The party also celebrated New Year’s Day by similar festivities.  Sixteen of the men were given leave to go up to the first Mandan village with their musical instruments, where they delighted the whole tribe with their dances, one of the French voyageurs being especially applauded when he danced on his hands with his head downwards.  The dancers and musicians were presented with several buffalo-robes and a large quantity of Indian corn.  The cold grew more intense, and on the tenth of the month the mercury stood at forty degrees below zero.  Some of the men were badly frost-bitten, and a young Indian, about thirteen years old, who had been lost in the snows, came into the fort.  The journal says:—­

“His father, who came last night to inquire after him very anxiously, had sent him in the afternoon to the fort; he was overtaken by the night, and was obliged to sleep on the snow with no covering except a pair of antelope-skin moccasins and leggins, and a buffalo-robe.  His feet being frozen, we put them into cold water, and gave him every attention in our power.  About the same time an Indian who had also been missing returned to the fort.  Although his dress was very thin, and he had slept on the snow without a fire, he had not suffered the slightest inconvenience.  We have indeed observed that these Indians support the rigors of the season in a way which we had hitherto thought impossible.  A more pleasing reflection occurred at seeing the warm interest which the situation of these two persons had excited in the village.  The boy had been a prisoner, and adopted from charity; yet the distress of the father proved that he felt for him the tenderest affection.  The man was a person of no distinction, yet the whole village was full of anxiety for his safety; and, when they came to us, borrowed a sleigh to bring them home with ease if they had survived, or to carry their bodies if they had perished. . . .

“January 13.  Nearly one half of the Mandan nation passed down the river to hunt for several days.  In these excursions, men, women, and children, with their dogs, all leave the village together, and, after discovering a spot convenient for the game, fix their tents; all the family bear their part in the labor, and the game is equally divided among the families of the tribe.  When a single hunter returns from the chase with more than is necessary for his own immediate consumption, the neighbors are entitled by custom to a share of it:  they do not, however, ask for it, but send a squaw, who, without saying anything, sits down by the door of the lodge till the master understands the hint, and gives her gratuitously a part for her family.”