74 GAMES OF THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS  [eTH. ann. 24 
which the other players as well as the spectators join. At a certain propitious 
moment the one to play first strikes the bowl a smart tap, which causes the dice 
to fly upward from the bottom of the bowl, and as they fall and settle the result 
is watched with very keen interest. The value indicated by the position of the 
dice represents the number of counters which the player is permitted to take 
from the ground. The value of the throws is as follows: First throw. 4 red dice 
and 4 white counts a draw; second throw, 5 red dice and 8 white, 1; third 
throw, 6 red dice and 2 white, 4; fourth throw, 7 red dice and 1 white, 20; 
fifth throw, 8 red dice and no white, 40. j 
The players strike the bowl alternately until one person wins all the 
counters—both those on the ground and those which the opponent may have won. 
Micmac. Nova Scotia. (Cat. no. 18850, Free Museum of Science 
and Art, University of Pennsylvania.) 
Set of six buttons of vegetable ivory (figure 61) about seven-eighths 
of an inch in diameter, rounded and unmarked on one side and 
flat with a dotted cross on the other, being modern substitutes 
for similar objects of caribou bone. Bowl] of wood (figure 62), 
nearly flat, 113 inches in diameter. Fifty-one round counting 
sticks (figure 63), 7} inches in length, and 4 counting sticks 
(figure 64), 74. inches in length. 
They were collected by the donor, Mr Stansbury Hagar. The fol- 
Jowing account of the game is given by the collector : ¢ 
A game much in use within the wigwams of the Miemaec in former times is 
that called by some writers altestakun 
or woltéstakin. By good native author- 
ity it is said that the proper name for it is 
woltéstOmkwon. It isa kind of dice game 
of unknown antiquity, undoubtedly of 
pre-Columbian origin. It is played upon 
a circular wooden dish—properly rock 
maple—almost exactly a foot in diam- 
eter, hollowed to a depth of about three- 
fourths of an inch at its center. This 
Fic. 61. Bone dice; diameter, seven-eighths dish plays an important role in the older 
ap Sate lame ateaties aoe tte legends of the Micmacs. Filled with 
Seren poe eee ane”T water and left overnight, its appear- 
ance next morning serves to reveal 
hidden knowledge of past, present, and future. It is also said to have been 
used as a vessel upon an arkite trip. The dice of caribou bone are six in num- 
ber, having flat faces and rounded sides. One face is plain; the other bears a 
dotted cross. When all the marked or all the unmarked faces are turned up 
there is a count of 5 points; if five marked faces and one unmarked face or 
five unmarked faces and one marked face are turned up, 1 point results; if a 
die falls off the dish there is no count. There are fifty-five counting sticks— 
fifty-one plain rounded ones about 74 inches long, a king pin > shaped like the 
“Micmac Customs and Traditions. American Anthropologist, v. 8, p. 31, 1895. 
>Mr. Hagar informs me that the king pin is called kesegoo, the old man, and that the 
notched sticks are his three wives and the plain sticks his children. The Micmac 
explains these names by saying that when a stranger calls, the children come out of 
the wigwam first, then the women, and then the head of the family; and this is the 
way it happens when one plays at woltéstOmkwon. “The technical name for the king 
