This motion, the conjurers say, is produced by the concussion of the air. The spirits come and enter with such velocity that it is the wind they produce which occasions it. The conjurer is all the while seated peaceably in the bottom, (on the ground) of his hut.
Some of them to shew their power have had small sticks of the hardest wood (such as produces the wild pear, and of which the Indians make their arrows, and ram-rods for guns) about the size of a man's finger, made as sharp-pointed as possible and dried, when they become in consequence nearly as dangerous as iron or bayonets. Some have eighteen, twenty-four, more or less, though seldom less than eighteen planted in the bottom of their hut. They are about twelve or fourteen inches out of the ground.
On the points of these sticks is the conjurer placed, sometimes on his bottom, at others on his knees and elbows. And there he remains as quietly and composedly as if he were on "a bed of roses". And when he comes off, no marks of injury appear, though he entered naked, only his cloute about him, and of course the cords with which he is tied. Their familiars (their dreamed, or those who appear to them in their dreams and promise them their assistance and protection) support them so that no injury happens them!!!
[Mythology]
[North (Wind) and his Daughter (The Birth of Wee-suck-ā-jāāk & Mishabose)]
March 29th.—I feel but very indifferently disposed to write, but I am on the eve of an accumulation of business and may not after a few days have the necessary time, so that I shall [take the] risk.
A couple of days back, I have been conversing with a Cree (Indian) who piecemeal gives me the following account of their mythology:
The North (Wind), apparently one of oldest of created rational beings, thus addressed his daughter, his only child, "My daughter! Be very careful, and remember that anything you do, or wherever you go, on turning yourself, turn always in the same direction with the sun, and never in a contrary direction."
Now women are a compound of perverseness, obstinacy and curiosity, and withall forgetful enough too sometimes. This girl, one day she was chopping fire-wood. Without thinking of her father's admonition, in going to another tree, [she] turned round to the right in a contrary direction to the sun, and instantly fell to the ground and died.
The time she used to take up in this occupation being expired, her parents became very uneasy, and after some search, found her on her back dead, and her belly [swollen] to an enormous size. The father and mother, on each or opposite sides, contemplated her situation with great grief. At last the father arose, stood up, and made a long speech, praying to "The Father of Life" to have mercy and compassion on his child.