“My heart told me that I should be a Medicine Man, and I went out upon a mountain and fasted and prayed for two days, awaiting a sign from the Great Spirit. At the end of the second day, as the sun was going to sleep, I saw a great light which blinded my eyes, and heard a noise as of the rushing of many waters. I looked around again, and about me were four animals—a black-tailed deer, a white-tailed deer, a wolf and a buffalo. They all spoke the speech of men. They said that the Great Spirit had heard my prayer and had sent them to me. The animals then took me over the prairies and told me what plants were hurtful and what were good for my people. They told me what diseases of men the good herb would cure, and then they vanished as suddenly as they came. I returned to my people, told the chiefs what I had seen, was made and have since been a Medicine Man.” [Illustration: CLEFT ROCK, DEVIL’S LAKE, WISCONSIN.] But the transition from savage superstition to civilized modes is apparent among the Menomines, not only in the adoption of modern clothing, houses, household utensils and Christian ideas; it appears also in the change of their superstitions. They still believe in Medicine Men, and indulge in what is known as the Medicine Dance, but only at the time of the initiation of new candidates for such honors; and their doctors must now be the possessors of more or less medical knowledge, and be able to read and write. The ceremony is too long and tedious to describe, but the most superficial observer cannot fail to detect through it all the influence of contact with civilization. The Ojibways are another remnant of the great Indian tribes of the Northwest, whose homes are in Polk county, in the vicinity of Balsam Lake, a pretty sheet of water in a wild district, where fishing is good and game still fairly abundant. One peculiarity of these Indians is the sacredness with which they regard their dead, and the care they take to preserve the bodies of relatives from violation. They are content to house themselves, even through the severest winters, in the flimsiest structures, which afford very little shelter from the cold, but their dead they carefully wrap in blankets and deposit them in small oblong houses that are made to perfectly exclude rain, snow and cold, except such as may enter by a square little door in one end. These miniature mortuary houses are placed close to the homes of the living, that a better watch may be kept upon them; but what superstitious motive prompts this custom, I have not been able to learn. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Illustration: