THE MEDICINE-MAN WHO KILLED HIS SON. 309 
downy feathers. She also took therefrom a buffalo hair robe, which 
was also covered with soft downy feathers. She unbraided her hair. 
She took from the bundle a ball of mud. This she spread all over herself. 
Then she spread some of it allover the boy. She took a buffalo robe from 
the bundle and placed it on the boy’s shoulders. She then took her 
own robe and put it upon her shoulders. Then she tied up the bundle 
and put it away. She took the boy by the hand and they went to the 
medicine-lodge. As they entered the lodge, and the woman’s husband 
saw them, he bowed his head instead of looking up, and never said a 
word. The woman and the boy seated themselves on the north side 
near the entrance. Other medicine-men gave them this place. In the 
afternoon, when the grand procession of medicine-men was about ready, 
she daubed the boy with mud and downy feathers. She went to her 
tipi, opened her bundle, and took from it two gourds with round necks. 
_ These she took into the lodge. When everybody had marched out, the 
woman began to sing about the diving ducks. The boy was imitating the 
ducks. They marched outside in a circle four times and then entered 
the lodge. The medicine-men were surprised at the way in which the 
woman was carrying on, for she was the wife of the leading medicine- 
man, and these songs which she was singing were not the songs of any 
of the men who were within the lodge. After the performance was over 
the woman was told that if she wanted to do sleight-of-hand perform- 
ances, she could do so that night. She told them that she was not going 
to do any sleight-of-hand performances at night. She said she wanted 
. to do it in the daytime and that she wanted to doit the next day at noon. 
That night the medicine-men began to do their sleight-of-hand per- 
formance and kept it up until daylight. The woman asked the medi- 
cine-men all to join in and help her. Her husband would not have 
anything to do with her. He tried to discourage the others from doing 
anything, for he did not know that the woman understood any of these 
performances. When all the other medicine-men agreed to help the 
woman she told them that she wanted them to march down to the creek. 
She and the boy were in the lead, and the medicine-men followed, singing 
for them. They arrived at the creek. The woman jumped in with the 
gourds in her hand and held the gourds under the water. Then she 
brought them up from the water and the gourds had turned into soft 
downy feathers. She turned them loose and the soft downy feathers 
drifted down the stream. She waved her hands at the downy feathers 
and they turned back and came upstream to where she was. Then she 
took hold of them, pulled them down under the water, and when she 
took them out they were gourds again. The people were shouting, for 
