CHAPTER XXXI.
DOCTORS OR JUGGLERS.
I call these men Doctors, because it is the name given them by their countrymen who have borrowed it from our language,[196] and they are themselves very fond of this pompous title. They are a set of professional impostors, who, availing themselves of the superstitious prejudices of the people, acquire the name and reputation of men of superior knowledge, and possessed of supernatural powers. As the Indians in general believe in witchcraft, and ascribe, as I have already said, to the arts of sorcerers many of the disorders with which they are afflicted in the regular course of nature, this class of men has risen among them, who pretend to be skilled in a certain occult science, by means of which they are able not only to cure natural diseases, but to counteract or destroy the enchantments of wizards or witches, and expel evil spirits.
These men are physicians, like the others of whom I have spoken, and like them are acquainted with the properties and virtues of plants, barks, roots, and other remedies. They differ from them only by their pretensions to a superior knowledge, and by the impudence with which they impose upon the credulous. I am sorry that truth obliges me to confess, that in their profession they rank above the honest practitioners. They pretend that there are disorders which cannot be cured by the ordinary remedies, and to the treatment of which the talents of common physicians are inadequate. They say that when a complaint has been brought on by witchcraft, more powerful remedies must be applied, and measures must be taken to defeat the designs of the person who bewitched the unfortunate patient. This can only be done by removing or destroying the deleterious or deadening substance which has been conveyed into them, or, if it is an evil spirit, to confine or expel him, or banish him to a distant region from whence he may never return.
When the juggler has succeeded in persuading his patient that his disorder is such that no common physician has it in his power to relieve, he will next endeavour to convince him of the necessity of making him very strong, which means, giving him a large fee, which he will say, is justly due to a man who, like himself, is able to perform such difficult things. If the patient who applies, is rich, the Doctor will never fail, whatever the complaint may be, to ascribe it to the powers of witchcraft, and recommend himself as the only person capable of giving relief in such a hard and complicated case. The poor patient, therefore, if he will have the benefit of the great man’s advice and assistance, must immediately give him his honorarium, which is commonly either a fine horse, or a good rifle-gun, a considerable quantity of wampum, or goods to a handsome amount. When this fee is well secured, and not before, the Doctor prepares for the hard task that he has undertaken, with as much apparent labour as if he was about to remove a mountain. He casts his eyes all round him to attract notice, puts on grave and important looks, appears wrapt in thought and meditation and enjoys for a while the admiration of the spectators. At last he begins his operation. Attired in a frightful dress, he approaches his patient, with a variety of contortions and gestures, and performs by his side and over him all the antic tricks that his imagination can suggest. He breathes on him, blows in his mouth, and squirts some medicines which he has prepared in his face, mouth and nose; he rattles his gourd filled with dry beans or pebbles, pulls out and handles about a variety of sticks and bundles in which he appears to be seeking for the proper remedy, all which is accompanied with the most horrid gesticulations, by which he endeavours, as he says, to frighten the spirit or the disorder away, and continues in this manner until he is quite exhausted and out of breath, when he retires to wait the issue.
The visits of the juggler are, if the patient requires it, repeated from time to time; not, however, without his giving a fresh fee previous to each visit. This continues until the property of the patient is entirely exhausted, or until he resolves upon calling in another doctor, with whom feeing must begin anew in the same manner that it did with his predecessor.
When at length the art of the juggling tribe has after repeated trials proved ineffectual, the patient is declared incurable. The doctors will say, that he applied to them too late, that he did not exactly follow their prescriptions, or sometimes, that he was bewitched by one of the greatest masters of the science, and that unless a professor can be found possessed of superior knowledge, he is doomed to die or linger in pain beyond the power of relief.
Thus these jugglers carry on their deceit, and enrich themselves at the expense of the credulous and foolish. I have known instances in which they declared a patient perfectly cured and out of all danger, who nevertheless died of his disorder a very few days afterwards, although his doctors affirmed that the evil spirit or the effects of witchcraft were entirely removed from him; on the other hand, I have seen cases in which the patient recovered after being pronounced incurable and condemned to die. In those cases, however, he had had the good sense to apply to some of the honest physicians of one or the other sex, who had relieved him by a successful application of their medicines.
The jugglers’ dress, when in the exercise of their functions, exhibits a most frightful sight. I had no idea of the importance of these men, until by accident I met with one, habited in his full costume. As I was once walking through the street of a large Indian village on the Muskingum, with the chief Gelelemend,[197] whom we call Kill-buck, one of those monsters suddenly came out of the house next to me, at whose sight I was so frightened, that I flew immediately to the other side of the chief, who observing my agitation and the quick strides I made, asked me what was the matter, and what I thought it was that I saw before me. “By its outward appearance,” answered I, “I would think it a bear, or some such ferocious animal, what is inside I do not know, but rather judge it to be the Evil Spirit.” My friend Kill-buck smiled, and replied, “O! no, no; don’t believe that! it is a man you well know, it is our Doctor.” “A Doctor!” said I, “what! a human being to transform himself so as to be taken for a bear walking on his hind legs, and with horns on his head? You will not, surely, deceive me; if it is not a bear, it must be some other ferocious animal that I have never seen before.” The juggler within the dress hearing what passed between us, began to act over some of his curious pranks, probably intending to divert me, as he saw I was looking at him with great amazement, not unmixed with fear; but the more he went on with his performance, the more I was at a loss to decide, whether he was a human being or a bear; for he imitated that animal in the greatest perfection, walking upright on his hind legs as I had often seen it do. At last I renewed my questions to the chief, and begged him seriously to tell me what that figure was, and he assured me that although outside it had the appearance of a bear, yet inside there was a man, and that it was our doctor going to visit one of his patients who was bewitched. A dialogue then ensued between us, which I shall relate, as well as I can recollect it, in its very words:
Heckew. But why does he go dressed in that manner? Won’t his patient be frightened to death on seeing him enter the house?