KADiN] RELIGION 295 



This I know now. The whole thing is untrue. Therefore I stopped 

 using these supernatural powers some time ago.* 



The old people made me fast so that I might obtain blessings, 

 and that I might lead a life similar to that led by my ancestors. My 

 father asked me to fast so that I might be of some help to my fellow- 

 men as I grew up. It is through fasting that individuals obtain the 

 power of curing disease and restoring a person to health again. 



Spirits from above also came to me. They took me to the spirit- 

 shaman village. As the shamans gathered around me they said that 

 the blessing would be very difficult to give me. Tlien the shaman 

 sitting far in front made himself holy and breathed upon me (i. e., 

 performed the actions of a shaman when treating a patient) . When 

 he was finished, then he began to sing and all those in the lodge 

 began to breathe, helping him. Then the second shaman made 

 himself holy and began to breathe and sing. In this way four of 

 them made themselves hoW. They were showing me what to do 

 when I came back to earth. If a person on earth is sick (this is 

 what they meant), and is in an almost hopeless condition where no 

 one else could cm-e him, then they would call for me and offer me 

 tobacco with which I was to sacrifice to the spirits who had taught 

 me. 



Indeed I am holy. If a man is sick I can restore him to health. 

 That is what I used to think. I reaUy (had it been true) should 

 have felt it, for I labored earnestly and honestly to be a holy person. 

 Yet in spite of all my exertions I was very unfortunate. I had 

 married twice and both of my wives and all my children died. In- 

 deed, how could I ever consider myself a holy man (i. e., if I couldn't 

 even cure my own wife and children of what value were my "super- 

 natural powers") ? For a long time I knew that, at least I should 

 have known it.^ (I was not holy.) Tlien I ate the peyote and 

 now I really see myself as I am. Indeed I am not holy. My body 

 is without a soul. I thought myself holy. So I have stopped the 

 practice of the shaman. 



8 The informant had become a convert to the Peyote belief only a short time before he wrote down this 

 accomit of his fasting, and it is interesting to see that, although he no longer beUeves in the efficacy of the 

 supernatiu-al powers, he still believes that they exist. Two years after this, however, the same informant 

 explained them, as all the older members of the Peyote cult explain them, namely, as delusions, either 

 caused by the abnormal condition of the youth while fasting or as snares of the de\nl. 



9 In the words "I should have known it" are summed up the essential change of attitude between 

 the Peyote Winnebago and the older Winnebagoes. The latter, too, had observed the apparent failure 

 of the supernatural powers on many occasions, but instead of attributing them to any diminution of efficacy 

 in the "powers," attributed them, on the contrary, to a lack of something in the individual trying to use 

 the "power, "in so far as they thought about it at all. But the essential difference between the two cults, 

 the older one and the Peyote, lies not so much in the logical conclusions their adherents have drawn from 

 the failure of the "supernatural powers" to behave as they were expected to, as in the fact that the Peyote 

 people make the failure of the "power" the subject of discussion and the old Winnebagoes accept the whole 

 concept of "supernatural power" as such, and do not permit it to rise into their consciousness. 



