Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 (1907 Volume 29).djvu/397

 them, designates, by a blow of the hatchet, the tree which is to be cut down. Each then gives it one blow, after which the victim approaches to complete the work. As soon as she commences what seems to her but pastime, the whole crowd of young furies surround her, howling and dancing. Unconscious that the tree is to supply the wood for her own sacrifice, the poor child pursues her work as if a great honor had been reserved for her.—Atipaat, the old woman, then fastens to her the ashki[240] with which to draw the wood.

{368} The troop then lead the way towards the village, dancing as they pass along, but giving the hapless victim almost no assistance in dragging her load. An innumerable multitude attend them to the place of sacrifice, and receive them with loud acclamations. They there relieve her of her burden and again place her in the hands of the guards, who, with voices harsh and quivering, chant the great deeds of their younger days and re-conduct her to her lodge. In the meantime the whole band assist to arrange the wood between two trees, after which they immediately disperse.

On the morning of the fourth day, before sunrise, a savage visits all the lodges to announce to each family, in the name of the Master of life, that they must furnish two billets of wood about three feet long for the sacrifice.

Then thirty warriors issue from their lodges, decked in all sorts of accoutrements; their heads adorned with deer and buffalo horns, with the tails of horses and the plumes of the {369} eagle and heron, interwoven with