516 MEDICINE-MEN OF THE APACHE. 
feast of Holi or Hulica, in which this statement occurs: ‘Troops of men 
and women, wreathed with flowers and drunk with bang, crowd the 
streets, carrying sacks full of bright-red vegetable powder. With this 
they assail the passers-by, covering them with clouds of dust, which 
soon dyes their clothes a startling color.” 
“Red powder (gulal) is a sign of a bad design of an adulterous char- 
acter. During the Holi holidays, the Maharaj throws gulal on the 
breasts of female and male devotees.” ! 
“In India, the devotees throw red powder on one another at the fes- 
tival of the Huli, or vernal equinox. This red powder, the Hindoos 
say, is the imitation of the pollen of plants, the principle of fructifica- 
tion, the flower of the plant.”? 
The women of the East Indies (Brahmins), on the 18th of January, 
celebrate a feast in honor of the goddess Parvati: ‘Leur but est d’ob- 
tenir nne longue vie pour leurs maris, & qu’elles ne deviennent jamais 
veuves. Elles font une Image de Parvati avee de la farine de riz & du 
grain rouge quwelles y mélent; elles Vornent @habits & de fleurs & apres 
Vavoir ainsi servie pendant neuf jours, elles la portent le dixiéme dans 
un Palenquin hors de la Ville. Une foule de femmes mariées la suivent, 
on la jette ensuite dans un des étangs sacrez, oti on la laisse, & chacune 
sen retourne chez elle.”* 
Speaking of the methods in use among the Lamas for curing disease, 
Rey. James Gilmour says: “Throwing about small pinches of millet seed 
is a usual part of such a service.”4 
Dr. W. W. Rockhill described to me a Tibetan festival, which in- 
cludes a procession of the God of Mercy, in which procession there are 
masked priests, holding blacksnake whips in their hands, and carrying 
bags of flour which they throw upon the people. 
The use of these sacred powders during so many different religious 
festivals and ceremonies would seem to resemble closely that made by 
the Apache of hoddentin and the employment of kunque by the Zuni 
and others; and from Asia it would seem that practices very similar 
in character found their way into Europe. Of the Spanish witches it 
is related: 
When they entered people’s houses they threw a powder on the faces of the inmates, 
who were thrown thereby into so deep a slumber that nothing could wake them, until 
the witches were gone. . . . . Sometimes they threw these powders on the 
fruits of the field and produced hail which destroyed them. On these occasions the 
demon accompanied them in the form of a husbandman, and when they threw the 
powders they said: 
**Polvos, polvos, 
Pierda se tado, 
Queden los nuestros, 
Y abrasense otros.’’® 
' History of the Sect of the Mahdrajahs, quoted by Inman, Ancient Faiths, ete., vol. 1, p. 393. 
2 Higgins, Anacalypsis, vol. 1, p. 261. 
3 Picart, Cérémonies et Coftitumes, etc., vol. 6, part 2, p. 119. 
4 Among the Mongols, London, 1883, p. 179. 
5 Wright, Sorcery and Magic, London, 1851, vol. 1, p. 346. 
