Voyages of Samuel De Champlain — Volume 03

by Samuel de Champlain

Moreover, they do not recognize any divinity, or worship any God and believe in anything whatever, but live like brute beasts. They have, however, some respect for the devil, or something so called, which is a matter of uncertainty, since the word which they use thus has various significations and comprises in itself various things. It is accordingly difficult to determine whether they mean the devil or something else, but what especially leads to the belief that what they mean is the devil is this: whenever they see a man doing something extraordinary, or who is more capable than usual, or is a valiant warrior, or furthermore who is in a rage as if out of his reason and senses, they call him oqui, or, as we should say, a great knowing spirit, or a great devil. However this may be, they have certain persons, who are the oqui, or, as the Algonquins and Montagnais call them, manitous; and persons of this kind are the medicine-men, who heal the sick, bind up the wounded, and predict future events, who in fine practise all abuses and illusions of the devil to deceive and delude them. These oquis or conjurers persuade their patients and the sick to make, or have made banquets and ceremonies that they may be the sooner healed, their object being to participate in them finally themselves and get the principal benefit therefrom. Under the pretence of a more speedy cure, they likewise cause them to observe various other ceremonies, which I shall hereafter speak of in the proper place. These are the people in whom they put especial confidence, but it is rare that they are possessed of the devil and tormented like other savages living more remote than themselves.

This gives additional reason and ground to believe that their conversion to the knowledge of God would be more easy, if their country were inhabited by persons who would take the trouble and pains to instruct them. But it is not enough to send to them friars, unless there are those to support and assist them. For although these people have the desire to-day to know what God is, to-morrow this disposition will change when they are obliged to lay aside and bring under their foul ways, their dissolute manners, and their savage indulgences. So that there is need of people and families to keep them in the way of duty, to constrain them through mildness to do better, and to move them by good example to mend their lives. Father Joseph [195] and myself have many times conferred with them in regard to our belief, laws, and customs. They listened attentively in their assemblies, sometimes saying to us: You say things that pass our knowledge, and which we cannot understand by words, being beyond our comprehension; but if you would do us a service come and dwell in this country, bringing your wives and children, and when they are here we shall see how you serve the God you worship, and how you live with your wives and children, how you cultivate and plant the soil, how you obey your laws, how you take care of animals, and how you manufacture all that we see proceeding from your inventive skill. When we see all this, we shall learn more in a year than in twenty by simply hearing you discourse and if we cannot then understand, you shall take our children, who shall be as your own. And thus being convinced that our life is a miserable one in comparison with yours, it is easy to believe that we shall adopt yours, abandoning our own.

Their words seemed to me good common sense, showing the desire they have to get a knowledge of God. It is a great wrong to let so many men be lost, and see them perish at our door, without rendering them the succor which can only be given through the help of kings, princes, and ecclesiastics, who alone have the power to do this. For to them alone belongs the honor of so great a work; namely, planting the Christian faith in an unknown region and among savage nations, since we are well informed about these people, that they long for and desire nothing so much as to be clearly instructed as to what they should do and avoid. It is accordingly the duty of those who have the power, to labor there and contribute of their abundance, for one day they must answer before God for the loss of the souls which they allowed to perish through their negligence and avarice; and these are not few but very numerous. Now this will be done when it shall please God to give them grace to this end. As for myself, I desire this result rather to-day than to-morrow, from the zeal which I have for the advancement of God's glory, for the honor of my King, and for the welfare and renown of my country.

When they are sick, the man or woman who is attacked with any disease sends for the oqui, who visits the patient and informs himself about the malady and the suffering. After this, the oqui sends for a large number of men, women, and girls, including three or four old women. These enter the cabin of the sick, dancing, each one having on his head the skin of a bear or some other wild beast, that of the bear being the most common as it is the most frightful. There are three or four other old women about the sick or suffering, who for the most part feign sickness, or are sick merely in imagination. But they are soon cured of this sickness, and generally make banquets at the expense of their friends or relatives, who give them something to put into their kettle, in addition to the presents which they receive from the dancers, such as porcelain and other bagatelles, so that they are soon cured; for when they find that they have nothing more to look for, they get up with what they have secured. But those who are really sick are not readily cured by plays, dances, and such proceedings.

