Part 22

[37] But not to all persons! The typical over-enthusiasm with which new materia medica are received is itself an interesting ethnographic commentary. Prentiss and Morgan (_Therapeutic Uses_, 4-5) prescribed it variously for “cramps, griping and colic ... [and] nervous headache” as well as “tickling in the throat.” They also report (_The Alkaloids of Anhalonium_, 123-37) uses by other doctors. Two brothers, doctors, prescribed peyote for their brother who was suffering from “softening of the brain.” He died a few months later, uncured. Nevertheless, they prescribed peyote for their sister, who was “very low and out of her head;” she later recovered. Richardson (D. A.), (_A Report_, 194-95) reports still more spectacular sequelae. He administered peyote to a man with “frontal cephalalgia.” “Especially would I remark,” he says, “on the clearing of the skin of pimples over the chest and back, and a marked softening of the hair, which before the exhibition of the anhalonium was dry, with a tendency to break easily.” It nevertheless also decreased the abnormal oiliness of the skin. Further, he thought it was a solvent for uric acid, likely to be of value for stones in the bladder. Lastly, “In my opinion, anhalonium is a superior cardiac tonic, and, like nitroglycerine, its effects are prolonged after the administration of the drug is withdrawn.”

The efficacy of peyote in native doctoring seems as little established also. Reasons of ethnographic nature have already been cited for doubting the anti-alcoholic virtue of peyote. Indeed, the leader of one meeting I attended I visited in jail later in the week; he had been arrested for drunken street-fighting. I could uncharitably cite half-a-dozen similar cases, but it seems amply enough demonstrated that there is no relation of exclusiveness between peyotism and alcoholism.

[38] Klüver, _Mescal, The “Divine” Plant_, 97, 108. Prentiss and Morgan, _Anhalonium Lewinii_, 581; Wertham and Bleuler, _Inconstancy in the Formal Structure_, 52, 60.

[39] Hutchings, in Heffter, _Ueber Pellote_, 409; Pilcz, _Ueber Pellotin_, 1121-22; Warburg, in Bennett and Zingg, _The Tarahumara_, 136; Ellis, _Mescal: A Study_, 71; Martindale and Westcott, _The Extra Pharmacopoeia_, 1:836; Briau, in Koang-Hobschette, _Les Cactacées_. Karwoski (_Psychophysics_, 212) suggests that peyote might heighten rapport in psychoanalysis; cf. Deschamps.

[40] Bensheim, _Typenunterschiede_, 121; Wertham and Bleuler, _Inconstancy in the Formal Structure_, 70; Zucker, _Versuche_, 107; Zador, _Meskalinwirkung bei Störung_, 30; _Meskalinwirkung_; Klüver, _Mescal, The “Divine” Plant_, 36-39, 41; Ladd-Franklin, _Colour and Colour-Theories_, _passim_.

[41] Briau, in Koang-Hobschette, _Les Cactacées_, 73-74; Rouhier, _Le Peyotl_, 337; Ellis, _Mescal: A New Artificial Paradise_, 141.

[42] An editorial _Paradise or Inferno?_ (Editorial, 390) sharply rebuked Ellis for the attractiveness which he had ascribed to mescal intoxication, basing the criticism on grounds of medical ethics.

[43] Letter to Schultes, Feb. 21, 1936. My own experience leads me fully to endorse Hrdlička’s careful statement. Elsewhere in the text are cited numerous cases of natives who, in good faith I believe, gave up the use of peyote entirely upon the rising of special or acute anxieties. My informants, on the other hand, quite as frankly admitted that there were some individuals who showed signs of addiction, in the sense that they consumed the plant often and abundantly, but these are not clear uncomplicated instances of drug-addiction; I trust such native candor implicitly. Besides, peyote is not wholly pleasant (“You must suffer to peyote”).

[44] The issue of the native religious use of the drug is indeed a complex one. But whatever else may be said, it is only fair to the Indians to state that the bitterest and most unmeasured condemnations of the drug have issued from quarters which are scarcely disinterested. Whatever the merits of the case, those persons are concerned with the deculturation of the Indian, and see in the peyote religion a formidable obstacle to their progress in inducting the native into modern life. The doubtless good intentions of such persons have on occasion, however, led them into errors of judgment when, for instance, they would argue that peyotism is merely out-and-out drug addiction in religious guise (e.g. Daiker, Hughes, Newberne and Burke, Seymour, Watermulder, and the writers in the Indian Rights Association and Literary Digest articles;) Lindquist, for example, feels free to commit numerous errors of fact yet still pontificate on the “false gods” of “the cult of Death” which is “nothing but an evil” (_The Red Man_, 72, 73, 75). For, given the Plains religious and ideological background, the peyote cult is entirely plausible as a religion, and the issue is properly one of religious freedom.

