Page:Archæologia Americana—volume 2, 1836.djvu/161

 SECT. IV.] BETWEEN THE MISSISSIPPI AND THE PACIFIC. 125 The Minetares (Minetaree and Minetaries) consist of three tribes, speaking three different languages which belong to a common stock. Its affinities with the Dahcota are but remote, but have appeared sufficient to entitle them to be considered as of the same family. Two of those tribes, the Mandanes, whose number does not exceed fifteen hundred, and the stationary Minetares, amounting to three thousand souls, including those called Annahawas, cultivate the soil, and live in villages situated on, or near the Missouri, between the forty-seventh and forty-eighth degrees of north latitude. They are kept in a state of perpetual alarm by the Assiniboins, the Tetons, the Rapid Indians, and other erratic tribes, and have on that account been often obliged to change the seat of their villages. Yet they have been often quarrelling with the Ricaras, who like them are an agricultural people ; and they make often predatory expeditions against the Shoshonees, in the eastern valleys of the Rocky Mountains. Both the Mandanes and the Minetares consider themselves as natives of that part of the country. The tradition of the Mandanes is, that they came from under ground by means of a great vine, which, breaking under the weight of some of them, has left behind a part of their nation whom they expect to join after death. The color of the chief, who visited Wash- ington, appeared less dark than that of our Indians ; and he was the only full-breed Indian, ever seen by me, whose eyes were of a bluish cast. It is believed that this is the tribe, often spoken of as white Indians, and which gave rise to the fabulous account of a tribe descended from the Welsh and speaking their language ; a tale, which the knowledge we have now acquired of the various Indian nations and of their dialects has set at rest. The third Minetare tribe is that known by the name of the Crow or Upsai'oka nation, probably the Keehcetsas of Lewis and Clarke. They are an erratic tribe, who hunt south of the Missouri, between the Little Missouri and the southeastern branches of the Yellowstone River. According to Mr. Do- nald Mackenzie, who resides at the mouth of the Yellowstone, they have about three hundred lodges, and may be computed at three thousand souls. The vocabulary of the stationary Minetares, and the speci- men of the Crow or Upsaroka dialect, were obtained by Dr. Say. We knew from Lewis and Clarke, that the Mandanes spoke a kindred dialect, and this has been confirmed by the