Dog Feast. Plate 96. Catlin. The Manners, Customs and Condition of the North American Indians. London, 1892. Archives & Rare Books Department, University Libraries, University of Cincinnati.
Among the events accompanying the christening of Fort Pierre was a Dog Feast. Catlin devoted several pages in Manners and Customs to a detailed description of the significance of the Dog Feast -- its physical arrangements, accompanying rituals of gift-giving and smoking, the silence of eating itself -- and offered a final gastronomic evaluation:
"We all agreed that the meat was well cooked, and seemed to be a well-flavoured and palatable food; and no doubt, could have been eaten with a good relish, if we had been hungry, and ignorant of the nature of the food we were eating."
Page 231.
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