One of the printed queries before me is, “Do they (the Indians) believe in ghosts?” I believe all ignorant and superstitious nations believe in apparitions.  It seems to be one of the most natural consequences of ignorance; and we have seen, in the history of wise and learned men, that it requires a high intellectual effort to shake this belief out of the mind.  If God possessed no other way of communicating with the living, it is reasonable to believe that he would send dead men, or dead men’s souls.  And this is the precise situation of the only well authenticated account we have, namely, that of Saul at Endor [vide 1st Samuel, 7th to 15th verses].  The Chippewas are apt to connect all their ghost stories with fire.  A lighted fire on the grave has a strong connection with this idea, as if they deemed some mysterious analogy to exist between spirituality and fire.  Their name for ghost is Jeebi, a word rendered plural in ug.  Without nice attention, this word will be pronounced Chebi, or Tchebi.

Another is as follows:  “Do they use any words equivalent to our habit of swearing?” Many things the Indians may be accused of, but of the practice of swearing they cannot.  I have made many inquiries into the state of their vocabulary, and do not, as yet, find any word which is more bitter or reproachful than matchi annemoash, which indicates simply, bad-dog.  Many of their nouns have, however, adjective inflections, by which they are rendered derogative.  They have terms to indicate cheat, liar, thief, murderer, coward, fool, lazy man, drunkard, babbler.  But I have never heard of an imprecation or oath.  The genius of the language does not seem to favor the formation of terms to be used in oaths or for purposes of profanity.  It is the result of the observation of others, as well as my own, to say, that an Indian cannot curse.

31st.  The ornithology of the north is very limited in the winter.  We have the white owl, the Canada jay, and some small species of woodpeckers.  I have known the white partridge, or ptermigan, to wander thus far south.  This bird is feathered to the toes.  There are days when the snow-bird appears.  There is a species of duck, the shingebis, that remains very late in the fall, and another, the ae-ae-wa, that comes very early in the spring.

The T. polyglottis, or buffoon-bird, is never found north of 46 deg.  N. latitude in the summer.  This bird pours forth all sorts of notes in a short space of time, without any apparent order.  The thrush, the wren, the jay, and the robin are imitated in as short a time as it takes to write these words.

7th.  During severe winters, in the north, some species of birds extend their migrations farther south than usual.  This appears to have been the case during the present season.  A small bird, yellowish and cinereous, of the grosbec species, appeared this day in the neighborhood of one of the sugar-camps on the river below, and was shot with an arrow by an Indian boy, who brought it up to me.  The Chippewas call it Pashcundamo, in allusion to the stoutness of its bill, and consequent capacity for breaking surfaces.[37]