The Indian is scrupulously exact in the performance of his engagements, and this the traders know so well, that they feel no apprehension, when, having delivered their goods to their Indian customer, they see him plunge into his trackless wilderness with his purchase, and disappear amid wilds into which no civilized foot could follow him. They know that his first care will be to secure the game whose skin is to assist in the redemption of his promise; and at the stipulated moment he is again seen to emerge from the forest, unconscious even that what we should call an unusual degree of confidence has been reposed in him, and guided only by his own pure and simple conviction, that a promise once given is a sacred thing, and to be redeemed at whatever cost. Lying and treachery are held in profound abhorrence; we could relate very many facts in support of this assertion, but will confine ourselves to the two following ones only:--A distinguished warrior of the Assinneboins accompanied Major Sanford to Washington in 1832, and being there, became acquainted with the more obvious details of every-day life among the civilized; these he described to his people on his return, and was listened to for some time with respectful attention; but at length the wonders he related surpassing their powers of belief, they decided that he had been taught by the white men to lie, and that in a manner so shameless as to make him a dangerous example to his younger hearers; they then, after much solemn deliberation, concluded that he was unworthy to live, and the unhappy man was put to death accordingly; his protestations of innocence being regarded but as a deeper plunging into crime. Every thing connected with the dead is held sacred, but the mode of burial differs widely in different tribes. Some place the body dressed and armed with bow, quiver, tomahawk, &c., on the ground between flat stones set edge upwards, and cover it, first with similar stones, and afterwards with earth; others bury at about two feet below the earth. Among the Mandans it was customary (alas for the necessity of that “was”) to lay their dead, well wrapped in skins, on high scaffolds, as practised by the Parsees of Asia. After a sufficient lapse of time, the bones were gathered, and buried with solemn ceremonies, the skulls excepted, which were ranged in a circle within a larger one formed of buffalo skulls, and thither the women belonging to the family of the deceased repair to soothe the departed with songs, to inform him how those he left behind are faring, and to feed him with their choicest dainties, dishes of which they leave behind at their departure. Mourning for the dead is expressed by certain modes of paint, and among some tribes by cutting off locks of the hair. The sketch that accompanies this paper represents two warriors, and a woman of the Sacs and Foxes, mourning over the tomb of Black Hawk, the celebrated leader of the war known as the Black Hawk War.