As beaver, and the larger animals, such as buffalo, elk, deer, and bear, decreased in the immediate vicinity of Leech and Sandy Lakes, the hardy bands of Ojibways who had taken possession of these beautiful sheets of water, were obliged to search further into the surrounding country for the game which formed the staple of life. It became customary for these two pioneer bands to meet by appointment, every fall of the year, at Gull Lake, or at the confluence of the Crow Wing with the Mississippi; and from thence to move in one collected camp into the more plentifully supplied hunting grounds of the Dakotas.

The camp, consisting of between fifty and a hundred light birch bark wigwams, moved by short stages from spot to spot, according to the pleasure of the chiefs, or as game was found to abound in the greatest plenty. This mode of hunting was kept up from the first fall of snow at the commencement of winter, to the month of February, when the bands again separated, and moved back slowly to their respective village sites, to busy themselves with the manufacture of sugar, amidst the thick groves of the valuable maple which was to be found skirting the lakes of which they had taken possession. As a general fact the women only occupied themselves in the sugar bushes, while the men scattered about in small bands, to hunt the furred animals whose pelts at this season of the year were considered to be most valuable. When sugar-making was over and the ice and snow had once more disappeared before the warmth of a spring sun, the scattered wigwams of the different bands would once more collect at their village sites, and the time for recreation, ball-playing, racing, courtship, and war, had once more arrived. If no trader had passed the winter amongst them, many of the hunters would start off in their birch canoes to visit the trading posts on the Great Lakes, to barter their pelts for new supplies of clothing, ammunition, tobacco, and firewater.

If any one had lately lost relatives, naturally, or at the hands of the Dakotas, now was the proper time to think of revenge; and it is generally at this season of the year that war parties of the red men prowled all over the northwestern country, searching to shed each other's blood.

According to invariable custom, the Ojibway mourns for a lost relative of near kin, for the space of one year; but there are two modes by which he can, at any time, wipe the paint of mourning from his face. The first is through the medium of the Meda, or grand medicine, which, to an Indian, is a costly ordeal. The next is to go to war, and either to kill or scalp an enemy, or besmear a relic of the deceased in an enemy's blood. This custom is one of their grand stimulants to war, and the writer considers it as more fruitful of war parties, than the more commonly believed motive of satiating revenge, or the love of renown.

The spring of the year is also the favorite time for the performance of the sacred grand Meda-we rites. The person wishing to become an initiate into the secrets of this religion, which the old men affirm the Great Spirit gave to the red race, prepares himself during the whole winter for the approaching ceremony. He collects and dries choice meats; with the choicest pelts he procures of the traders, articles for sacrifice, and when spring arrives, having chosen his four initiators from the wise old men of his village, he places these articles, with tobacco, at their disposal, and the ceremonies commence. For four nights, the medicine drums of the initiators resound throughout the village, and their songs and prayers are addressed to the master of life. The day that the ceremony is performed is one of jubilee to the inhabitants of the village. Each one dons the best clothing he or she possesses, and they vie with one another in the paints and ornaments, with which they adorn their persons, to appear to the best advantage within the sacred lodge.

It is at this season of the year also, in which, while the old men are attending to their religious rites, and the lovers of glory and renown are silently treading the war path, the young men amuse themselves in playing their favorite and beautiful game ofbaug-ah-ud-o-way, which has been described in a former chapter, as the game with which the Ojibways and Sanks captured Fort Michilimacinac in the year 1763.

The women also, at this season of the year, have their amusements. The summer is the season of rest for these usual drudges of the wild and lordly red hunters. Their time, during this season, is generally spent in making their lodge coverings and mats for use during the coming winter, and in picking and drying berries. Their hard work, however, again commences in the autumn, when the wild rice, which abounds in many of the northern inland lakes, becomes ripe and fit to gather. Then, for a month or more, they are busied in laying in their winter's supply.

When the rice-gathering is over, the autumn is far advanced, and by the time each family has secreted their rice and other property with which they do not wish to be encumbered during the coming winter's march, they move once more in a body to the usual rendezvous at Gull Lake, or Crow Wing, to search for meat on the dangerous hunting grounds of their enemies. In those days, which we now speak of, game of the larger species was very plentiful in this region of country, where now the poor Ojibway, depending on his hunt for a living, would literally starve to death.

As an illustration of the kind and abundance of animals which then covered the country, it is stated that an Ojibway hunter named No-ka, the grandfather of the Chief White Fisher, killed in one day's hunt, starting from the mouth of Crow Wing River, sixteen elk, four buffalo, five deer, three bear, one lynx, and one porcupine. There was a trader wintering at the time at Crow Wing, and for his winter's supply of meat, No-ka presented him with the fruits of this day's hunt. This occurred about sixty-five years ago, when traders had become more common to the Ojibways of the Upper Mississippi. It is from this old warrior and stalwart hunter, who fearlessly passed his summers on the string of lakes which form the head of the No-ka River, which empties into the Mississippi nearly opposite the present site of Fort Ripley, that the name of this stream is derived.

Long Prairie, the present site of the Winnebago agency, was at this time the favorite winter resort of those bands of the Dakota tribe now known as the Warpeton and Sisseton. It was in the forests surrounding this isolated prairie, that herds of the buffalo and elk took shelter the bleak cold winds which at this season of the year blew over the vast western prairies where they were accustomed to feed in summer; and here, the Dakotas, in concentrated camps of over a hundred lodges, followed them to their haunts, and while they preyed on them towards the west, the guns of the Ojibways were often heard doing likewise towards the east. The hunters of the two hostile camps prowled after their game in "fear and trembling," and it often happened that a scalp lock adorned the belt of the hunter, on his return at evening from his day's chase.

The chiefs of the two camps, and the older warriors deeply deprecated this state of affairs, as. it resulted only in the perpetual "fear and trembling" of their wives and children, and caused hunger and want often to prevail in camp, even when living in the midst of plenty, Efforts were made to bring about a peaceable meeting between the two camps, which were at least crowned with success, and it soon became customary, let the war rage ever so furiously during all other seasons. The pipe of peace was smoked each winter at the meeting of the two grand hostile hunting camps, and for weeks they would interchange friendly visits, and pursue the chase in one another's vicinity, without fear of harm or molestation.

The Ojibways assert, that when the two camps first neared each other in the fore part of winter, and the guns of the enemy whom they had fought all summer, and whose scalps probably still graced their lodge poles, were heard booming in the distance, towards Long Prairie, they were generally the first to make advances for a temporary peace, or as they term it in their euphonious language, to createpin-dig-o-daud-e-win (signifying, "to enter one another's lodges"). Their grudge against the Dakotas was never so deep seated and strong as that which this tribe indulged against them, probably from the fact that their losses in their implacable warfare, included not their ancient village sites, and the resting places of their ancestors.

conclude chapter 22