Hoffman] OJIBWA MEDICINE SOCIETY 67 



at the approach of day, and who also professes ability to prepare lucky 

 charms for the hunter and potent love powders for tlie disappointed 

 lover; and (4) the mashkikikewinini, or herbalist, who professes knowl- 

 edge of the properties of plants, and administers, as the name implies, 

 "medicine broths" or decoctions and infusions. All of these, save the 

 mide', practice their respective professions singly and alone, and there- 

 fore do not affiliate with others of like pretensions so as to constitute a 

 regularly organized society, at the meetings of which the members hold 

 ceremonial services for the instruction and initiation of candidates for 

 membership. 



The mide', on the contrary, are organized into a society termed the 

 Mide'wiwin, which consists of an indefinite number of persons of both 

 sexes, and is graded into four separate and distinct degrees. Admis- 

 sion to membership in the degrees of this society is a matter of great 

 importance, and consequently of great difficulty. The male candidates 

 are selected usually from among those who in their youth were desig- 

 nated for this distinction, which occurred at the period of "giving a 

 name" by a selected mide' priest, who thus assumed the office of god- 

 father. From that date until the age of puberty of the boy, his parents 

 gather presents with which to defray the expenses of preliminary 

 instruction by hired mide' priests, and the feasts to be given to all 

 those who might attend the ceremonies of initiation, as well as to 

 defray the personal services of the various medicine men directly assist- 

 ing in the initiation. Frequently the collecting of skins and peltries 

 and other goods that have to be purchased involves a candidate hope- 

 lessly in debt; but so great is the desire on the part of some Indians 

 to become acknowledged medicine men that they will assume obligations 

 that may require years of labor or hunting to liquidate; or, should they 

 fail, then their relatives are expected to assume the responsibility thus 

 incurred. 



In this society, as maintained by the Ojibwa, are preserved the tradi 

 tions relating to cosmogony and genesis of mankind, to the appearance 

 on the earth of an anthropomorphic deity whose primary services con- 

 sisted of interceding between Ki'tshi Ma'nido and the Indians, that 

 the latter might be taught the means wherewith they might provide 

 themselves with the good things of the earth and with the power of 

 warding off disease and death, and who gave to the Indian also the 

 various plants and instructed them how to prepare the objects neces- 

 sary to be used for special purposes in specified ways. The being who 

 thus originally instructed the Indians is called Ml'nabo'zho, and the 

 method pursued by him is dramatically rehearsed at the initiation of a 

 candidate into the society of the Mide'. By the Ojibwa this entire 

 proceeding is firmly believed to be of a sacred or religious character. 



There is another body among the Ojibwa termed the Ghost society, 

 to which reference is necessary. When a child who has been set apart 

 to be dedicated to the society of the Mide' dies before reaching the 



