. Echoes from the Rocky Mountains : reminiscences and thrilling incidents of the romantic and golden age of the great West, with a graphic account of its discovery, settlement, and grand development . ialsthe highest form of their mysterious religion. The enclosure representsto the Indian mind the church of the civilized; the grass and sage andherb and wild-clematis their gi^andmother the Earth ; and a cross atthe foot of the pole the sun and stars. Thus are blended the heavensand the earth and the religious fervor of the wild savage nature in aceremony revolting to the civilized and Christian
. Echoes from the Rocky Mountains : reminiscences and thrilling incidents of the romantic and golden age of the great West, with a graphic account of its discovery, settlement, and grand development . ialsthe highest form of their mysterious religion. The enclosure representsto the Indian mind the church of the civilized; the grass and sage andherb and wild-clematis their gi^andmother the Earth ; and a cross atthe foot of the pole the sun and stars. Thus are blended the heavensand the earth and the religious fervor of the wild savage nature in aceremony revolting to the civilized and Christian mind, but yet par-taking of the most reverential forms of their own religious zeal. As remarked, the Sun Dance of the Sioux resembles in manypoints the Bull dance of the Gros Ventres. The Shoshones term it the IXHOES FROM THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS. 541 Drv Dance. The Comanches have a dance similar in character,but not called Sun Dance. The Poncas have a Sun Dance likethe Sioux, and the Mez Perces somethimg of the same kind, butalways performed in winter. It has been said by those most conversant with the life of the Indiantribes of the plains, that taken all in all, the wolf, appears of all animals. INDIAN BRAVE GRADUATING BY SELF TORTURE. to furnish their most perfect type. The Tonkawas, one of these tribes,appear not only to recognize the resemblance, but also to accept theseanimals as in some way connected with their remote ancestrial progen-itors. One of these ceremonies, the Wolf Dance, resembles theMysterious rites of the ancient Greeks and Romans, and is held tobe of such sacred origin that no one not connected bv birth with the 542 ECHOES FROM THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS. tribe is ever permitted to view the ceremony. General E. B. Marcyformerly Inspector-General of the United States army, whose earlylife in the military service, a period of thirty years, was spent almostexclusively near these tribes, relates that perhaps the only white manwho was ever permitted to witness the Wolf D
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