NARCOTIC PLANTS AND STIMULANTS SAFFORD. 403 



dians of the United States under the misleading names of " mescal 

 buttons" or "mescal beans," as well as under the Nahuatl name 

 peyote. 



CEREMONIAL USE BY THE INDIANS. 



In a paper by the present writer published in the Journal of 

 Heredity (vol. 6, No. 7, 1915) under the title, "An Aztec Narcotic," 

 the author gives an account of the ceremonial use of this plant by 

 various tribes of Indians. The first to bring to public notice its 

 ceremonial use by existing tribes of Indians was James Mooney, of 

 the Bureau of American Ethnology (1891). His attention had been 

 directed to it while making investigation among the Kiowas, Avho 

 are descendants of one of the tribes called Chichimecas by the Az- 

 tecs ; and it is from the Chichimecas that they declared they had re- 

 ceived the knowledge of this plant. Like the Aztecs, the Kiowas 

 ascribed divine attributes to the drug, and their ceremony in connec- 

 tion with it was essentially religious. Not only the Kiowas, but 

 other tribes now living in Oklahoma receive supplies of the narcotic 

 from traders who bring it from the vicinity of Laredo, Tex., in 

 olden times the land of the Chichimecas. Mr. Mooney's account was 

 published in the Therapeutic Gazette of September 16, 1895. Other 

 observers who mention the use of the narcotic Lophophora are Lum- 

 holtz, who describes the ceremonies of the Tarahumari Indians con- 

 nected with it, and Leon Diguet, who tells of its use by the Huichol 

 Indians of the mountains of Jalisco and Tepic. 



Efforts have been made to prevent its spread among the Indians 

 of the United States. An account of the recent prosecution of an 

 Indian named Nah-qua-tah-tuck, of the Menominee Indian Reserva- 

 tion, Wis., for furnishing this drug to Indians of his tribe is 

 given in the author's paper above cited. It developed in the trial 

 that there is a regidarly organized association among the Indians, 

 called the Peyote Society, holding weekly services in which it is ad- 

 ministered as a sort of communion; and it was claimed that its use 

 put an end to the habit of drinking alcoholic beverages. Dr. Morgan, 

 of the Bureau of Chemistry, gave to the court an account of his 

 experiments bearing upon the physiological action of the narcotic. 



At a meeting of the Lake Mohonk Conference in October, 1914, 

 several papers relating to the effects of this drug upon the Indians 

 were read and affidavits from tAvo Omaha Indians were quoted. 

 From one of the latter I take the following extracts: 



AMONG THE OMAHA INDIANS. 



At the meetings of the society " before they sing they pass the peyote around. 

 They begin taking this medicine along about darli, and when they pass it, ask 

 you how many you want, and they often try to persuade you to take more 



