This classic treatise on the Omahas is based on twenty-nine years of study and observation in the field. "Nothing has been borrowed from other observers,'" Alice C. Fletcher writes in the Foreword. Volume II considers social life and societies, music, warfare, treatment of disease, death and burial customs, religion, and language.

The first chapter on Social life includes information on kinship, courtship, marriage, child raising, etiquette, avocations of men, of women, clothing, adornment, property, and amusement. An Appendix traces the history of the tribe since the coming of the white man and describes the effects of that contact.