January 15, 1834
Calm, pleasant morning; at seven thirty, −8 1/2°F [−22.5°C]. Wind northeast, not strong but cold.
About noon Mató-Tópe came with many Indians. One of them wore a long, trailing bonnet of white and black kiliou feathers (máhchsi-akub-háschka) on his head. This beautiful bonnet had about 40 eagle feathers attached to a broad red strip of cloth. They went to Ruhptare to adopt a medicine son and to dance the medicine pipes.
Mató-Tópe was dressed beautifully. In his hair he had [symbolized] all his wounds with small wooden sticks: four yellow, one red, and one blue. I had precise copies made. On the right side of his head, he also wore a knife made from wood, painted partly red as a sign that he had killed a Cheyenne chief with a knife. On top of each wooden piece, there is a yellow nail driven in, like a little button. On the back of his head, he wore a large tuft of eagle owl feathers, a symbol of the Meníss-Óchatä, and eagle feathers stuck radially upright in his hair. I lent him my necklace of bear claws, and he took an ornamented eagle’s feather belonging to Máhchsi-Karéhde that was at our place and stuck that in his hair, too. One eye was painted yellow, the other red; his forehead and the lower part of his chin (were) red. His body and arms were marked with reddish brown vertical stripes, and his coups (were) indicated by horizontal stripes on his arms. On his chest (was) a yellow hand that indicated he had taken prisoners. Cháratä-Numakschi came after [Four Bears] and cleaned his gun with a red strip that Belhumeur had given him.
They stayed for about an hour and then went to Ruhptare. At twelve thirty, −2°F [−18.9°C]. Wind northeast. The weather [was] good. In the afternoon the Yanktonai came and roasted ears of corn on the fire. Evening calm and not especially cold.
