96 THE MEDICINE-MAN. 



*' So saying, he entered his lodge alone, nor suffered any to come near 

 during the long fast that followed. Darkness had closed four times upon 

 the prairie, and the sun again hastened to hide behind the mountain peaks, 

 when, calling the young men to him, the medicine-man said : 



" ' Fetch me now meat and water, with a new robe, and bid my people 

 come near, that they may know the words that I would speak.' 



" The obedient braves made haste and did as bidden. Folding the robe, 

 he sat upon it and partook of the refreshments placed before him. After 

 eating he arose, and six large snakes, crawling from the robe one after 

 another, sprang to his shoulder, and, whispering in his ear, vanished from 

 sight. The last snake had just told his message when the chief began : 



" ' The Good Spirit wills it, that we remove from hence. Three moons 

 being dead, let three hundred warriors return, and their hearts shall be 

 made glad with medicine-dogs and the scalps of enemies.' 



"The village left, and, at the time appointed, the warriors returned. They 

 met the enemy, — fought, and were victorious. Sixty-three scalps and one 

 hundred medicine-dogs were the fruits of their success." 



Before dismissing the subject, many other particulars were cited in proof 

 of the extraordinary abilities of different medicine-men, but the above being 

 the most remarkable, I have thought proper to pass over the remainder in 

 silence. 



Note. — ^.n account, still more wonderful than either of the foregfoing, was subse- 

 quently narrated in my hearing, while among the Arapaho Indians; and, without 

 vouching for the truth of all its particulars, I am unwilling to withhold it from the 

 reader. 



The performance alluded to is said to have occurred, some three years since, in the 

 presence of the whole Arapaho village, incredible as it may seem. The actor was a 

 Riccaree by nation, and is well known to the mountain traders. 



In the centre of a large circle of men, women, and children, stood the subject of 

 the appended sketch, stripped to the waist, as the gunner's mark. A shot perforated 

 his body w^ith a bullet, which entered at the chest and emerged from the opposite side. 

 He instantly fell, and the blood flowing in streams dyed the grass where he lay, and 

 everything seemed to prefigure the reality of death. 



While in this condition, his wife approached and besprinkled his face with water ; 

 soon after which he arose, as from a slumber — the blood still pouring from him. 

 Beplastering his wound with mud before and behind, the blood ceased to flow, when 

 he commenced yawning and stretching ; in a few minutes the plaster was removed by 

 a pass of tlie hand, and neither blood, nor wound, nor the sign of a scratch or scar 

 appeared ! There stood the self-restored medicine-man, before the wondering throng, 

 alive and well, and in all the pride of his strength ! 



He then brought his naked son into the ring, a lad of some eight years, and, stand- 

 ing at a distance of several yards, bow in hand, he pierced liim through and through, 

 from diaphragm to vertebra, at three successive shots. 



The boy fell dead, to every appearance, and the thick blood freely coursed from his 

 wounds. 



The performer then clasped the body in his arms and bore it around the ring for 

 the inspection of all, three times in succession. Upon this he breathed into his mouth 

 and nostrils, and, after suffusing his face with water and covering his wounds with a 

 mud plaster, he commenced brief manipulations upon his stomach, which soon ended 

 in a complete recovery, nor left a single trace of injury about him. 



Both of these feats, if performed as said, can scarcely admit the possibility of trick 

 or slight of hand, ami must stand as the most astonishing instances of jugglery on 

 lecord. 