The intellectual “authority” in west European culture is, of course, the empirical and pragmatic (or putatively), while that of the Indian in this religion, as elsewhere, can correctly be termed mystical, if we understand by this a super-normal knowledge-technique transcending ordinary epistemological considerations. For there can be no shadow of a doubt concerning the deep and humble sincerity of the worship and belief—and sincerity perhaps, even in the absence of other ingredients, is the chief component of a living religion. And if the chief function of a religion is the liquidation of the anxieties and the solution of the fears and troubles of its adherents, then surely the peyote religion eminently qualifies as such.

The issue then balances somewhat delicately on the point of “authority,” which is really at bottom a matter of comparative ethnography. If, as we believe, the scientific is truly the most mature knowledge-technique man has yet perfected, then facile and off-hand condemnation of peyotism on its basis is even less possible. Aside from the probable ultimate disappearance of the Native American Church, a generous and libertarian philosophy would condemn present attacks on it as often misguided and even oftener uninformed. The chief human difficulty in the world today is the adjustment of one culture to another, of one absolutistic ideology and Weltanschauung to another. But the scientific spirit itself would protest against the dictatorship of any one ideology, of whatever sort; there is too much chance that any self-contained scheme be dangerously wrong, when unchecked by modifying differing beliefs. Science, indeed, has been lifted above the level of folklore precisely because the spectacle of variously conditioned culture-historical outlooks has necessitated self-criticism and an objective comparative survey of beliefs. A fetishistic attitude toward science and its tentative pronouncements, therefore, is itself folkloristic in tone. This however, is not to suggest any distrust in the ability of the scientific method to obtain such sound results as have been so far achieved; but it is intended to point out the real limitations in our information.

Although the best modern scientific knowledge would indicate that the alkaloids in peyote do not perform the manifold therapeutic miracles which natives ascribe to it, one might still well wonder whether harsh sumptuary laws would not work more positive hardship and harm than the drug itself. If not the injustice then certainly the inexpedience of such exercise of civil authority has been amply demonstrated in the Eighteenth Amendment and its sorry consequences. We may not presume therefore to judge what should be the administrative fate of the peyote cult. The emotional and ideological side of the religion is not open to judgement; and on the properly scientific and physiological side of the question the simple fact is that we actually don’t know enough about it.

APPENDIX 7: JOHN WILSON, THE REVEALER OF PEYOTE

The life and career of a remarkable individual were successively involved in the several traditions of the Ghost Dance, mescalism, old Algonquian shamanistic “shooting” ceremonies and finally peyotism. Both for its intrinsic interest and its historical significance we give here in some detail the life of this man. Wilson appears first as a leader in the Ghost Dance movement of the 1890’s. Mooney[1] writes:

The principal leader of the Ghost dance among the Caddo is Nĭshkûntŭ, “Moon Head,” known to the whites as John Wilson. Although considered a Caddo, and speaking only that language,[2] he is very much of a mixture, being half Delaware, one-fourth Caddo, and one-fourth French. One of his grandfathers was a Frenchman. As the Caddo lived originally in Louisiana, there is a considerable mixture of French blood among them, which manifests itself in his case in a fairly heavy beard. He is about 50 years of age [in 1892-93], rather tall and well built, and wears his hair at full length flowing loosely over his shoulders. With a good head and strong, intelligent features, he presents the appearance of a natural leader.... He was one of the first Caddo to go into a trance, the occasion being the great Ghost dance held by the Arapaho and Cheyenne near Darlington agency, at which Sitting Bull presided, in the fall of 1890. On his return to consciousness he had wonderful things to tell of his experiences in the spirit world, composed a new song, and from that time became the high priest of the Caddo dance. Since then his trances have been frequent, both in and out of the Ghost dance, and in addition to his leadership in this connection he assumes the occult powers and authority of a great medicine-man, all the powers claimed by him being freely conceded by his people.

Captain Scott, who visited the Caddo in 1890-91 during the period of their greatest excitement about the Ghost Dance, also met Wilson, of whom he writes:[3]

John Wilson, a Caddo man of much prominence, was especially affected [by the Ghost Dance], performing a series of gyrations that were most remarkable. At all hours of the day and night his cry could be heard all over camp, and when found he would be dancing in the ring, possibly upon one foot, with his eyes closed and the forefinger of his right hand pointed upward, or in some other ridiculous posture. Upon being asked his reasons for assuming these attitudes he replied that he could not help it; that it came over him just like cramps.

