SwANTON] INDIANS OF THE SOUTHEASTERN UNITED STATES 767 



formula over his next arrow, believing that it was then sure to in- 

 flict a mortal wound. If the grease of partridges or other small 

 game which had been caught with a snare or lasso was spilled, it was 

 thought that the snare would catch nothing more. Formulae were 

 uttered to enable hunters to find turtles. Bones of animals caught 

 in a snare or trap were not thrown away but hung up or placed on the 

 roof of the house. If this ceremony were omitted, it was thought 

 that the animals would not enter the snare or trap again. When 

 they went to hunt deer and took the antlers of another deer with 

 which to stalk the animals, they repeated formulae over them. If 

 a man went to a fishweir immediately after having had intercourse 

 with his wife, it was thought that no more fish would enter it. 



A gambler rubbed his hands with certain herbs in order that he 

 might be fortunate in play. A runner is also said to have taken 

 an herb to make him win, and this seems to have been in the form 

 of a drink. (Pareja, 1613, pp. 123-133; Gatschet, 1877-1880, vol. 16, 

 pp. 635-638; vol. 17, pp. 500-501; vol. 18, pp. 489-491; Swanton, 1922, 

 pp. 383-385.) 



We have far too little satisfactory knowledge regarding the re- 

 ligion of the early Cherokee. Timberlake is probably right in saying 

 that they believed in one superior being, very likely one of the same 

 character as the celestial deity of the Creeks and Choctaw and closely 

 associated with the sun (Timberlake, Williams ed., 1927, p. 87.) Ac- 

 cording to Mooney's informants, however, the sun was feminine, as ap- 

 pears to have been the belief of the Yuchi and Shawnee. The moon, 

 however, was a male, sun's brother (Mooney, 1900, p. 252 et seq.). 

 The cosmogonic myth recorded by Mooney represents the animals as 

 living together in the sky world and the earth as drawn from beneath a 

 primeval ocean by the little Water-beetle, after the pattern of the 

 well-known earth-diver story. The sky vault is of solid rock and 

 the earth an island suspended in a sea of water by cords at the 4 

 cardinal points which will sometime break and submerge all the 

 present land. The Appalachian mountains were made by the wings 

 of the Buzzard flying over when the land was still soft; the sun 

 was raised to its present convenient height in several successive 

 moves by the conjurers. There is another world beneath this with 

 a different climate, as is proved by the temperature of springs. There 

 were a great many minor spirits, and the connection of some of these 

 with disease has kept knowledge of them alive down to the present time. 

 Olbrechts lists upward of 70, the greater part animal beings, the rest 

 various sorts of human or manlike spirits, including giants, pygmies, 

 and Two Men together, the Enemy, Fire, Flint, Little Flint, Little 

 Fog, Little Frost, Ghost, Important Thing (some sort of monster). 

 Old One, Pain, Speaker, Spirits, Sun, Big Whirlwind, Little Whirl- 



