University of Virginia Library

No. V.

The Snake Indians.

The Snake Indians (they call themselves Shoshonés), are allies of the Flat-heads, and enemies of the Blackfeet and
Crows: they live on the Rocky Mountains, and beyond, on the Columbia, and are divided into two branches—the true
Shoshonés, and the Gens de Pitié, or Les Radiqueurs (Root-diggers), the Muradiços of the Spaniards. The first have
many dogs, which they do not use for carrying burdens, but for food; they have not so many horses as the Blackfeet, and
employ them to carry their baggage; they live in leather tents, are in general not so well made as the Blackfeet, but
there are some tall, well proportioned men among them; their tribe is said to be very numerous, more so than the
Sioux, and they trade with the Spaniards, who barter with them for beaver and otter skins, leather shirts, &c. They
are not hostile to the Whites.

The Root-diggers, on the contrary, are a very miserable people; they have no leather tents, but merely set up
poles, which they cover with boughs, hay, and grass; their physiognomy is said to be distinguished by rather flat noses;
they are extremely poor and rude, go nearly naked, live chiefly on roots, and possess no guns. They eat great quantities
of ants, which they prepare for food in the following manner:—they collect a large mass, which they wash, and knead
into balls; these they bake between hot coals, reduce them to powder, and boil them for soup. Mr. Campbell, of Fort
William, who had often visited them, gave me the following account of them. They were so rude and indifferent to what
passed around them, that everything they saw about him appeared to them new and ridiculous; they were ignorant even of
the value of beaver skins, which they singed. Some huts of these people which he visited had been long standing on the same
spot, without their having thought of looking out for a better tract of country. He found among them great numbers

of white goat skins; and, as they were so little acquainted with the Whites, a very good trade (by barter) was carried on
with them.

The Comandes, who call themselves Samparicka, are said to speak nearly the same language as the Snake Indians;
they live about the sources of the Rio Colorado (Rivière Rouge): they ornament one sleeve of their shirts with tufts of
hair, the other with feathers.