M. R. HARRINGTON — SACRED BUNDLES OF THE SAC AND FOX INDIANS. 171

wounded. Some of the roots are said to wake the magic power of the animal amulets and make them “alive,” while one kind is carried to protect the warrior from possible boomerang effects of his own enchantments against others. Sometimes a number of these little packets were tied along a buckskin thong to form an amulet for the neck or arm.
When I asked for more definite information about the “hypnotic” effect of these magic herbs on the enemy, I was told that “The enemy seem to lose their minds. Sometimes they cannot see our warriors coming at all; again they may see us, but not in the place where we really are; sometimes they take us for a herd of buffalo or horses. One enemy said after the tribes had made friends again that he suddenly began to see different kinds of animals coming toward him in the air: he began to shoot at them and forgot all about the Sac and Fox warriors.”
Some time in the future I hope to find a Sac and Fox Indian who will consent to open and explain each package of roots and herbs and give me the Indian names of each kind and a description of how they grow, so that I can have them identified; but so far I have not been able to accom- plish much along this line.
Detailed Description.
We had worked among the Sac and Fox for quite a long time before the slightest hope of obtaining a war bundle appeared. We had seen a number of them hanging in the bark lodges, but none of the owners would even consider selling. In fact, they refused with such indignation that we despaired of ever getting as much as one.
But at last a man was located who had too many bundles to care for, and finding them a burden, was willing to sell a few if he could be sure they would be well treated. This was Mecabe'kwa, known as U. S. Grant, the same whose version of the tradition accounting for the origin of war bundles has
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172 UNIVERSITY MUSEUM — ANTHROPOLOGICAL PUBLICATIONS VOL. IV.
already been given. The first purchase consisted of two bundles, as follows:
Bundle 2/5317.
Size closed, 18f" x 4§". Buckskin cover badly broken and decayed; ties, braided blanket ravelings; calico sack of native tobacco attached to one of the ties; war whistle thrust beneath them.
Contents. — Headband made of the split skin of a female ivory-bill woodpecker (PI. XXX, B). To each shoulder is fast- ened the red crest of a male, of the same species. At the throat are tied a bunch of buffalo hair and some deer hair dyed red, while here and there on the neck and wings are fastened nine little packets of medicine wrapped in buckskin. The strings for tying the amulet in place are of buckskin.
Amulet for attachment to the scalp lock, made of a piece of a buffalo tail, to the distal end of which are attached a piece of the downy skin of a young swan, some eagle down feathers dyed red, a little brass bell and four little buckskin packets of medicine.
Three buffalo tails; one in a fawn skin case painted red on the flesh side, but without attachments, and two with the proximal end bent forward upon itself to make a loop for the belt. One had a little packet of medicine, a hawk bill and a tuft of red cloth attached; the other, two medicine packets and a strip of faded yellow ribbon.
Neck amulet made of a strip of skin from a buffalo’s neck, the hair now nearly gone.
Tuft of buffalo mane hair, perhaps part of a scalp lock amulet.
Two strips of downy young swan skin, one arranged as a scalp lock amulet with a bit of buffalo hair and a small white feather, the other plain. In length they measured respectively 81" and 10".
Fragments of fawn skin covers for amulets.
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