INDIANS OF WASHINGTON TERRITORY. 677 



was no noise or singing, or pounding on sticks or drumming; the doctor 

 put his hands in the water, warmed them a little, and then placed them 

 on the woman's side, her dress having been opened and partly taken 

 down for the purpose, and he acted as if he were trying to draw out; 

 something. This was done a second time, when he plunged them into 

 water, placed his n)Outh next to tliem and blew suddenly and power- 

 fully a few times; this was done two or three times, when he left, the 

 performance being ended. 



Tama Housing for lost souls. — Sometimes before a person dies, it may 

 be months, it is supposeil that a spirit comes from the spirit world and 

 carries away the spirit of the person, after which the person v/astes away 

 or dies suddenly. If by any means it is discovered that this has been 

 done, and there are those who profess to do it, then they attempt to 

 get the spirit bacli by a tamanous, and if it is done the person will live. 

 Sometimes a person who has much intercourse with the other world 

 persuades one who is in the best of health that he has visited the 

 spirit land and seen the spirit of his dupe there, and the latter is thus 

 frightened into having a tamanous. Again, when some credulous indi- 

 vidual has been ailing a'little for a long time, but not sufficiently to feel 

 that he needs to employ a medicine man, one of these arrant humbugs 

 takes a fancied journey to the land of shades to search for the lost soul 

 of the invalid, the discovery of which he soon announces, and once 

 more there must be a tamanous. Frequently in the winter when time 

 hangs heavily on their hands and they are at a loss for amusements 

 these soul searchers pretend that they have received tidings of a num- 

 ber of errant spirits and they get up a general spirit hunt. 



In January, 1878, a tamanous of the last kind took place among the 

 Twanas, and 1 learned the following facts concerning it from one white 

 man and some school boys who were present : 



The performance is carried on mostly in the night, as it is said that 

 day-time with us is night-time in the spirit w^orld, and vice versa. The 

 breaking of the ground is an important part of the ceremony. The sur- 

 face of the earth is often actually broken in order, they say, that the 

 spirits of those who are performing can descend into the other world. 

 When, as they pretend, the descent is accomplished, they represent 

 pantomimically that they travel along a road, cross at least one stream, 

 and travel on until they come to a place where the spirits dwell. These 

 they surprise and engage in fight (a great noise is here kept up by all pres- 

 ent), and having captured they bring back to this world the spirits of 

 three persons which they pretended to roll over up in cloth and work 

 for some time, after which they seemed to give them to their real own- 

 ers. When they put the spirit of one man on him, he sang his tamanous 

 song, and when a medicine man received his, he cried verj' much. Only 

 men enact the part of travellers in the nether world, although women 

 and children are present at the tamanous. When they are supposed to 

 cross the stream they actually set up some boards against opposite sides 



