The Dahcotahs believe in the existence of a Great Spirit, but they have very confused ideas of his attributes.

Those who have lived near the missionaries, say that the Great Spirit lived forever, but their own minds would never have conceived such an idea.

Some say that the Great Spirit has a wife.
They say that this being created all things but thunder and wild rice; and that he gave the earth and all animals to them, and that their feasts and customs were the laws by which they are to be governed.

But they do not fear the anger of this deity after death.
Thunder is said to be a large bird; the name that they give to thunder is the generic term for all animals that fly.

Near the source of the St.
Peters is a place called Thunder-tracks--where the footprints of the thunder-bird are seen in the rocks, twenty-five miles apart.
The Dahcotahs believe in an evil spirit as well as a good, but they do not consider these spirits as opposed to each other; they do not think that they are tempted to do wrong by this evil spirit; their own hearts are bad.