Mr. Dunbar, are the Arickaras, known also as the Arickarees, Ricarees or Rees, the Caddos, the Huecos or Wacos, the Keechies, the Tawaconies, and the Wichitas or Pawnee Picts. To these may be added with some confidence the Tonkaways and the Lipans. The Caddos, Huecos, Keechies and Tawaconies are regarded by the Pawnees as closely connected with the Wichitas. They had but one name, _Kiri-ku´ruks_, for all these tribes, and knew no distinction between them. There is no doubt that the Arickaras were recently--perhaps within a century--either a band of the Skidi tribe, or at least allied to them as closely as the Chau-i have always been to the Kit-ke-hahk´-i and the Pita-hau-erat. The relationship of the Tonkaways and the Lipans has only recently been discovered, and has come to light through the removal of the Pawnees from their home in Nebraska to their present reservation in the Indian Territory.

In a note appended to his article on the Pawnees, published in the _Magazine of American History_ for November, 1880, Mr. Dunbar says, "A friend, who has had much experience with the Indians of the Southwest, informs me that he is inclined to believe that the Lipans of Mexico are of Pawnee stock. They have, in times past, exchanged frequent hospitalities with the Wichitas, or Pawnee Picts, and the two understand each other's dialects readily. The name Lipans he explains as _li'panis_, that is, _the_ Pawnees." While this suggestion is very interesting, so far as it goes, it scarcely furnishes sufficient ground on which to base a genetic connection of the Lipans with the Pawnee family. I have recently secured additional and more satisfactory evidence of such a connection.

It is generally believed by the Pawnees, especially by those who are most intelligent, and have had most intercourse with the southern tribes, that the Lipans are allied to them, and that this relationship is traceable through the Wichitas and the Tonkaways. The evidence consists of (1) statements by the Wichitas and Tonkaways, (2) an alleged similarity of language and personal names, and (3) a similarity in the songs of the tribes. A Pawnee Indian, who has lived for seven seasons with the Wichitas, gave me the following story which he had gathered from that people. They say that long ago they did not know the Tonkaways, but that when the tribes met they found that they could understand each other's speech. Their languages were not the same, but they were not more unlike than were the tongues spoken by the Skidi and the three other Pawnee bands long ago; in other words, they were dialects of the same language. After that meeting, the Tonkaways and the Wichitas lived together for a time. But the Tonkaways had bad ways. They would eat human flesh. When they could find a Wichita boy out away from the camp, they would capture him, and strangle and eat him. Sometimes they would kill a man of the Wichitas, if they could catch him away off on the prairie. Therefore the Wichitas drove the Tonkaways off south, and soon afterward moved up across the Arkansas River, and into southern Kansas. Since then the Wichitas and the Tonkaways have never lived together. A Tonkaway chief named Charlie told Ralph J. Weeks, an educated Pawnee, "I have heard that my people are Pawnees, but that we separated long ago." I am informed that the personal names of the Tonkaways are the same as those of the Pawnees, and are readily comprehended by the latter. Ralph Weeks, while in a Tonkaway lodge, heard a man call out to a girl, addressing her as _Tsi-sah-ru-rah-ka´-ri-ku_, which means "Woman Chief's House." Ralph inquired about this name, and found that it was the same in sound as Pawnee, and had the same meaning. The Tonkaways say that some of the Pawnee words are the same as those used by their relations to the south, the Lipans and others. The songs of the Tonkaways are the same as those of the Pawnees, and the latter at once recognize them. The old songs of the Lipans are the same as those of the Pawnees, according to both Pawnee and Tonkaway testimony. Finally, the Tonkaways and Lipans claim close relationship. They speak different dialects of the same language.

The Pawnees, however, say that they never knew of the existence of the Tonkaways until they came down into the Indian Territory, and, of course, never met them until after that time. Neither did they know the Caddos. As the Pawnees knew nothing of the Caddos and Tonkaways, so the Wichitas knew nothing of the Arickaras until recently, and were greatly surprised to learn that far to the north there was another tribe which spoke their language.

