The Dancing Lodge.

The dancing lodge may be said to take its origin on the fourth day, by which time the medicine woman has her tipi in place near its site and the camp circle has been formed. In construction, nine forked tree trunks about nine feet in height are set in a circle. Across their tops, except the eastern face, are laid stringers about fifteen feet long of the same material.[10] In the center, is another forked tree trunk much higher than the other (this we shall call the sun pole) connected with each of the stringers by a rafter. Green boughs are placed thickly against the outside of the lodge. On the inside, at the rear, is a booth screened and roofed with boughs. The material is cottonwood. That other woods were occasionally used, is attested by the fact that a locality is known as "the place of sweet pine dancing lodge."

Some informants claim that in former years each band was required to furnish two rafters, a post, a rail, and their proportionate amount of boughs. Two rafters were used instead of one as now, each band furnishing the section opposite their place in the circle. The contradiction between the number of bands and the size of the dancing lodge seems not to have troubled our informants. Now, the young men go out during the early part of the fourth day to cut the poles and boughs. This is done without ceremony. A crier usually rides around the camp circle reminding the various bands of their duty. Formerly, the young women went out on horseback to drag in the poles and brush. On this occasion, they dressed in the best costumes and used the finest horse trappings obtainable. The men cut the poles and brush, hitching them to the drag ropes with their own hands. As the procession galloped toward the camp circle, the men rode behind, shooting and yelling. In recent years, the men bring the material in on wagons without demonstration.

Men of some prominence are selected to dig the holes for the posts. The posts are erected and the stringers put in place, excepting one on the west side nearly opposite the entrance. The rafters are leaned against the stringers, ready to be pushed in place and the green boughs piled up at convenient places near by.

The cutting of the sun pole is attended with some ceremony. Some informants claim that formerly this was to be carried out by the medicine woman's band; others that one of the men's societies was called upon for this service. In any event, they go out as a war party and locate a suitable tree. A man with a war record, preferably one having struck an enemy with an ax, comes forward, takes an ax, paints the blade as he recounts some event in which he killed an enemy, and then strikes the tree. Four such deeds must be told before the tree can be felled. Then one or two men cut the tree as the others stand around. As the tree begins to fall all give the war cry and shoot at its top, then rush up, and tearing off branches, wave them in the air as if they were trophies from an enemy. Indeed, the whole proceeding, from start to finish, is a mimic attack on an enemy.

The pole is cut to approximate form and taken to the site of the dancing lodge. One end is placed on a travois (in recent times on a wagon), while the riders assist with their ropes, their horses massed around the travois horse.

The hole for the sun pole is dug without ceremony by relatives of the medicine woman. When it is in place, they tie a bundle of green boughs in the fork,[11] making everything ready for the raising in the evening. The sun pole now lies on the ground with the butt over the hole and the forked end supported by a piece of timber. The fork points to the west. It seems that formerly the pole was painted. Just below the fork it was circled by two black bands and two red ones beneath these.