"The Strawberry Ceremony as We are Taught in the Code of Handsome Lake"

Now moreover before noon many people will gather at the Longhouse. These people will be your relatives and will see you. They will have gathered the early strawberries and made a strawberry feast, and moreover will have strawberry wine sweetened with sugar. Then will all drink the juice of the berry and thank the Creator for your recovery and moreover they severally will call upon you by your name as a relative according as you are.

"Now when the day came I went as appointed and all the people say me coming and it was as predicted."

Now the messengers spoke to me and said that they would now tell me how things ought to be upon the earth. They said:" Do not allow any one to say that you have great fortune in being able to rise again. The favor of the four beings is not alone for you and the Creator is willing to help all mankind."

"Now on that same day the Great Feather and the Harvest dances were to be celebrated and at this time the beings told me that my relatives would restore me. 'Your feelings and spirits are low,' they said, 'and must be aroused. Then will you obtain power to recover.' Verily the servants of the Creator (Hadio"ya:'geono•) said this. Now moreover they commanded that henceforth dances of this same kind should be held and thanksgiving offered whenever the strawberries were ripe. Furthermore they said that the juice of the berry must be drunk by the children and the aged and all the people. Truly all must drink of the berry juice, for they said that the sweet water of the berries was a medicine and that the early strawberries were a great medicine. So they bade me tell this story to my people when I move upon the earth again. Now they said, 'We shall continually reveal things unto you. We, the servants of him who made us, say that as he employed us to come unto you to reveal his will, so you must carry it to your people. Now we are they whom he created when he made the world and our duty is to watch over and care for mankind. Now there are four of us but the fourth is not here present. When we called you by name and you heard, he returned to tell the news.

This will bring joy into the heaven-world of our Creator. So it is that the fourth is not with us but you shc111 sec him at another time and when that time is at hand you shc11J know. Now furthermore we must remind you of the evil things that you have done and you must repent of all things that you believe to have been evil. You think that you have done wrong because of O'gi'we, Ye'onda'tha and Gone'owo and because you partook of strong drink. Verily you must do as you think for whatsoever you think is evil is evil."

1 The earliest of the wild strawberries are thought to be of great medicinal value and are eagerly eaten as soon as ripe. So sacred a plant is the strawberry that it is thought to grow along the "heaven road." A person recovering from a severes illness says, "I almost ate strawberries."

2 The Osto'wa'gowa, the chief religious dance."