The mode of curing, however, varies. A common way in use near Guachochic is to make the patient stand on all fours and bathe him well with water; then to place him on a blanket and carry him over a fire toward the cross and the four corners of the world. When put down on the ground again he lies or kneels on the blanket, and the shaman places his tube against the afflicted part and begins to suck forcibly, while the rest of the people stand around with sticks, ready to kill the disease so as to prevent it from returning and doing harm to others. Presently the shaman produces from his mouth a small stone, which he asserts was the cause of the disease. While the people are furiously beating the air, he proceeds at once to bury it in the earth, or in the bottom of the river, into which he dives. He may suck out as many as eight stones, but generally contents himself with four; and for treating a man in this way he receives four almuds of maize.
On one occasion, when I had taken a little cold, I asked a shaman friend whether he could cure me. “Certainly I can,” was the confident reply. He took from a little basket, in which he kept his hikuli or sacred cacti and probably similar valuables, three black stones and said that he would sell one of these to me; if I put it into warm water it would cure me. This was not quite to my liking, as I wanted him to perform the magical feat of sucking maggots out of the skin. He complied with my request, and told me to go ahead to my camp, whither he would follow me soon. On his arrival I offered him some food, as my case was not urgent, but he declined, and proceeded to cure me. A saddle blanket was spread out for me to kneel on, and my Mexican and Indian attendants were told to retire, while he made his examination. Having ascertained that I had a headache, he took my head between his dirty hands, pressed it, applied his lips to my right ear, and commenced to suck very energetically. This was rather trying to my nerves, though not unendurably so. Presently he let go his hold, and spit out quite a lot of blood into a cup an Indian boy was holding out to him. He repeated the operation on my left ear with the same result. “More pain?” he asked. “Yes,” I said, “in my right hand.” He immediately grabbed that member in his mouth, biting almost through the skin over the pulse, and after having sucked for a little while, deposited contents, of a similar nature, into the cup from his mouth. It was afterward found that the blood was mixed with a considerable number of grass seeds, which had been the cause of my illness. I had not known that I was so “seedy.”
Rubio, the Shaman, and his Wife at Home in their Cave.
The curing is often performed at dances, during the night, as the family who give the feast expect to receive, in return for all their trouble and expense, the benefit of the shaman’s magic powers, whether any of them are ill or not. Once a man, his wife, and his child had been cured with tesvino, but nevertheless they still anxiously looked to the shaman for more treatment, apparently feeling that they needed more strength against coining evil. The woman said: “Yesterday I fell into the water and got wet and felt ill, and in the night I dreamed that I was dead and that you cured me.” To this the doctor replied, “Yes, that is why I came to cure you.” Then, yielding to their beseeching glances, he daubed them again, this time holding their hands and with a little cross in his left hand. Then he said: “Now you need not be afraid; I have cured you well. Do not walk about any more like fools and do not get wet again.” And they were content.
Shaman Rubio’s Cave,
Seen from the Outside.
There is a shaman near Baqueachic (bāká = bamboo reed) who has a great reputation for curing cattle, or rather for keeping them in health. Every year he makes a tour of the different ranches, and the Indians bring their animals to him to be treated. A large hole is dug in the ground and a fire kindled in it. Then some green branches of the mountain cedar and some copal are thrown in and burned, and the animals driven one by one through the smoke. Since the veterinary gets one animal for each ceremony, he becomes quite rich.
The shamans also undertake to cure the sun and the moon, because these, too, are often ill and have to be righted. Not a feast is held in which some spoonfuls from the jars containing the remedies are not thrown up for the benefit of the sun and the moon. Occasionally, however, special ceremonies have to be performed to cure the celestial bodies, particularly the moon, because from her all the stars receive their light. At the period of the dark moon she is considered to be sick and tied up by the Devil, and the world is sad. Then the shamans assemble to consult about her ailment and the means of curing her. An ox may be killed and tesvino made. In killing the animal, care is taken not to injure the heart, which is treated with great ceremony. The people always avoid touching it, and at sacrifices they hang it with the lungs to a stick raised near the cross. The shamans stand near, with small earthenware dishes containing copal incense; while the oldest cuts with his knife four crosses on four diametrically opposite points of the heart, and from the upper part all but slices off a piece, which is left hanging down beside the main part. All the blood the heart contained is sacrificed to the four cardinal points with much singing. Then the shaman asks for an earthen bowl which has never been used before, and in this he places the heart and burns it without adding fat or anything else. The ashes he rubs between his fingers until reduced to a fine dust, which he mixes with water and some medicinal herbs. The shamans stand in the middle, and the people around them, and all are unanimous in their prayer that they may see the moon. Each shaman takes three spoonfuls of medicine, the rest of which is thrown on the cross, and the shamans watch all night.
The Christian Tarahumares even feel called upon to cure the church when those buried in and around it have been noisily dancing and damaging the building to make the people give them tesvino. The principal shaman heads the procession, carrying a jar of the liquor. His assistant holds in one hand a bowl containing water mixed with the crushed leaves of the maguey, and in the other some fresh maguey leaves. The tesvino, as well as the green water, is liberally thrown upon the walls and the floor of the church to lay the perturbed spirits.