SELECTED. A Horrllle Sr rue Sun Dunce. This festive performance, aj practieeJ among the Sioux, is a sort of religious dance, in which the youn; hraves test their fortitude and stoicism in rciiting pain without wincing. There was a large lodge built in the shape of an amphitheatre, with a pole in the centre. cen-tre. The sides and roof were covered with willows, forming a tolerable screen, but rot so dense as to obstruct entirelv the view. The performance was com-menced com-menced with chants and incantations Five youns meu were brought in and partially stripped, their mothers beiti!: present and assisting in the ceremony. Then the medicine man began his pari by cutting slits in the flesh ot the young men and taking up the muscles with pinchers. The old squaws assisted in lacerating the flesh of the boys with kuives. The squaws would at the same time keep up a howling, accompanied with a movement to and fro. When the muscles were lifted out by pini-hcrs on the breast, one end of a sort of lariat or buffalo thong was tied to the bleed insr flesh, while the other end was tied to the top of the pole in the centre of the Iodic. The first young man, when thus prepared, commenced dancing around the circle in a frantic manner, pullim; with all his weight so ;is to stretch out the rope, and. by his j rk ing movements, loosen himself by tearing tear-ing out the iiesh. The young man'? dance was accompanied by a chant by those who were standing around, assisted as-sisted by the thumping of a hideous drum, to keep the tune Te.e joung brave who was undergoing this self-torture self-torture finally succeeded in tearing himself him-self loose, and the rope relaxed from its sudden tightness fell back toward to-ward the centre-pole with a piece of flesh to which it was tied. The victim, vic-tim, who, up to this point, did not move a muscle of his face, fell down on the ground, exhausted from the pain, which human weakness could not further fur-ther conceal. A squaw then rushed in and bore the young brave 'away. He had undergone the terrible ordeal, and, amid the congratulations of the old men, would be cmplinicnted as a warrior war-rior of undoubted pluck and acknowledged acknow-ledged prowess. Another of the young men named Charles was cut in two places under the shoulder-blade, the flesh was raised with pincers, and thongs tied around the flesh and muscles thus raised. The thongs reached down below the knees and were tied to bufl'alo skulls. With these heavy weights dang'iug at the ends of the thongs, the young man was required to dance around the circle to the sound of the drums and the chants of the bystanders, until the skulls became be-came detached by tearing out of the flesh. They continued the performance until one of the skulls broke loose, but the other remained. The mother ot the young man then rushed into the ring, leading a pony, and tied one end of the lariat which was around the pony's neck to the skull, which was still fastened to the young man. The latter then followed the pony lound the ring, until nearly exausted, he fell on his face, and the thong was thereby torn out of the flesh. The sufferer's voice grew husky from joining in the chant ; ho groveled on the ground in violent contortions for a few minutes, and was then removed to the outside of the lodge. A third man had the lariat of the pony hitched to the raised muscles of his back, and was dragged in this way several times round the ring, but the force not being sufficient to tear loose from the flesh, the pony was backed up, and a slack being thus taken in the lariat, the pony was urged swiftly forward, and the sudden .jerk tore the lariat out of the flesh. The dance with its bloody orgies lasted three days. Cur. "SV. Ism is JirpuhUcan.