168 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [sULL. 4a

 ages, and the sun Oiia-Chill; that is to say, fire par excellence, the most excel-
 lent of all fires, or, if one wishes, the supreme fire. Also in this sense Coyocop-
 Chill would signify the spirit par excellence, the supreme spirit. They say
 that this great spirit has created all things by his goodness alone, even the
 angels which they call Coyocop-Thccou, that is ministering spirits. According
 to them these ministering spirits have been created in order to be always
 present before the supreme spirit. It is through them that all nature has been
 formed by the order and the will of the supreme spirit except man who alone
 has been formed by this sinme spirit from a little earth and water kneaded
 together. They add that when he had made, formed, completed, and rounded
 him and found him good, he placed him on the earth and breathed upon him,
 that immediately this little figure put itself in motion, had life, and began to
 grow. I asked them how the woman had been formed. They replied that they
 did not know anything about that, but that apparently she had been formed in
 the same manner. I said no and explained to them the manner in which it was
 done. They appeared very well satisfied with that enlightenment.d
 Following is Du Pratz's more elaborate narrative contained in his
 own work:

 I wished to know first of the guardian of the temple what he and his fellow
 countrymen thought of God. In the common [i. e., Mobilian] language coustin/
 signifies spirit,' tchito, great,' and as all the natives, whatever language they
 speak, employ the words Great Spirit to express the word God, I asked him in
 the Natchez language what he thought of the Great Spirit, Coyocop-cliguip,
 because in their language, which I knew passably, coyocop signifies spirit,' and
 cliguip signifies 'great.' I was mistaken, however, for just as in French the
 word grand does not always signify the height or the length, but the qualities
 revealed, as when one says un grand roi, un grand gdneral, in the same way the
 word cliguip has the two significations, and in spite of that I had not yet
 attained by this word to the idea they have of God. The guardian of the
 temple then told me that they did not call him so but Coyocop-chill. To give
 an accurate idea of what this word chill signifies I will make use of an ex-
 ample. The Natchez call common fire oiia, they call the sun oiia-chill, the very
 great fire, the supreme fire. Thus in giving to God the name Coyocop-chill
 they mean the spirit infinitely great, the spirit par excellence, and the spirit ac-
 cording to their way of thinking, as far above other spirits as the sun by means
 of his heat exceeds the fiery element. I think myself obliged to give this ex-
 planation and to adduce this example in order to develop the idea which they
have of God through the name which they give him.
 He then told me that God was so powerful that all things were nothing before
him, that he had made all that we see, and that we are able to see; that he was
so good that he was not able to do harm to anyone even if he wished it; that he
thought that God had made all things by his will; that nevertheless the little
spirits who were servants of God might, indeed, at his order have made in the
universe the beautiful works which we admire, but that God himself had formed
man with his own hands.
 He added that they called these little spirits Coyocop-tichou, which signifies
free servant,b but also one as submissive and respectful as a slave; that the
spirits were always present before God, ready to execute his wishes with ex-
treme diligence; that the air was filled with other spirits of which some were
worse than others; that they had a chief yet worse than themselves, but that God

 SDumont, Mdm. Hist. sur La Louisiane, I, 161-163.
 SDico'n is the Natchez word for servant at the present day.-J. R. S.