The Wichitas claim that they and the Caddos are one people. Their languages are said to differ somewhat, but only dialectically.

The southern members of the Pawnee family appear always to have lived on excellent terms with the other wild tribes which inhabited their country. They were allies of the Kiowas, Comanches, and Cheyennes, tribes with which the northern Pawnees were long at war.

II. ORIGIN AND MIGRATIONS.

The Pawnees came from the south. All the information bearing on their origin, which has as yet been secured, points to the conclusion that the primitive home of this family was in the south.

Although Mr. Dunbar has carefully traced out the later history of several of the members of this group, his researches carry us back scarcely further than the beginning of the present century, and we have no actual knowledge of the origin and early history of the Pawnees. Except the Arickaras, none of the tribes belonging to this family have ever dwelt much north of the Platte River, and in this we have an indication of their southern origin. The traditions of the tribe confirm this suggestion, and Mr. Dunbar has given other reasons, derived from his study of this people, which abundantly justify us in regarding them as migrants from the south.

There are still current among the Pawnees two traditions as to the region from which they came, but both of these are vague, and so lacking in detail as to be of little value except as suggestions which need confirmation before being accepted as having any solid basis of fact. The first of these traditions, now half forgotten, is known only to the very oldest men. It is to the effect that long ago they came from the far southwest, where they used to live in stone houses. This might point to an original home for the Pawnees in Old Mexico, and even suggests a possible connection with the so-called Pueblo tribes, who still live in houses made of stone, and entered from above.

Secret Pipe Chief, a very old Chau-i, the High Priest of the tribe, gave me the history of their wanderings in these words: "Long ago," he said, "very far back, all of one color were together, but something mysterious happened so that they came to speak different languages. They were all together, and determined that they would separate into different parties to go and get sinew. They could not all go in company, there were too many of them. They were so numerous that when they traveled, the rocks where their lodge poles dragged were worn into deep grooves. Then they were far off in the southwest, and came from beyond two ranges of mountains. When they scattered out, each party became a tribe. At that time the Pawnees and the Wichitas were together. We made that journey, and went so far east that at last we came to the Missouri River, and stopped there for a time. When the season came round, we made out of the shoulder blade of a buffalo an implement to cultivate the ground. There we made our fields."

Another very old man, Bear Chief, a Skidi, said, "Long ago we were far in the southwest, away beyond the Rio Grande. We came north, and settled near the Wichita Mountains. One summer there we planted our corn. So we came from the south. After we left the Wichita Mountains, that summer we came north as far as the Arkansas River, and made our fields, and raised corn. Afterward we went to the Mississippi River where the Missouri runs into it. My father was born while we lived on the Mississippi." As Bear Chief must be nearly or quite eighty years old, it would seem likely that the Skidi, or some village of that tribe, may have been established on the Mississippi one hundred years ago, but this was not a permanent location.

The second of these traditions tells of a migration from the southeast. It states that the tribe originally came from somewhere in the southeast, that is from what is now Missouri or Arkansas. They started north after sinew--to hunt buffalo--and followed up the game, until they reached the northern country--the region of the Republican and the Platte rivers. They found this a pleasant country, abounding in game, and they liked it, and remained there. The Wichitas accompanied them part way on their journey, but turned aside when they had reached southern Kansas, and went south again.

All the traditions agree that up to the time of the journey which brought the Pawnees to their homes on the Solomon, Republican, Platte and Loup rivers, the Wichitas were considered a part of the Pawnee tribe. They agree also that after this separation, the two divisions of the tribe lost sight of each other for a very long time, and that each was entirely ignorant as to what had become of the other. We know that for a long time they were at war, and the difference of the dialects spoken by these two divisions of the family shows that the period of separation was a long one.

