Page:History of the Ojibway Nation.djvu/275

Rh 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 of baug-ah-ud-o-way, which has been described in a former chapter, as the game with which the Ojibways and Sauks 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