A Yankee doctor in paradise

by S. M. Lambert

All along the tumbled way I tried to investigate recent epidemics of dysentery. The germs were probably fly-borne to a large extent; also one might blame the local habit of eating with dirty fingers. Though soil pollution was common enough to cause a large hookworm infection, there was stream pollution too, because like many other Melanesians the mountain folk stand in water to perform their natural functions; otherwise, they tell you, the puri-puri man will get some of their bowel movement for his black magic.

In giving out tins to these villagers I encountered a kind of shyness new to me. They hadn’t the least prejudice or tabu against our form of examination, but when Ahuia asked this man or that what name should be written on his specimen he would simper and wriggle and shut up like a clam. Ahuia told me grimly, “He shamed to tell name belong him.” Finally he would manage to cajole the reticent one into whispering his name to his neighbor, who passed it on, whispering. In the land of ghosts frightened men will change their names, often two or three times, to fool the evil spirits of their dead relatives who come searching in the dark. Fiend-haunted natives have so many aliases that they can’t remember the last one, if asked suddenly. I lost a great deal of time trying to pump the name from one blushing warrior. Finally a mission boy bawled out, “Oh, Joni!” (meaning Johnnie)—and the man stepped up.

I found the Kunis only too anxious to listen and obey instructions. They were firm believers in the “se-nake in bell’” theory, and we were magicians who had come to relieve their bellies. There were old women, they said, who could remove the snake by sucking it from your ears, your nose, your navel. Did anybody ever see the snakes? No, Taubada, such magic only removed “the ghost of a snake”—and the serpent was so very tabu that you would surely die if you even looked at him as he crawled out of you.

Jestingly one of the Sacred Heart priests said that the witches were working in competition with the Rockefeller Foundation. That sounded funny; but I discovered that it was true.

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Ahuia told me that a magician was coming to a house “over there” and had asked to have me see him cure a woman of her snake. It was like a call to a medical consultation. The house over there was a leaf-thatched hut, spooky with faint lights through mountain dark. Among the branches queer birds croaked like frogs.

Inside the dirt-floored room, lit by a hurricane lantern, a nude woman lay on her back. Her abdomen was puffed; it looked like a gastric case, superinduced by intestinal parasites. There were other witnesses, men in the all-prevalent G-string, and among them the black local constable whose services I might appreciate. Dead silence reigned, except for the woman’s painful breathing.

A wizened little man came in quietly. He wore no paint or feathers, and his air was professional, as if he intended to put on rubber gloves and lecture before a class in surgery. A small boy followed with an earthen pot and a basket; he set these near where the woman lay. The witch doctor was businesslike, striking a trade match and dropping it into the pot, his face lit by the red flame. Daintily he reached into his basket and took out dried leaves, which he scattered over the fire. The room was fragrant with smoke. He crouched and said an incantation. Even though he was speaking in the strangest of strange languages his voice had a thick sound, as if he were talking through a mouthful of yams. Suddenly he sprang to his feet, went over to the patient and put his mouth tightly on her navel. There was a series of sucking sounds. He lifted his head and out of his mouth fell a little brown snake. It wriggled across the swollen abdomen, then glided to the floor.

The wizard rose and turned to me with a professional bow. “How was that, Doctor?” “Very good indeed, Doctor,” my eyes replied. The native constable asked the woman how she felt now, and she said, “Oh, so much better!” Even in the dim light it was easy to see what the sorcerer had done. It isn’t hard to carry a small snake in your mouth, if you don’t mind understudying Bosco.

The next day I was giving my own exhibition of magic. We had lingered here long enough to administer chenopodium and Epsom salts and to wash the specimens for observation. In the throng I recognized my rival physician, and he was a long time studying the slides. At last he turned away with a stony face. Was he convinced that my method was superior to his? I doubt it. It takes a great deal to change the mind of an old-school doctor.