CHAPTER XIII
Doctoring
So far most of the chapters have been devoted to the special events in connexion with missionary life, but those who need such doctoring as the missionary can give are like the poor—“always with us.”
At first their demands for attention were persistent but very irregular. They were made at all times of the day and often at night. Long effort and the use of a bell have reduced them to uniformity, and now the first hour after breakfast is devoted to the sick. Perhaps no hour of the day gives so complete an insight into the peculiarities of the native, and certainly no hour gives more laughable experiences.
Despite all the dirt their wounds often heal in a wonderful manner.
Now and then a stolid patient is met with who will submit to anything. Years ago at Port Moresby a man while hunting struck his foot against a broken tree. The result was a deep, gaping wound with splinters in it. When we thought all had been removed the man informed us he was sure there was one piece left. Three had a try to find that piece of wood but failed, and at last Walker thought he had got hold of it, and began to pull. For a moment the man said nothing, but then remarked quite quietly, “Misi Walker, that is the inside of my foot you are trying to pull out.”
Until used to doctoring the native would rather submit to external treatment than take medicines internally. Once greatly puzzled as to the non-effect of certain tabloids which had been sent to a sick man daily, I inquired how he had taken them. He languidly pointed to the roof of his house, but his action conveyed little information till his wife produced a dirty bit of rag, and unfolding it, displayed just the number of tabloids sent for her husband to take. No wonder they had produced no constitutional change.
The miserable “Ia sibona” often stands in the way of doctoring a child. The medicine is offered, and the child objects to take it. Any compulsion is discounted by the parent who calmly remarks, “Ia sibona. He does not wish to take it”; and there the matter would end if the Missionary would allow it to do so. Often I have seen not only the mother, but the father, turn away as though to insist upon the child taking the medicine and a moment later return the glass or spoon empty, but the child had not taken the medicine. The parent had swallowed it, perhaps to save trouble, but perhaps in the belief that as it had not gone out of the family the effect would be all right.
Payment for medicine and doctoring has always been a sore point with the people of this district. They do not hesitate to pay their sorcerers a pig or anything else they may demand for their attention, but seem surprised when the Missionary suggests that they should contribute to the food supply for the Mission boys and girls as a return for doctoring. In early years I have had patients refuse to take medicine I was willing to give them, because I would not pay them to swallow it. Those days are gone, and now some few bring a little present of food for the medicine, but it is generally a very little present.
Not long ago a man was wounded by a stinging ray. The fish had driven its spine right through his leg. Of course the man could not come to the Missionary so the Missionary had to go to him and continue his visits for weeks before the wound was healed. Without other than native help the man would certainly have died. When the doctoring was all over and the man able to walk again, his wife paid a visit to Donisi Hahine and made quite a speech about how her husband’s life had been saved. She should never forget it, but would remember it every time she looked at the wound. Then she produced from her “kiapa” a bunch, of bananas such as could be bought for a stick of tobacco, and put it on the verandah saying it was her return present for what had been done for her husband. At least she had been grateful, but one could not help the remark, “if that is the value she puts upon her husband’s life, then husbands must be cheap in this part of the world.”
Rarely indeed is there active opposition when medical help is offered, but occasionally it has shown itself, and could then be traced to sorcery. A child had been badly burnt but not brought up to have its wounds dressed, and consequently they got very foul, and the mother feared the child would die. Then she brought it to me, and when asked why she had not done so before said the child’s grandmother had objected because the spirits which dwelt in her round stone were angry, and did not want the white man to have anything to do with the child.