70 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BULL. 43

Then the savage, seeing him within gunshot, lets the deer head fall to the"
earth, passes his ready bandd) gun from his left hand to his right with
admirable skill and rapidity, shoots the animal, and kills it, for he very rarely
misses it.a

 Du Pratz thus describes the hunting of deer:

 The natives go to hunt the deer, sometimes in common and often singly.
The hunter who goes alone provides himself for this purpose with the dried
head of a deer, the brain being removed and the skin of the neck being still
hanging to the head. This skin is provided with circles made of cane splints,
which are kept in place by means of other splints lengthwise of the skin so
that the hand and arm can easily pass inside. Things being so arranged, the
hunter goes into those parts where he thinks there are likely to be deer and
takes the precautions which he thinks necessary not to be discovered. As soon
as he sees one he approaches it with the step of a wolf, hiding himself behind
one thicket after another until he is near enough to shoot it. But if before
that the deer shakes its head. which is a sign that it is going to make caprioles
and run away, the hunter, foreseeing his fancy, counterfeits this anilnal by
making the same cry that these animals make when they call eclh other, which
very often makes the deer come toward the hunter. Then he shows tlhe head,
which he holds in his hand, and causes it to make the movement of a deer
which browses and looks up from time to time. The hunter while waiting
alwayss holds himself concealed behind the thicket until the deer has approached
within gunshot, and although the hunter sees little of its side lie shoots it in the
shoulder and kills it. It is in this way that a native without hunting comnpan-
ions, without dogs, and without chasing comes finally, by means of a :patience
which we do not have, to kill a deer, an animal of a swiftness which at most is
only exceeded by the number of excitements which take hold of it at each
instant and carry it very far off, where the hunter is obliged to go to hunt it
with patience for fear a new fantasy will take it away forever and make its
enemy lose time and trouble. Let us now see how they chase in company and
take a deer alive.
 When tie natives wish to hold the deer dance, or wish to exercise themselves
pleasantly, or even when the desire seizes the great Sun, a hundred go to hunt
this animal, which is brought back living. This is why many young men go,
who scatter in the prairies where there are thickets to find a deer. As soon as
they have perceived it the band approaches it in the form of a very open
crescent. The bottom of the crescent advances until the deer springs up and
takes to flight. Seeing a company of men in front of it, it very often flees
toward one of the ends of the crescent or half circle. This point stops it. makes
it afraid, and thus sends it back toward the other point which is a quarter of a
league or thereabout distant from the former. This second does the same as
the first and drives it back.
 The play is continued for a fairly long time, which is done expressly to
exercise the young people, or to give pleasure to the great Sun, or to some
little Sun whom he names in his place. Sometimes the deer tries to flee and
go out of the crescent by the opening between the points, but then those who
are at the very points show themselves to make himn reenter and the crescent
advances to keep hin always inclosed between the youths. In this way it
often happens that the men have not gone a league while the deer has made
more than twenty with the different turns and caprioles which it has made
from one side to the other, until at last all the men come together a little

 a Dumont, Mim. IIist. sur La Louisiane, I, 150-151.