If several are expected, the first who come talk and smoke with the master until all have arrived or been heard from. The pipe being laid aside, the woman of the lodge dishes out the meal in wooden bowls, handing one to each. When all are served the master says “Eat ye.” They fall to, but neither he nor any of his family partake of it while their visitors remain. The guests, however, are expected to do justice to the repast, and the more heartily they partake the better pleased the host appears. When the meal is over and the dishes laid aside the pipe is again introduced, and during the conversation of an hour or so that follows the object of the invitation is disclosed, and whatever business it is most likely settled or whatever favor desired granted. Such a thing as disinterested hospitality may possibly be met with, at least we have been present on some of these occasions where the object of the call was not visible, but it is entirely incompatible with a correct view of the Indian character to infer thereby that he had no object. On stated feasts, a feather, the lower end painted red, is sent as an invitation card, but on all ordinary occasions the message is by some one of the inmates of the lodge. Casual visits without invitations are also common, sometimes only with the view of getting a meal, but mostly to accomplish some end or acquire some information. Guests, whether invited or not, are always awarded precedence. Any insult or imposition on a guest, once in an Indian lodge and under his protection, would be resented with greater severity than the same toward themselves.