they seem to have no terror of graveyards, and but little of mortuary remains. You may frighten children after nightfall by shouting nohidahi (ghost), but will not scare the aged. They have much faith in dreams, but usually regard as oracular those only which come after prayer, sacrifice, and fasting. They have queer notions respecting the effects of different articles of diet, thus: An expectant mother believes that if she eats part of a mole or shrew, her child will have small eyes; that if she eats a piece of porcupine, her child will be inclined to eat too much when it grows up; that if she partakes of the flesh of the turtle, her offspring will be slow or lazy, &c.; but they do not suppose such articles of food affect the immediate consumer. They have faith in witchcraft, and think that a sorcerer may injure any person, no matter how far distant, by acts upon an effigy or upon a lock of the victim's hair.
It is believed by some of the Hidatsa, that every human being has four souls in one. They account for the phenomena of gradual death, where the extremities are apparently dead while consciousness remains, by supposing the four souls to depart one after another at different times. When dissolution is complete, they say that all the souls are gone, and have joined together again outside of the body. I have heard a Minnetaree quietly discussing this doctrine with an Assinneboine, who believed in only one soul to each body.
Every man in this tribe, as in all other neighbouring tribes, has his personal medicine, which is usually some animal. On all war parties, and often on hunts and other excursions, he carries the head, claws, stuffed skin, or other representative of his medicine with him, and seems to regard it in much the same light that Europeans in former days regarded, and in some cases still regard, protective charms. To insure the future fleetness of some promising young colt, they tie to the colt's neck a small piece of deer or antelope horn. The rodent teeth of the beaver arc regarded as potent charms, and are worn by little girls on their necks to make them industrious.—"Ethnography and Philology of the Hidatsa Indians," pp. 49, 50.
