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XVI Happy Days

I' HERE were few more joyful or anij mated sights than a lodge or hunting j&M^M^\ party of Indians in good luck. The Indian bucks sitting around smoking or gambling, the Indian women busy in preserving fish and meat and preparing skins, and the funny little children and the dogs: a mingled, whooping, joyful mass, eating, sleeping and playing all day long. Even the little baby with his tightly bound head and body strapped to a board hung up against a tree, looked around with his little beady eyes in contented amusement, and unless frightened never cried.

Amongst themselves or with their intimate friends they were not at all reserved, but joked