The tradition of the migration of the Pawnees from the southwest is evidently much older than the one which tells of their coming from the southeast. Most of the younger men know the latter; but for the account of the journey over the mountains from the southwest and across the Rio Grande, it is necessary to go to the very old men. It is quite possible that both stories are founded on fact; and, if this is the case, the migration from the southeast may have taken place only a few generations ago. Such a supposition would in part explain its general currency at the present time.

In the existing state of our knowledge of this people, we have no facts to go on, nothing in the nature of evidence as to their early history, and we can only speculate as to the probabilities in regard to their wanderings. It may be conjectured that the Pawnees came from somewhere in Old Mexico, and, either as a number of related tribes, or as a single tribe made up of different bands, they crossed the mountains and the Rio Grande in a body, and wandered eastward across what is now Texas. From this body it seems probable that the ancestors of the Lipans and the Tonkaways were the first to separate themselves. The main tribe perhaps gradually drifted further and further to the east until it had crossed Texas and reached northwestern Louisiana, and perhaps even the neighborhood of the Mississippi River. During this long journey, which must have occupied many years--perhaps many generations--we may imagine that the Huecos and possibly the Keechies dropped behind, and remained on the plains.

How long the Pawnees sojourned in Louisiana no one can say. They now found themselves in a country, which in climate, productions, and topography, differed widely from anything they had before known. Up to this time, these people had always inhabited the high, dry tablelands of Mexico, or the almost equally arid plains of Texas, and now they had come to a country having a heavy rainfall, abounding in swamps, and overgrown with deciduous timber. The traditions of both Skidi and Pawnees speak of a time when they lived in a country where grows the cane which the white men use for fishing poles. We may imagine that this forest country was a barrier to their further progress eastward, and that it turned their steps in a new direction.

When the Pawnees left Louisiana, the Caddos certainly, and perhaps the Keechies and the Tawaconies, were left behind, and for a very long time lived in and near what is now Caddo Parish, Louisiana, where they were at the time of the Louisiana Purchase. Geographical names in this region indicate that their residence there was a long one, and Caddo Lake, Caddo Fork, Caddo Gap and a town named Keatchie, still bear testimony of the former occupants of the soil. From there the Caddos moved up to the Brazos River in Texas. They have always kept up a close intimacy with the Wichitas.

Perhaps it was during the sojourn of the Pawnees on the western borders of Louisiana and Arkansas, though it may have been much earlier, that the Skidi and the Arickaras, either as a single tribe, or as already divided into two separate bands, left the Pawnees and moved north and northwest. There appears to be reason for supposing that for a while this section of the tribe lived on the Red River, the Canadian and the Arkansas, and it is quite certain that sometimes they went as far east as the banks of the Mississippi near where St. Louis now is; but their permanent home, since they have been known to the whites, was on the Platte and the Loup rivers in Nebraska.

The Pawnees with the Wichitas moved northwest into what is now the Indian Territory and southern Kansas, where they separated, the latter turning off to the south, and living at various times on the Canadian and Red rivers and near the Wichita Mountains, while the Pawnees proper slowly continued their march northward and westward, residing for a time on the Arkansas and Solomon, the Republican and Platte rivers. Here they again met the Skidi.

It is impossible to conjecture when this settlement in the northern country took place, but it was certainly long ago. Mr. Dunbar has pointed out that "_O-küt-ut_ and _oku´-kat´_ signify strictly above and below (of a stream) respectively. Now their villages have usually been situated upon the banks of the Platte, the general course of which is from west to east. Hence each of these words has acquired a new meaning, _i. e._, west and east." In the same way _Pük-tïs´-tu_--toward the Omahas, has come to mean north; and _Ki´ri-ku´ruks-tu_--toward the Wichitas, to mean south. The coining of such words points to a long sojourn by the Pawnees in the region of the Platte. It is interesting to note that the Omahas have never in historic times lived north of the Pawnees, but always east of them, though we know that long ago they did live to the north.