The extent of the playground was marked off by two pair of "byes"
like those used in cricket, planted about thirty rods apart. But
the goals of each side were only about thirty feet apart.
At a signal from the oldest of the chiefs the contestants
arranged themselves in two parallel lines facing each other,
inside the area and about ten rods apart. Every man was armed
with a strong stick three and a half to four feet in length, and
curving toward the end. Upon this curved end was tightly
fastened a network of thongs of untanned deerskin, drawn until
they were rigid and taut. The ball with which they were to play
was made of closely wrapped elastic skins, and was about the size
of an ordinary apple.
At the end of the lines, but about midway between them, sat the
chiefs, who, besides being judges and stakeholders, were also
score keepers. They kept tally of the game by cutting notches
upon sticks. Every time one side put the ball through the
other's goal it counted one, but there was an unusual power
exercised by the chiefs, practically unknown to the games of
white men. If one side got too far ahead, its score was cut down
at the discretion of the chiefs in order to keep the game more
even, and also to protract it sometimes over three or four days.
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