EADiN] SHAMANISTIC AXD MEDICINAL PRACTICES 275 



"To you, grandmother, the Earth, I too offer tobacco. You 

 blessed me and promised to help me whenever I needed you. You 

 said that I could use all the best herbs that grow upon you, and that 

 I would always be able to effect cures with them. Those herbs I ask 

 of you now, and I ask you to help me ciu-e this sick person. Make 

 my medicine powerful, gi-andmother. 



"To you. Chief of the Spirits, I offer tobacco. You who blessed 

 me and said that you would help me. I oft'er you tobacco and ask 

 you to let this sick person live, and if his spirit is about to depart, I 

 ask you to prevent it. 



"I offer tobacco to all of you who have blessed me." 



Then the shaman blew upon his flute, breathed upon the sick man 

 and sang fom- times. Then he walked around the lodge and spat 

 water upon the patient. After this he sang four times and stopped. 

 The spirits would now let him know whether the patient was to live 

 or die. 



In this manner a shaman treats Ms patients for foiu* days, and after 

 that takes his offerings and goes away. If the sick person happens 

 to recover, the shaman would tell him that he would never be sick 

 again. 



TnuNDERCLotT) s Fastixg Experiknce 



Then he (Thundercloud) told of his fasting experience. "At 

 the very beginning, those above taught me (the following). A 

 doctor's village existed there; and all the various spirits that lived 

 up in the clouds came after me, and instructed me in what I was 

 to do. In the beginning they taught me, and did the following for 

 me. 'Human, let us try it,' they said to me. There, in the middle 

 of the lodge, lay a dead, rottening log, almost completely covered 

 with weeds. There they tried to make me treat (the sick person). 

 Then once he breathed, and all those that were in the lodge also 

 breathed; then the second time he breathed, and aU breathed with 

 him; then for the third time he breathed; and then for the fourth time 

 he breathed. As a young man he, the dead log, arose and walked 

 away. After the fourth breathing, he arose and walked away. 

 'Human, very holy he is,' they said to me. 



"There, from the middle of the ocean, they (the spirits) came 

 after me, for there, in the middle of the ocean, is a shamans ' village. 

 There they blessed me — as many (spirits) as there are in the middle 

 of the ocean — they all blessed me. There they made me try my 

 power. As many waves as there are, all of them as large as the 

 ocean, they asked me to blow upon; and as I blew upon them, every- 

 thing became (as quiet) as (water) in a small saucer. So it became. 

 Then I blew for the third time, and again it was that way. The 

 fourth time they made the ocean choppy, and had (the waves) piled 