Wilson soon became a well-known doctor in this connection. Scott continues:

John Wilson had progressed finely, and was now a full-fledged doctor, a healer of diseases, and a finder of stolen property through supernatural means. One day, while we were in the tent, a Wichita woman entered, led by the spirit. It was explained to us that she did not even know who lived there, but some force she could not account for brought her. Having stated her case to John, he went off into a fit of the jerks, in which his spirit went up and saw “his father” (i.e., God), and who directed him how to cure this woman. When he came to, he explained the cure to her, and sent her away rejoicing. Soon afterwards a Keechei man came in, who was blind of one eye, and who desired to have the vision restored. John again consulted his father, who informed him that nothing could be done for that eye because that man held aloof from the dance.

When Mooney visited the Caddo on Sugar Creek late in 1895,

John Wilson came down from his own camp to explain his part in the Ghost dance. He wore a wide-brim hat, with his hair flowing down to his shoulders, and on his breast, suspended from a cord, about his neck, was a curious amulet consisting of the polished end of a buffalo horn, surrounded by a circlet of downy red feathers, within another circle of badger and owl claws. He explained that this was the source of his prophetic and clairvoyant inspiration. The buffalo horn was “God’s heart,” the red feathers contained his own heart,[4] and the circle of claws represented the world. When he prayed for help, his heart communed with “God’s heart,” and he learned what he wished to know. He had much to say also of the moon. Sometimes in his trances he went to the moon and the moon taught him secrets.... He claimed an intimate acquaintance with the other world and asserted positively that he could tell me “just what heaven is like.” Another man who accompanied him had a yellow sun with green rays painted on his forehead, with an elaborate rayed crescent in green, red, and yellow on his chin, and wore a necklace from which depended a crucifix and a brass clockwheel, the latter, as he stated, representing the sun.

On entering the room where I sat awaiting him, Nĭshkûntŭ approached and performed mystic passes in front of my face with his hands, after the manner of the hypnotist priests in the Ghost dance, blowing upon me the while, as he afterward explained to blow evil things away from me before beginning to talk on religious subjects....[5] Laying one hand on my head, and grasping my own hand with the other, he prayed silently for some time with bowed head, and then lifting his hand from my head, he passed it over my face, down my shoulder and arm to the hand, which he grasped and pressed slightly, and then released the fingers with a graceful upward sweep.[6]

A curious mixture of Caddoan (?) mescalism, Ghost Dance, Delaware “shooting” ceremonies and early peyotism occurred among the Shawnee when Wilson came to them about 1889. The Quapaw were being taught the Ghost Dance, in which a small water drum was used to accompany the circling of the dancers, alternately men and women. Wilson showed them how to swallow mescal beans, and also how to “shoot” them into a person so that he or she would fall down. Then he doctored the person with peyote to bring him back to consciousness. A number of tribes were involved in these doings, according to Mrs. Voegelin, the Shawnee, Delaware, Mohawk, Peoria, Caddo (?), Quapaw, Iowa and Oto. Gradually, however, Wilson turned from the Ghost Dance to peyote. Already in Mooney’s time he was “prominent in the mescal [i.e., peyote] rite, which has recently come to his tribe [the Caddo] from the Kiowa and Comanche.”[7]

Both mescalism and the Ghost Dance, in his person, have traceable influence upon peyotism. This syncretism of cultures in one personality is of considerable interest.

Before Wilson had quite reached the age of forty, he had lived the life of an ordinary Indian of Oklahoma. He was addicted to moderate drinking. He frequented the social dances and gambling gatherings usual among reservation groups of his type. He had participated likewise in the contemporary religious ceremonies performed by the Delaware.... As a vagrant, not however in the condemning sense of the term, he had wandered as most Oklahoma Indians do, from tribe to tribe and inevitably also among the whites experiencing the wide range of personal and social contacts which might be inferred from the statement. Anderson states, in short, that his uncle had lived a sinful life but adds in effect that he had not been guilty of any major offences. He was married to a woman of Delaware and Caddo descent and had an adopted son, Black Wolf, reputed to be also part Delaware part Caddo, and who is still living (1932) and carrying out Wilson’s teachings and ministrations.

About this time he attended a Comanche dance, where a Comanche man presented him with a peyote button and told him to give it a trial—which he did in an unusually thorough manner. Speck continues:

Before long he concluded to adopt the advice given and to retire from worldly companionship, to make the trial and to study its outcome. With this objective in mind he informed his wife, secured provisions for a few weeks stay in camp and together they drove away in a wagon to a little creek where an abundant supply of fresh drinkable water might be had. The place he selected was a secluded “clean and open place” where they would be alone free from intrusion and worldly distractions. Anderson thinks that Wilson remained there about two or three weeks but he does not remember hearing him say how long. When all was ready he began his innovation to the mysteries of Peyote the first night by eating 8 or 9 “buttons.” We learn that during the period of self exposure to the power of Peyote he took the medicine at frequent intervals during the day or night as the impulse prompted him using about the same quantity each time it was taken. As soon as he began, using the words of the informant, “_Peyote took pity on him_” for his humble mien and sincere desire to learn its power. During the whole period he allowed nothing to distract him, giving his entire thought and wish to learn what Peyote might teach him. The outcome was the revelation that motivated him for the rest of his life and made him a teacher of the Peyote doctrines, which he himself exclusively evolved through the revelations given him at this time.

