My interpreter, a young half breed, passed the winter of 1819-20 with the Indians and gives this account. One day shortly before Christmas, he was out with an elderly man, a chief of this place, a hunting. Suddenly he stopped as to _listen_, apparently with great eagerness and anxiety, upon which, after allowing a sufficient time, the interpreter asked what was the matter. "Listen and you'll hear." "I have listened," says the interpreter, "but hear nothing, and it is surprising that you who are deaf should hear and I not." "Ah! A white man is thy father, and thou are just as _skeptical_, doubting and ridiculing every thing we say or do 'till when it is then too late. Then ye lament, but in vain." After this the Indian became much downcast and very thoughtful for several days. And as if to increase his anxiety, or rather to corroborate the husband's assertions, his wife said that one day she also _heard_, though the other women that were with her heard nothing, and an altercation ensued. His uneasiness increasing too much, he was forced to have recourse to _their_ only alternative in such cases, _une Jonglerie_ as the French term it, that is conjuring. One of their party, another half-breed abandoned many years since by his father and leading an Indian life, was applied to. He is reputed a _true man_: [he] never lies. Out of respect to the other, he was induced to consent, but much against his will. "For I am much afraid that [one] of these times _they will carry me off_." He was prepared, and entered with his _rattler_, shortly after which the box and the rattle began to move in the usual brisk and violent manner. _Many_ [spirits] entered, and one asked what was wanted that they had been called upon. The Indian, from the outside of the frame (for only the conjurer alone enters), inquired if there was not some evil spirit near from whom he had everything to dread. "No." replied the same voice. "_All is quiet_, you trouble yourself with vain phantoms." "What then is the meaning," asked again the Indian, "of those sudden flashes of light I sometimes see in the night?" "What?" rejoined another voice from within. "Hast thou attained unto this age and never yet observed this?" And then laughing, [it] continued, "It is always the case during this _moon_ (December). And if you doubt me, for the future observe attentively and you will find it to be the case." This satisfied him for the time. He became cheerful and assumed his wonted ways, but not for a long time. He soon relapsed and, after some days, applied again to the conjurer. When he had entered his box or frame, a number again entered and one of them enquired why they were called for. The conjurer said [why]. "What?" says he, the Spirit, "Again! Thou art very skeptical. Dost thou not believe? Now thou art fond of, thou wantest to be haunted. Well thou shalt have thy desire!"