During this time the six old men-buffaloes did not once leave off singing, shaking their medicine staves behind the fire, and beating the "badger." At a certain, moment they rose, thrust forward the upper part of their body, and began dancing, though still singing, and shaking their wands, while the badger beat time. When this dance had lasted long enough, they resumed their places in the same order as before.
It is impossible for anyone, unless he has been present, to form an idea of the original sight offered by this quaint scene. These men painted of different hues, their varying dresses, their songs, their drums, their cries, and the noises of every description which blended with them, borne from the desert on the wing of the night breeze, beneath the dark and lugubriously starlit vault of heaven, while the immense canopy of verdure formed as it were a majestic temple for this singular ceremony--all this did not fail to possess a certain wild grandeur.
After the dances had continued for more than two hours, the strangest part of the festival began with the entrance of the squaws into the inclosure. One of them, who was very young and remarkably pretty, came up to her husband, and gave him her waist belt and petticoat to hold, so that she was perfectly naked under her gown. She advanced dancing to one of the most renowned warriors, passed her hand all down his right arm, and then retired slowly, with her smiling face turned towards him. The warrior thus invited, at once rose, and disappeared with her in the wood. There, a man may ransom himself by making a present; but we must avow, to the honour of the Indian fair sex, that few men do so. My companions, Black Elk and Belhumeur, who were invited, took very good care not to buy themselves off, and, on the contrary, readily followed their dancer; but, for my part, I peremptorily refused, and remained deaf to all the looks, and nods, and wanton smiles which the dear charmers thought themselves obliged to lavish on me as a stranger.
I must confess, to my sorrow, however, that it was not from virtuous motives that I acted thus; I was in love, and courting at the time an exquisite girl called "Boar's Head," whom I married eventually, and with whom I lived happily for the five years we had arranged that our marriage was to last. At the end of that period I sold her for three female buffalo skins to another chief of my tribe.