306 



The Journal of Heredity 



energy which permits him to overcome 

 great fatigue and to endure hunger and 

 thirst for five days."-^ 



PRESENT USE IN THE UNITED STATES 



Efforts have been made to prevent 

 the spread of the drug among the 

 Indians of the United States, and 

 action has been taken in the courts to 

 prosecute those who have been instru- 

 mental in procuring it and furnishing 

 it. One of the most recent cases is that 

 of the United States versus an Indian 

 named Nah-qua-tah-tuck, alias Mitchell 

 Neck, of the Menominee Indian Reser- 

 vation, Wisconsin, accused of furnishing 

 intoxicants to certain Indians, in viola- 

 tion of the law. Dr. Francis P. Morgan, 

 of the Bureau of Chemistry, was simi- 

 moned as a Government expert. The 

 trial developed the following facts : 



On March 15, 1914, the accused 

 brought a supply of the drug in a dress 

 suit case to the house of an Indian 

 family named Neconish, situated a 

 short distance north of the village of 

 Phlox, Wisconsin, near the western 

 boundary of the Menominee Reserva- 

 tion, at which place there was a meeting 

 of a religious nature. The drug had 

 been received by parcel post from 

 Aguilarcs, Texas. The participants first 

 made a line about the house to keep out 

 the evil s])irits, and then invoked God, 

 begging him to make all of them good 

 and to keep them from evil. The 

 pcyote was next distributed, and when 

 it was eaten caused the partakers to see 

 the evil things they had done and 

 showed them the good things they 

 ought to do. 



The ceremony began about 9 o'clock 

 in the evening. One witness testified 

 that shortly after having eaten four 

 buttons he could see pictures of various 

 kinds when his eyes were shut. First he 

 saw God, with a bleeding wound in his 

 side. This vision vanished when he 

 opened his eyes, but reai)peared when 

 he closed thcrrr again. Then he saw 

 the devil with horns and tail, of the 

 color of a negro. Then he saw bad 

 things which he had done before, bottles 

 of whiskey which he hcid drunk, a 

 watermelon which he had stolen, and 



so many other things that it would 

 take all day to tell of them. Then he 

 saw a cross with all kinds of colors about 

 it, white, red, green and blue. He was 

 not made helpless. He stated that he 

 could have walked had he wished to do 

 so, but that he preferred to sit still 

 and look at the pictures. 



Another witness testified that he 

 ate the peyote so that his soul might 

 go up to God. The witnesses who 

 testified at this trial declared that the 

 peyote helped them to lead better lives 

 and to forsake alcoholic drinks. The 

 defendent was acquitted on the ground 

 that the meeting was one of a religious 

 nature. 



THE PEYOTE SOCIETY 



Thomas Prcscott of Wittenberg, Wis- 

 consin, testified that there is a regularly 

 organized association among the Indians 

 called the Peyote Society, also known as 

 the Union Church Society, of which he 

 had been a priest for seven years. In 

 the weekly ceremonies of this society 

 the peyote is either eaten or taken in 

 the form of tea. In his opinion the 

 effect of the peyote is to make better 

 men of the Indians. Many of them 

 were formerly common vagabonds, liable 

 to commit all sorts of crimes when under 

 the influence of alcohol. After becom- 

 ing members of the peyote society, 

 however, they gave up drink, established 

 themselves in regular homes, and lived 

 sober and industrious lives. In relating 

 his personal experience he made the 

 following statements : 



"We boys, before we got this peyote, 

 was regular drunkards; so when I was 

 drunk I was lying on the road somewhere 

 sometimes, and I got no home nor 

 nothing. Before I got this I did wrong 

 and everything else. Now, since I got 

 this peyote, it stojjixxl me from drinking, 

 and now, since I used this ])eyote, I have 

 been sober, and- today I am sober yet 

 ... I see a good and a bad when I 

 eat that peyote. When I eat that 

 peyote then it teaches me my heart; I 

 know anything that is right and what 

 is wrong. That is the way jjcyote 

 works for good and works for God, and 

 that is how we worship. . . . When 



*• Diguet, L^on. loc. cit. p. 621. 



