It is highly important to every man passing through a country frequented by Indians to know some of their habits, customs, and propensities, as this will facilitate his intercourse with friendly tribes, and enable him, when he wishes to avoid a conflict, to take precautions against coming in collision with those who are hostile. Almost every tribe has its own way of constructing its lodges, encamping, making fires, its own style of dress, by some of which peculiarities the experienced frontiersman can generally distinguish them. The Osages, for example, make their lodges in the shape of a wagon-top, of bent rods or willows covered with skins, blankets, or the bark of trees. The Kickapoo lodges are made in an oval form, something like a rounded hay-stack, of poles set in the ground, bent over, and united at top; this is covered with cloths or bark. The Witchetaws, Wacos, Towackanies, and Tonkowas erect their hunting lodges of sticks put up in the form of the frustum of a cone and covered with brush. All these tribes leave the frame-work of their lodges standing when they move from camp to camp, and this, of course, indicates the particular tribe that erected them. The Delawares and Shawnees plant two upright forked poles, place a stick across them, and stretch a canvas covering over it, in the same manner as with the "_tente d'abri_." The Sioux, Arapahoes, Cheyennes, Utes, Snakes, Blackfeet, and Kioways make use of the Comanche lodge, covered with dressed buffalo hides. All the Prairie Indians I have met with are the most inveterate beggars. They will flock around strangers, and, in the most importunate manner, ask for every thing they see, especially tobacco and sugar; and, if allowed, they will handle, examine, and occasionally pilfer such things as happen to take their fancy. The proper way to treat them is to give them at once such articles as are to be disposed of, and then, in a firm and decided manner, let them understand that they are to receive nothing else.