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SWANTON] CHOCTAW SOCIAL AND CEREMONIAL LIFE 167
my resting and smoking with the last party, they informed me, tliat their camp
consisted of two hundred and fifty warriors, under great leaders, who were then
returning from war against a town of the Koo-saahte Indians, who had settled
twenty-five miles above Mobille, on the eastern side of the river ; that they had
killed and wounded several of them, suspecting them of abetting the Muskolige,
and fortunately got one of their scalps, which the warriors of separate towns
divided, and were carrying home, with joyful hearts.
A stranger would be much surprised to see the boasting parade these savages
made with one scalp of a reputed enemy. To appearance, more than a thousand
men, women, lusty boys, and girls, went loaded with provisions to meet them
and to dance, sing, and rejoice at this camp, for their success in war, and safe
return. Their camps were made with the green bark and boughs of trees, and
gave a striking picture of the easy and simple modes of early ages. Their
chieftains and great warriors sat in state, with the assuming greatness of tlie
ancient senators of imperial Rome. I had the honor to sit awhile with them,
and was diverted with the old circling and wheeling dances of the young men
and women. I smoked with them, and then took my leave of this last camp
of rejoicing heroes.'"
In 1730 De Lusser observed the following treatment of the scalps
of enemies and the head of one of their own people by the Choctaw of
Oskelagna
Those who had killed were carrying the scalps that they had taken and all
were daubed with white earth from head to foot. There was one who brought
the head of one of their people wlio had been killed. He threw it at my feet
telling me that he was a warrior who had lost his life for the French and that
it was well to weep for his death. In a minute all the men assembled around
this head and set themselves to howling for half a quarter of an hour. To give
evidence of the regret that I felt for his death I did not fail to make grimaces
as they did. After this it was taken up again to be carried to the women who
did the same.
When he reached the town of Chicachae he witnessed the namegiving
ceremony.
The warriors of this village who slept near the bayou of the Chicacha^
arrived this morning at about nine o'clock. They were all bedaubed with paint
like those of the Yellow Canes and passed howling in front of the cabin to
which I went. I found all the warrioi-s who had taken part in the fighting
sitting on the ground forming a semi-circle. The captains and the honored men
were sitting on a bed of canes on which I took my seat with Reverend Father
Beaudouin. After this they made several warriors . . . This ceremony consists
only of changing the names.
We learn from the same officer that a red calumet was presented to
a tribe when their alliance was desired against a third, and the
acceptance of it was equivalent to promise of assistance.
In a letter sent by M. de Vaudreuil, Governor of Louisiana, to the
French minister and dated March 3, 1749, dealing with conflicts between
the French and English parties in the Choctaw Nation, we find
it stated that the chief of Yowani was able to identif}?^ a body of the
=» Adair, Hist. Am. Inds., pp. 298-299.