"Provides real insight into the religion of the nineteenth-century Gros Ventre (Atsina) Indians. Known to themselves as the White Clay People, this little-known tribe now shares the Fort Belknap Reservation in Montana with the Assiniboines. However, throughout much of their recorded history they were allied with the Blackfeet. The book is a record of the spiritual life of Bull Lodge (born ca. 1802, died 1886), religious leader, healer, and for a time, keeper of the Feathered Pipe, one of the two tribal objects of the Gros Ventres. . . . [It] makes absorbing reading. Beginning at the age of twelve, Bull Lodge sought spiritual power through the tribal Feathered Pipe. From the ages of seventeen to twenty-three he was favored with a series of seven visions on seven buttes that together outline a Gros Ventre cultural geography. . . .
"The strength of the narrative is the rich detail of ritual description: fasting, sacrifices, vision experiences, the practices of healing. By describing ritual in the context of a man's life, the book gives a uniquely historical understanding of the dynamics of traditional religious life. It provides deeper understanding of the Gros Ventres' way of life and gives a valuable comparative perspective on plains Indian religion."—Raymond J. DeMallie, Western Historical Quarterly.