THE WOMAN AND THE BUFFALO DANCE. 371 
doctor him myself.” Then the Buffalo said: ‘‘Let him nurse. Now 
place him upon the ground.”” Then the Buffalo bull began to roll in the 
dust on the ground. When he stood up he said: ‘‘Woman, take up 
the robe which I have made while I wallowed. Place the baby in the 
robe, and put some of the dust all over the child.”” When the woman 
had done this the child stopped crying, and then the bull began to bawl, 
and after a while three more bulls came. The bull spoke and said, ‘‘Let 
us doctor the baby,’’ and the other bulls said: ‘‘Everything has been 
_ done for the child which could be done except to blow breath upon him. 
If you want us to blow our breath upon the child we will do so.” Each 
bull went up to the child and blew his breath upon him. Then one of 
the bulls took a large piece of wool from his back and placed it upon the 
child. He told the woman not to be afraid; that her son would get 
well. While they were all standing around the woman and the child, a 
Buffalo cow came. She lay down and the Buffalo bull told the woman 
to let the boy lie beside the cow. The mother placed her child by the 
cow. After a long time the cow spoke and said: ‘‘The child is now 
well. He has had sleep.’’ The boy crawled around the bulls, and the 
bulls awoke and they doctored him. By daylight the boy was strong 
and well. Then the Buffalo gave the root to the woman, and the Buffalo 
bull said: ‘‘When the boy is sick, take this root and pound it and give 
it tc him. The disease and the medicine will fight, and when pains come 
out upon the sick one, take him down to the creek and wash him. Be 
not afraid of wild beasts, for the root will scare them away.”’ 
The woman took her boy and went off, and on the way she saw a 
snake. The woman, having the root, passed by the snake, and when 
she passed she looked back and saw that the snake had died. Every 
time that the child became sick the woman washed him in the river and 
he became well. After a while a man came to the village where the 
woman and her boy lived alone, and said: ‘‘Let me live with you. Let 
me be your husband.” The woman said, ‘‘I will let you live with us.”’ 
Soon the man learned about the wonderful medicine that his wife had, 
and saw her power to cure the sick, and he was glad that he had come there 
and married her. He asked her to tell him how she had received the 
power, and she told him about her sick child and how the Buffalo had 
pitied her when she was alone and in trouble, and had saved the life of 
her boy, and had given her medicine that would always keep disease and 
danger away from him. When the man heard the story he wanted to go 
and see the Buffalo and thank them for what they had done. He and 
the woman and boy started west and soon came to the Buffalo. The 
Buffalo bull who had first helped her, came and spoke to them again. He 
