78 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 195 



power was dissipated by the rays of the morning sun. These may be 

 the same as the creatures described by J. O. Dorsey (1885 a, p. 106) 

 as follows: "There is a race of beings, having large heads and long 

 hair, dwelling in solitary places, to which they entice unwary victims." 



Fletcher and La Flesche (1911, p. 194) mention that "the Nida was 

 a mythical creature, in one conception a sort of elf that crept in and 

 out of the earth." These authors state that the term Nida was also 

 applied to the bones of large extinct animals, and that it is still applied 

 to the elephant (ibid.). PLC, however, in his "History" (p. 18) 

 and in an interview, gives (and gave) the term Pdsnuta (pa-snu-tah) 

 for both the bones of extinct elephants and for the hairy mammoth 

 allegedly seen by the Ponca near Butte, Nebr. He mentioned that 

 this term was now used for circus elephants. Tales of "hairy ele- 

 phants" are common in many Midwestern tribes, and I have per- 

 sonally secured them from Omaha, Ponca, Dakota, and Winnebago 

 informants. 



Ddxte-wdu or Deer-woman was mentioned by PLC, OK, WBB, 

 and several younger informants. This personage is occasionally 

 seen by the Ponca even at the present time. OK described her as 

 follows: 



Say a young man is traveling alone at night. He sees a pretty girl and she 

 makes him fall in love with her [by enchantment]. This girl is really the Deer- 

 woman, and if he gives in, he will become a hermaphrodite [OK pronounced this 

 "morphadite," and was probably using it, in the manner of local Whites, for 

 homosexual]. Young men are warned that if the}' see this girl, they musn't 

 give in to her, or something will happen to them. 



J. O. Dorsey (1885 a, p. 107) in his discussion of Ponca mythologic 

 beings, mentions the Deer-woman as well. He says, however, that 

 men who had intercourse with her died rather than that they became 

 homosexuals. At the 1961 Ponca powwow it was reported that Deer- 

 woman appeared among the dancers at a "49" dance one night. 

 A child noticed the deer feet beneath her skirts and screamed in 

 fright, and a near-panic ensued. Though the young informant who 

 reported this to me laughed at the whole affair, there seemed to be 

 an undercurrent of nervousness about it. 



Concerning the "Trickster" figure, J. O. Dorsey (1890, p. 11) 

 writes: "Makdigei or Makdige, the name of the mythical hero of the 

 Ponkas and Omahas, answering to the Iowa and Oto Mistsine." 

 This is undoubtedly the same as Ist]nike, mentioned by Skinner 

 (1915 c, p. 779) and by my own informants (PLC, JLR, OK, AMC, 

 WBB) , Now called "Monkey" in English by both Ponca and Omaha, 

 this creature is the central figure in a cycle of humorous tales. Alter- 

 nating between good deeds and malevolent acts, he seems to repre- 

 sent the good and bad sides of man's character. Several of the Omaha 

 and Ponca tales concerning Isijnike have a wide distribution in North 



