We sat down on the floor, and mother placed between us a pretty wooden bowl filled with freshly made pemmican, smiling at our childish notion that food taken after the spirits had tasted it meant death within the year. As we were eating with relish the food placed before us, my mother said, "You do not understand why the bowl of pemmican was placed on the little grave, and I must tell you. The spirit of the person buried in that grave, or the spirit of any other person dead and buried, cannot eat food; but people love their dead relatives; they remember them and long for their presence at the family gathering: it is this desire that makes them go and put a share of the food on the grave of those who have become nothing, and not the belief that the dead can return and partake of food the same as the living." We listened with respectful attention as my mother explained to us this custom which arose from the tender longing that prompted the mourner to place on the little mound the food that might have been the share of the loved one who lay under the sod; but I am afraid we failed to grasp the meaning of her words, and clung to the commonplace idea entertained by less thoughtful persons. In the afternoon there was a general movement throughout the village, men, singly and in groups, walked with stately tread toward the edge of the bluff back of my father's house. Women, too, no less dignified, made their way in the same direction, followed by their grown-up daughters dressed in their gayest attire, their ornaments glinting in the sun. Little boys and girls chased each other hither and thither as they drifted that way, and soon there was a great gathering of people, all bent upon enjoying the excitement of the race. Brush and I mingled with the boys, and took part in their lively games, as preparations were going on for the sport of the day. My father was in his corral trying to lasso a young horse to put on the track, a spirited little animal with bald face and large white spots on his sides. When, with some difficulty, he was caught and bridled, he stood pawing the ground, impatient to go, tossing up his head from time to time and moving his ears excitedly. My father led him up to where the people were gathered; other men had already brought their horses there. Boys about Brush's size, lithe of figure, stood by the racers ready to mount when it was time to start. My father looked around, and finally his eyes rested upon Brush. "Boy, can you ride?" he asked. "I can," was the prompt answer. My breath was fairly taken away at this reply. I did not know that Brush could ride well enough to mount a running horse at a race. "I want you to ride my horse in this race," said my father. "All right," replied the lad, taking off his school uniform. In a moment he was ready, stripped naked, with only a breech cloth.