According to the same author, in Pre-Columbian times some of the Pueblo Indians used a thick disk of buffalo-hide as a shield. On the Plains, from the Rio Grande to the Saskatchewan, the circular shield of buffalo-hide was, until the extinction of the buffalo, a part of the regalia of every warrior. These shields usually bore symbolic designs. In many cases the designs were painted upon the rawhide itself, and protected by a buckskin cover; while in other cases the designs were painted upon the cover. Practically no shields of buffalo-hide are to be found in the hands of the surviving Dakota; but in social and religious ceremonies, models or shield-covers of buckskin or cloth, upon which are painted the designs formerly placed on shields, are often used. For purposes of study the writer secured such models of shields, with explanations of the designs and with other shield-lore, from persons who formerly owned buffalo-hide shields. When the enemies of the Dakota were armed with native weapons, the shield had some value in itself, because few arrows could get through it, and it was of sufficient strength to ward off a blow from a club or an axe; but even at that time the designs and medicine objects tied to the shield seem to have been regarded as of greater importance than the mechanical properties of the shield itself. It was the power represented by the design to which the owner of the shield looked for protection. Naturally, with the introduction of fire-arms, shields ceased to have a real protective value; but their designs were still looked upon as capable of affording protection against evil. According to the statements of some old men who still have faith in protective designs, the ancient shield manifested its power upon the mind of the enemy by influencing them to shoot at the shield rather than at the exposed parts of the body of its bearer. But when fire-arms were introduced, experience demonstrated that the shield was no longer a desirable object in battle, because the same influence that drew arrows to it drew bullets also, and in this case with fatal results. From this they concluded that guns represented a mystic power superior to that of shield-designs, but that the latter were still efficacious, except where so overpowered. This explanation is interesting, because these men seem to have grasped the idea that the shield, being a conspicuous object, would attract the attention and thus the aim of the enemy; but they confused this psychological explanation of the observed facts with a mystic conception that the magic power of the design upon the shield was the cause or force that reached out and lay hold of the attention of the enemy. Yet the introduction of fire-arms did not relegate the shield to oblivion; and shield-designs are still cherished by men of the olden time, because they represent a kind of individual totem or protective power.