§ 86. The members of this order shot at one another with their otterskin bags, as has been the custom in the Wacicka dancing society of the Omaha (Om. Soc., pp. 345, 346). Some have said that they waved their otter-skin bags around in order to infuse the spirit of the otter into a bead in its mouth, and that it was by the spirit of the otter that they knocked one another down. Each one who practiced this dance professed to keep some small round object in his breast to cough it up before or during the dance, and to use it for shooting one of his companions in the neck. He who was thus shot did in turn cough up the mysterious object, and at the end of the dance each member swallowed his own shell or pebble. THE RED MEDICINE DANCING SOCIETY. § 87. The Indians used to obtain in the prairies, towards the Rocky Mountains, an object about the size of a bean or small hazelnut and of a red color. Mr. Hamilton was told that it grew on bushes, and that it was considered to be alive, and they looked on it as a mysterious animal. In the red medicine dance the person who makes the medicine kills the animals by crushing the beans and boiling them in a large kettle filled with water. This drink is designed for or appropriated by a few members, and they drink the liquid when it is quite hot. The more that they drink the more they desire, and they seem able to drink almost any quantity. It produces a kind of intoxication, making them full of life, as they say, and enabling them to dance a long time. (See § 62.) GREEN CORN DANCE. § 88. This dance did not originate with the Iowa. It is said that the Sac tribe obtained it from the Shawnee. It is held after night. Men and women dance together, and if any women or men wish to leave their consorts they do it at this dance and mate anew, nothing being urged against it. BUFFALO DANCING SOCIETY. § 89. The Iowa have the buffalo dance, and by a comparison of Mr. Hamilton’s description of it, and his account of the buffalo doctors, and of the medicine or mystery bag of buffalo hide, with what has been learned about the Omaha order of buffalo shamans (see § 43), it seems probable that among the Iowa this dance was not participated in by any but those who had had visions of the buffalo, and that there was also some connection between all three--the dancing society, the buffalo doctors, and the mysterious bag of buffalo hide. As among the Omaha, the buffalo doctors of the Iowa are the only surgeons. ┴[C]IWERE TRADITIONS. § 90. The ┴ɔiwere tribes have traditions of their origin similar to those found among the Osage, Kansa, and Ponka, and these traditions are considered as “waqonyitaⁿ,” or mysterious things, not to be spoken of lightly or told on ordinary occasions.