and hell are not aboriginal, but were among the first incorporated from the teachings of the white missionaries. The characters resembling letters may be from the alphabetic system of sixteen characters which it is said the Ojibwa invented for recording their own language, and taught to the Kickapoo and Sauk, and which resembled somewhat the letters of the Roman alphabet, from which they apparently were derived. (_Hamilton, 1._) [Illustration: PL. LXXXVI THE PRAYER-STICK] This prayer-stick or “bible,” as it has been called, was obtained by Mr Bartlett from Mr R.V. Armstrong, of Mill Creek, Indiana, who stated that it was the only remaining one of a large number which had been in possession of the family for many years. The story of the manner in which it was originally obtained, as told by Mr Armstrong, is interesting. “His father, Reverend James Armstrong, was a Methodist minister and missionary who had been sent to northern Indiana in the early part of this century. In 1830, while living on Shawnee prairie, 3 miles from the present site of Attica, Indiana, a large band of Kickapoo Indians came to his house to visit the missionary, and apparently regarded the interview as of great importance to themselves. They declared that they were from beyond the Mississippi river, that they had heard of Mr Armstrong and his missionary labors, and that they believed him to be the one for whom their people had long been looking. Each Indian held in his hand one of these wooden crosses, and as they knelt on the grass in front of the missionary’s house, they went through their devotions in their own tongue, moving their fingers over the inscription that ascends the shaft of the cross. The missionary understood them to state that this cross was their “bible,” that they knew that it was not the true bible, but that they had been told to use it until one should come who would give them in exchange the genuine word of God. Thereupon the missionary gathered up their crosses—and there were more than a large basketful of them—and gave in exchange to each a copy of the New Testament. The Indians received the books with profuse expressions of gratitude and apparently viewed them at once as sacred possessions. These wise men from the west then went away to their far country.”