who might travel westward to the foothills of the Rockies, north to the Barren Lands, south to the countries of the Iowa and Oto, east to the land of the Iroquois, and find brethren who had traveled the same road, or at least one fundamentally similar. He had shown his fortitude and fidelity, those two great, cardinal virtues of the Medicine Lodge, and he had come through the sacred mysteries alive and in possession of the secret rites that had been handed down since the days when the Menomini first came out of the ground.
Alanson Skinner
Thunder-cloud, a Winnebago Shaman, Relates and Prays
I came from above and I am holy. This is my second life on earth. Long ago I lived on earth, long ago when this earth was full of wars. I used to be a warrior then and I was a brave man.
Long ago in battle I was killed. As I went along I thought I had stumbled and fallen on the ground. Then I got up again and went on my way. To my home I went. When I got home my wife and my children were there, but they would not look at me, they would not notice me. So I spoke to my wife, but she did not show in any way that she was aware of my presence. She did not show any signs that she was aware of anyone speaking to her. There I stood. I could not converse with them and they never looked at me. “What can be the matter?” I thought. At last it occurred to me that I was probably dead, so I immediately started out for the battlefield and there, surely enough, I saw my body lying. Then, for the first time, I knew that I was dead.
After that I tried for a long time to return to my original home; for four years I tried, but I failed, so I stayed on earth.
At one time I was a fish and I lived with them. Their life is much more wretched than ours, for they are often in lack of food. Yet they are happy beings for they have dances very often.
At another time I lived as a little bird. Now that is a wonderful existence when the weather is good, but when it is cold, life is a hardship. Often birds are in lack of food and suffer from cold. It was my custom to go to the camp of certain people who lived near and to stay there in the daytime. These people were hunting at the time and from their meat-racks I used to steal a little food.
A little boy was staying with them and we were always terribly afraid of him, for he had an object that was fear-inspiring. With this he would shoot and make so great a noise that we would fly away. At night we used to go home, to a hollow tree. Whenever I got there first, the others, coming after me in great numbers, would almost squeeze me to death and yet, on those occasions when I waited till all the others had entered, I almost froze to death.
On another occasion I became a buffalo and lived as a buffalo lives. Lack of food and cold weather did not bother us much, but we had to be on the alert all the time against hunters.
Then from that place I went home, to my spirit-home up above, the place I had originally come from. Now in the sky, up above, there is a doctors’ home; that is the place I have come from.
After a while I wanted to leave my home and go to the earth again. The person in charge of that home is my grandfather. He at first objected to my going, but I asked him again and again. The fourth time I asked him, he consented. He said to me: “Well, grandson, if you really wish to go to the earth, you may go. Before you go, you had better fast, for if any of the spirits have compassion upon you, then you will be able to live in peace on earth.”
I fasted for four years, and the spirits above, even as far as the fourth heaven, all approved of my going. They blessed me. Ten days I fasted and after that I fasted twenty days; and again I fasted thirty days. All the spirits blessed me, even those under the earth.
Then when I was ready to go to the earth, all the spirits gathered around me and they had a council. In the center of the world, there, they had a council. There they were to advise me. All the spirits were present. They told me that I would not fail in anything I attempted. There they tested my powers. The first thing they did was to place a spirit grizzly bear at the end of the dancing lodge. This bear, it was said, could not be hurt in any manner.
The lodge was full of spirits. Then they started to sing the songs that I was to use when on earth. After that, I walked around the fireplace, and taking a live coal, I held it in the palm of my hand and danced around the fireplace again. Then I shouted “wahi!” and struck the hand containing the live coal with the other hand. The bear, the invulnerable bear, shot forward and fell to the ground, flat on his stomach. A black substance oozed from his mouth.
Then the spirits said to me, “You have killed him. Powerful as he was, you have killed him. Clearly never will anything evil succeed in crossing your path.” That I would fail in nothing they told me. Then they took the one that I had killed and taking a red knife they cut him into pieces and piled him in the center of the lodge. There they covered him with a dark covering and said. “Now! Again you must try your strength.” So I asked for the objects that I was to use on earth, a flute and a gourd. Those were the objects that I used.
Then I made myself holy. Those that had blessed me were present. Then I walked around the one who had been cut into pieces and I breathed upon him. Then for the second time I walked around the object and I breathed upon him, and the rest within the lodge, breathed with me. Four times I breathed upon him, and then he arose and walked away, a human being.
“Hoho, it is good,” they said, “he has restored him to life. Surely, most surely, he is holy.” Thus they spoke to me. “Well, grandson, you will ever be thus. Whatever exists you will be able to destroy and then to restore to life again. Most surely have you been blessed.” Thus they spoke to me.
Then they placed a black stone in the doctors’ lodge above, there where I was blessed and again they put me to a test of strength. Four times I breathed upon that stone and finally I made a hole right through the stone by the force of my breathing. So now, whoever has a pain, if he permits me to blow upon him, then I can blow his pain away for him. It makes no difference what kind of pain it is, for my breath has been made holy. They, the spirits, made my breath holy and strong.
Then the spirits presiding over the earth and those living under the earth, they also gave me a trial. A rotten log was placed before me. I breathed upon it, I spat water upon it, and the log rose up, a living man. He walked away. This power of spitting upon people, of squirting water upon people, I received from an eel; from an eel that was the chief of all the eels, an eel that lives in the center of the ocean, in the very deepest part of the ocean. He is perfectly white. He it is, who blessed me. Therefore it is that I can use water and that the water I possess is inexhaustible. This is what he told me.
Then I came to the people of the earth. Before I came, they all had a council meeting about me. When I came, I entered a lodge and there I was born again. I thought that I had entered a lodge, but it was really my mother’s womb that I had entered. Not even then, at my birth, did I lose consciousness. As I grew up I fasted again, and then again all those who had blessed me before sent their blessings to me once more. It is for that reason that I am the dictator over all these spirits. Whatever I say will be so.
Now the tobacco you offered me is really not for myself, but for the spirits, because I have really been sent here by the spirits to get tobacco for them. Here, there is a sick person and you have offered me tobacco. That is what I am on earth for: to accept this offering. I tell you that this patient will live.
You will live, patient, so help yourself as much as you can and make yourself strong. Now as I offer tobacco to the spirits, you must listen, and if you feel that I am telling
