"The Pawnee Family, though some of its branches have long been known, is perhaps in history and language one of the least understood of the important tribes of the West. In both respects it seems to constitute a distinct group. During recent years its extreme northern and southern branches have evinced a tendency to blend with surrounding stocks; but the central branch, constituting the Pawnee proper, maintains still in its advanced decadence a bold line of demarcation between itself and all adjacent tribes. The members of the family are: The Pawnees, the Arikaras, the Caddos, the Huecos or Wacos, the Keechies, the Tawaconies, and the Pawnee Picts or Wichitas. The last five may be designated as the Southern or Red River branches. At the date of the Louisiana purchase the Caddos were living about 40 miles northwest of where Shreveport now stands. Five years earlier their residence was upon Clear Lake, in what is now Caddo Parish. This spot they claimed was the place of their nativity, and their residence from time immemorial. ... They have a tradition that they are the parent stock, from which all the southern branches have sprung, and to some extent this claim has been recognized. ... The five [southern] bands are now all gathered upon a reserve secured for them in the Indian Territory by the Government. ... In many respects, their method of building lodges, their equestrianism, and certain social and tribal usages, they quite closely resemble the Pawnees. Their connection, however, with the Pawnee family, not till recently if ever mentioned, is mainly a matter of vague conjecture. ... The name Pawnee is most probably derived from 'párĭk-ĭ,' a horn; and seems to have been once used by the Pawnees themselves to designate their peculiar scalp-lock. From the fact that this was the most noticeable feature in their costume, the name came naturally to be the denominative term of the tribe. The word in this use once probably embraced the Wichitas (i. e., Pawnee Picts) and the Arikaras. ... The true Pawnee territory till as late as 1833 may be described as extending from the Niobrara south to the Arkansas. They frequently hunted considerably beyond the Arkansas; tradition says as far as the Canadian. ... On the east they claimed to the Missouri, though in eastern Nebraska, by a sort of tacit permit, the Otoes, Poncas, and Omahas along that stream occupied lands extending as far west as the Elkhorn. In Kansas, also, east of the Big Blue, they had ceased to exercise any direct control, as several remnants of tribes, the Wyandots, Delawares, Kickapoos, and Iowas, had been settled there and were living under the guardianship of the United States. ... On the west their grounds were marked by no natural boundary, but may perhaps be described by a line drawn from the mouth of Snake