Now this Indian was indeed as savage and brave as the devil; and he had need to be so to do this, for the Weewillmekq' looked his very worst. But the man drew his knife and scraped from the horn till he was told that he had enough.
"Go to your camp," said the Worm. "Put half the scrapings into a cup of water. Make your brother drink it."
"And the other half?" asked the Indian.
"Give it to the girl who made all this trouble. She needs medicine, too."
He returned to camp, and gave the drink to his brother, who recovered.
When the hunt was at an end they went home.
They arrived at night. There was an immense lodge in the town, and a dance was going on. The younger brother had prepared a cool drink,— sweet with maple-sugar, fragrant with herbs,—and in it was the powder of the horn of the Weewillmekq'. The witch, warm and very thirsty from dancing, came to the door. He offered her the cup. Without heeding who gave it, she drank it dry, and, turning to her partner, went on in the dance.
And then a strange thing happened. For at every turn of the dance she grew a year older. She began as a young girl; when at the end of the room she was fifty years of age; and when she got back to the door whence she started she fell dead on the floor, at the feet of him who gave her the drink, a little, wrinkled, wizened-up old squaw of a hundred years.
Aha, yes? wood enit atokhahyen, muggoh mah't adem. This is the story of the Dance of Old Age. But you may call it Sektegah, the Dance of Death, if you like it better. [Footnote: This extraordinary story was related to me by Noel Joseph, at Campobello, August 26, 1883. I am indebted to Mrs. W. Wallace Brown for the incantation song. The Weewillmekq' has, as it appears in several tales, an extraordinary resemblance to the Norse dragon. It cures mental diseases. It seems to be the same with the Chepitchcalm.]
III. Another Version of the Dance of Old Age.
(Passamaquoddy.)