Dancing is both an amusement and a religious observance, among the American Indians, and is known to constitute one of the most wide spread traits in their manners and customs. It is accompanied, in all cases, with singing, and, omitting a few cases, with the beating of time on instruments. Tribes the most diverse in language, and situated at the greatest distances apart, concur in this. It is believed to be the ordinary mode of expressing intense passion, or feeling on any subject, and it is a custom which has been persevered in, with the least variation, through all the phases of their history, and probably exists among the remote tribes, precisely at this time, as it did in the era of Columbus. It is observed to be the last thing abandoned by bands and individuals, in their progress to civilization and Christianity. So true is this, that it may be regarded as one of the best practical proofs of their advance, to find the native instruments and music thrown by, and the custom abandoned. Every one has heard of the war dance, the medicine dance, the wabeno dance, the dance of honour (generally called the begging dance,) and various others, each of which has its appropriate movements, its air, and its words. There is no feast, and no religious ceremony, among them, which is not attended with dancing and songs. Thanks are thus expressed for success in hunting, for triumphs in war, and for ordinary providential cares. Public opinion is called to pressing objects by a dance, at which addresses are made, and in fact, moral instructions and advice are given to the young, in the course of their being assembled at social feasts and dances. Dancing is indeed the common resource, whenever the mass of Indian mind is to be acted on. And it thus stands viewed in its necessary connection with the songs and addresses, in the room of the press, the newspaper, and the periodical. The priests and prophets have, more than any other class, cultivated their national songs and dances, and may be regarded as the skalds and poets of the tribes. They are generally the composers of the songs, and the leaders in the dance and ceremonies, and it is found, that their memories are the best stored, not only with the sacred songs and chants, but also with the traditions, and general lore of the tribes.