with a pine-knot torch. After these preparatory rites, he gives the signal to the whole tribe, who make the air re sound with the terrible war-cry, the Sassaskwi. At this piercing cry, which freezes the heart with terror, which paralyzes the timid and rouses the ardor of the brave, which confounds the buffalo in his course, and fills the bear with such fear as to take from him all the power of resisting or fleeing from his enemies, the savages, impatient and greedy for blood, issue from their dark lodges. Like a terrific hurricane they rush headlong to the fatal spot. Their cries, mingled with the noise of their feet, resemble the roar of thunder, increasing as the storm approaches. As a swarm of bees surround their queen, these Pawnee savages encompass the Sioux child - their trembling victim. In the twinkling of an eye, their bows are bent and their arrows adjusted to the cords. The arrow of Lecharoutetewarouchte, or chief of the sacrifice, is the only one which is barbed with iron. With this it is his province to pierce the heart of the innocent Dakota. A profound silence reigns for an instant among the ferocious band. No sound breaks the awful stillness save the sobs and piteous moans of the victim, who hangs trembling in the air, while the chief of the sacrifice makes a last offering of her to the Master of the Universe. At that moment he transfixes her through the heart - upon the instant a thousand murderous arrows quiver in the body of the poor child. Her whole body is one shapeless mass, riddled with arrows as numerous as are the quills upon the back of the porcupine.
While the howling and the dancing continue, the great chief of the nation, mounting the three posts in triumph, plucks the arrows from the dead body and casts them into the fire. The iron-barbed arrow is the only one preserved for future sacrifices. He then squeezes the blood from the mangled flesh upon the maize and other seeds, which stand around in baskets ready to be planted; and then, as the last act of this cruel and bloody sacrifice, he plucks the still palpitating heart from the body, and, heaping the