It is impossible to know how far the prophet was responsible for the final shaping of the doctrine. Like all such movements, it undoubtedly grew and took more definite form under the hands of the apostles who went out from the presence of its originator to preach to the various tribes. A religion which found adherents alike in the everglades of Florida and on the plains of the Saskatchewan must necessarily have undergone local modifications. From a comparison of the various accounts we can arrive at a general statement of the belief. The prophet was held to be an incarnation of Manabozho, the great “first doer” of the Algonquian system. His words were believed to be the direct utterances of a deity. Manabozho had taught his people certain modes of living best suited to their condition and capacity. A new race had come upon them, and the Indians had thrown aside their primitive purity of life and adopted the innovations of the whites, which had now brought them to degradation and misery and threatened them with swift and entire destruction. To punish them for their disobedience and bring them to a sense of their duty, Manabozho had called the game from the forests and shut it up under the earth, so that the tribes were now on the verge of starvation and obliged to eat the flesh of filthy hogs. They had also lost their old love for one another and become addicted to the secret practices of the poisoner and the wizard, together with the abominable ceremonies of the calumet dance. They must now put aside all these things, throw away the weapons and the dress of the white man, pluck out their hair as in ancient times, wear the eagle feather on their heads, and clothe themselves again with the breechcloth and the skins of animals slain with the bows and arrows which Manabozho had given them. (_Kendall, 1._) They must have done with the white man’s flint-and-steel, and cook their food over a fire made by rubbing together two sticks, and this fire must always be kept burning in their lodges, as it was a symbol of the eternal life, and their care for it was an evidence of their heed to the divine commands. The firewater must forever be put away, together with the medicine bags and poisons and the wicked juggleries which had corrupted the ancient purity of the Midé rites. Instead of these the prophet gave them new songs and new medicines. Their women must cease from any connection with white men. They were to love one another and make an end of their constant wars, to be kind to their children, to keep but one dog in a family, and to abstain from lying and stealing. If they would listen to his voice and follow his instructions, the incarnate Manabozho promised that at the end of four years (i. e., in 1811) he would bring on two days of darkness, during which he would travel invisibly throughout the land, and cause the animals which he had created to come forth again out of the earth. (_Kendall, 2._) They