During the time of his sojourn, Wilson did not fast or undergo other abnegations but lived normally.... Each time Wilson took peyote during those days and nights of seclusion he ate about fifteen peyote “buttons.” ... During the two weeks or so of his experimental seclusion, Wilson was continually translated in spirit to the sky realm where he was conducted by Peyote. In this estate he was shown the figures in the sky and the celestial landmarks which represented the events in the life of Christ, and also the relative positions of the Spiritual Forces, the Moon, Sun, Fire, which had long been known to the Delawares, through native traditional teachings, as Grandfather and Elder Brothers. Here, too, he was shown the grave of Christ, now empty, “where Christ had rolled away the rocks at the door of the grave and risen to the sky.” He was shown, always under the guidance of Peyote, the “Road” which led from the grave of Christ to the Moon in the Sky which Christ had taken in his ascent. He was told by Peyote to walk in this path or “Road” for the rest of his life, advancing step by step as his knowledge would increase through the use of peyote, remaining faithful to its teachings ... [and if he did] he would finally, just before his death, bring him into the actual presence of Christ and of Peyote.... The details of construction of the earth works to form the “Moon” which he was to construct in the Peyote tent were all revealed to him with their meanings as Peyote continued his instructions to Wilson during his visits to the sky.... Also came revelations as to how the face should be painted, the hair dressed. Of major importance, however, was the complete course of instruction given to Wilson by Peyote in the singing and syllabization of the numerous Peyote songs which were to form the principal parts of the ceremony of worship. Anderson felt certain that Wilson possessed and used no less than two hundred of these songs.[8]

Wilson’s original moon, however, passed through an evolution, for Anderson’s drawing in Speck is considerably simpler in design than those depicted for the Osage by Murphy, or photographed by the author for the Quapaw. An early version, apparently, is one collected from Henry Hunt (Wichita) near Anadarko. In this the crescent or “moon” is elongated to imitate the parted hair of an Indian, whose eyes are the two mounds of ashes between its horns; a line runs from the father-peyote to the east, terminating in a mound with five circles concentrically zoning it like a globe-map, with another line at right angles to this drawn from tip to tip of the crescent, making a cross, at the intersection of which is drawn a heart resembling a man’s nose. There is also a heart at the “parting” of the hair, on which the fetish peyote rests, and a third one on the top of the zoned mound at the east. This altar is said to symbolize Moonhead’s face, and indeed it much resembles one when seen from the eastern door. Speck says in confirmation of our conjecture that

at first, he said, he made a small “Moon,” increasing its size day by day symbolical of his progress in spiritual knowledge. By the end of his sojourn amid spiritual environment, he came to make the so-called large “Moon,” the Wilson “Moon” which has become typical of his followers.[9]

But Wilson, no doubt, made still later additions, for these early moons entirely lack the elaborate apron symbolism of the Osage and Quapaw altars.

A Delaware informant said Wilson’s moon was first used north of Lookeba, Oklahoma. Black Wolf and George Caddo were early converts to his version—which, indeed may initially have been not so different from the older Caddo moon with a cross and mound east of the crescent (the Wilson division of the tipi into north and south side, for example, is an old one in Caddoan ceremonial organization).[10] The symbolism of the Wilson “Big Moon” receives varied interpretations nowadays. The Osage call the three hearts of the altar the “Heart of Goodness,” the “Heart of the World,” and the “Heart of Jesus;” others interpret the “world” as the “sun.” The ashes are the graves of Christ and Wilson for some, the dividing of the Red Sea for others. Some say the whole fire-pit is the grave of Christ, and the ash mounds his lungs, as the figure under the fire is his heart. The twelve lines of the altar apron are variously the twelve steps to heaven, the twelve heavens of Delaware mythology, the twelve months of the year, the twelve feathers of the eagle’s tail, etc. The symbolism of seven for the “days of the week” is possibly Southwestern in origin (cf. the seven bosses of the drum). Diamond-shaped figures close to the sun-mound represent Christ’s foot-prints, according to Petrullo,[11] while the “WW” or “MM” at the west of the altar are said to mean this for the Quapaw (“Moonhead” or “Wilson” depending on one’s position while reading the initials). The cross of the altar, of course, is symbolical of the Crucifixion. The cigarette of corn husk is known as the “Pipe of Jesus” among the Delaware.[12]