Idols were always carried to war by the natives of Hispaniola: "Atanse á la frente ídolos chiquitos cuando quieren pelear."[42]
"Among the primitive Germans * * * the maintenance of discipline in the field as in the council was left in great measure to the priests; they took the auguries and gave the signal for onset."[43]
"In New Caledonia * * * the priests go to battle, but sit in the distance, fasting and praying for victory."[44]
Our hunting songs and war songs may be a survival of the incantations of Celtic or Teutonic medicine-men.
The adoption or retention of obsolete phraseology as a hieratic language which has been noted among many nations of the highest comparative development is a manifestation of the same mental process.
Gibberish was so invariable an accompaniment of the sacred antics of the medicine-men of Mexico that Fray Diego Duran warns his readers that if they see any Indian dancing and singing, "ó diciendo algunas palabras que no son inteligibles, pues es de saber que aquellos representaban Dioses."[45]
Henry Youle Hind says:
The Dakotahs have a common and a sacred language. The conjurer, the war prophet, and the dreamer employ a language in which words are borrowed from other Indian tongues and dialects; they make much use of descriptive expressions, and use words apart from the ordinary signification. The Ojibways abbreviate their sentences and employ many elliptical forms of expression, so much so that half-breeds, quite familiar with the colloquial language, fail to comprehend a medicine-man when in the full flow of excited oratory.[46]
"Blood may be stanched by the words sicycuma, cucuma, ucuma, cuma, uma, ma, a."[47] There are numbers of these gibberish formulæ given, but one is sufficient.