The Indians regard with awe the medicine waters of these fountains, as being the abode of a Spirit who breathes through the transparent water, and thus by his exhalations causes the perturbation of its surface. The Arapahoes especially attribute to this water god, the power of ordaining the success or miscarriage of their war expeditions, and as their braves pass often by the mysterious springs when in search of their hereditary enemies, the Utes, in the "Valley of Salt," they never fail to bestow their votive offerings upon the water sprite, in order to propitiate the Manitou of the fountain and insure a fortunate issue to their path of war. Thus at the time of my visit, the basin of the spring was filled with beads and wampum and pieces of red cloth and knives, while the surrounding trees were hung with strips of deer skin, cloth, and moccasins; to which, had they been serviceable, I would most sacrilegiously have helped myself. The signs, too, around the spring, plainly showed that here a war dance had been executed by the braves, and I was not a little pleased to find that they had already been here and were not likely to return the same way; but in this supposition I was quite astray. The large spring referred to by Dr. James, Sage, Frémont, Ruxton, and the other writers whom I have quoted, is the one now enclosed and used by the bottling works at Manitou. Ruxton says the two springs were intimately connected with the separation of the Comanche and the Snake, or Ute tribes, and he gives the following legend concerning the beginning of the trouble: