96. Sʻhagodiyoweqgowa
A few years ago (previous to 1884) two young men started for a Sʻhagodiyoweqgowa dance. They had their wooden masks or “false faces” with them in a bundle. On the way they stopped at a white woman’s house. The woman asked, “What have you in your bundle?” “Our masks, or false faces,” they answered; “we are going to a Sʻhagodiyoweqgowa dance.” “If you will put on the masks and let me see them, I will give you two quarts of cider,” said the woman. Going outdoors, they put on the masks, and came into the house again. The woman’s child, a boy of six or seven, became so frightened that he acted as if he had lost his mind; he could not talk. The mother sent to Perrysburg (N. Y.) for a doctor. He came, but he could not help the boy. The mother then went to an Indian shaman for advice, who said to her that she must get the maskers, or false faces, to cure him. They came at her request and danced, and they rubbed the boy with ashes, also blowing some in his face; soon he was well. According to custom, the woman had ready a pot of pounded parched corn, boiled with pork and seasoned with maple sugar, for the false faces, or maskers.