To return to my narrative: the old women near the sick person receive the presents, each singing and pausing in turn. When all the presents have been made, they proceed to lift up their voices with one accord, all singing together and keeping time with sticks on pieces of dry bark. Then all the women and girls proceed to the end of the cabin, as if they were about to begin a ballet or masquerade. The old women walk in front with their bearskins on their heads, all the others following them, one after the other. They have only two kinds of dances with regular time, one of four steps and the other of twelve, as in the trioli de Bretagne. They exhibit much grace in dancing. Young men often take part with them. After dancing an hour or two, the old women lead out the sick person to dance, who gets up dolefully and prepares to dance, and after a short time she dances and enjoys as much as the others. I leave it to you to consider how sick she was. Below is represented the mode of their dances.

The medicine-man thus gains honor and credit, his patient being so soon healed and on her feet. This treatment, however, does nothing for those who are dangerously ill and reduced by weakness, but causes their death rather than their cure; for I can testify that they sometimes make such a noise and hubbub from morning until two o'clock at night that it is impossible for the patient to endure it without great pain. Sometimes the patient is seized with the desire to have the women and girls dance all together, which is done in accordance with the direction of the oqui. But this is not all, for he and the manitou, accompanied by some others, make grimaces, perform magic arts, and twist themselves about so that they generally end in being out of their senses, seemingly crazy, throwing the fire from one side of the cabin to the other, eating burning coals, holding them in their hands for a while, and throwing red-hot ashes into the eyes of the spectators. Seeing them in this condition, one would say that the devil, the oqui, or manitou, if he is thus to be called, possesses and torments them. This noise and hubbub being over, they retire each to his own cabin.

But those who suffer especially during this time are the wives of those possessed, and all the inmates of their cabins, from the fear they have lest the raging ones burn up all that is in their houses. This leads them to remove everything that is in sight; for as soon as he arrives he is all in a fury, his eyes flashing and frightful, sometimes standing up, sometimes seated, as his fancy takes him. Suddenly a fit seizes him, and laying hold of everything he finds in his way he throws them to one side and the other. Then he lies down and sleeps for some time. Waking up with a jump, he seizes fire and stones which he throws about recklessly on all sides. This rage passes off with the sleep which seizes him again. Then he rages and calls several of his friends to sweat with him. The latter is the best means they have for preserving themselves in health. While they are sweating, the kettle boils to prepare them something to eat. They remain, two or three hours or so, covered up with great pieces of bark and wrapped in their robes, with a great many stones about them which have been heated red hot in the fire. They sing all the time while they are in the rage, occasionally stopping to take breath. Then they give them many draughts of water to drink, since they are very thirsty, when the demoniac, who was crazy or possessed of an evil spirit, becomes sober.

Thus it happens that three or four of these sick persons get well, rather by a happy coincidence and chance than in consequence of any intelligent treatment, and this confirms their false belief that they are healed by means of these ceremonies, not considering that, for two who are thus cured, ten others die on account of the noise, great hubbub and hissing, which are rather calculated to kill than cure a sick person. But that they expect to recover their health by this noise, and we on the contrary by silence and rest, shows how the devil does everything in hostility to the good.

There are also women who go into these rages, but they do not do so much harm. They walk on all fours like beasts. Seeing this, the magician, called oqui, begins to sing; then, with some contortions of the face, he blows upon her, directing her to drink certain waters, and make at once a banquet of fish or flesh, which must be procured although very scarce at the time. When the shouting is over and the banquet ended, they return each to her own cabin. At another time he comes back and visits her, blowing upon her and singing in company with several others, who have been summoned for this purpose, and who hold in the hand a dry tortoise-shell filled with little pebbles, which they cause to resound in the ears of the sick woman. They direct her to make at once three or four banquets with singing and dancing, when all the girls appear adorned and painted as I have represented in figure G. The oqui orders masquerades, and directs them to disguise themselves, as those do who run along the streets in France on Mardi-gras. [196] Thus they go and sing near the bed of the sick woman and promenade through the village while the banquet is preparing to receive the maskers, who return very tired, having taken exercise enough to be able to empty the kettle of its migan.

According to their custom each household lives on what it gets by fishing and planting, improving as much land as it needs. They clear it up with great difficulty, since they do not have the implements adapted to this purpose. A party strip the trees of all their branches, which they burn at their base in order to kill them. They clear carefully the land between the trees, and then plant their corn at distances of a pace, putting in each place some ten kernels, and so on until they have made provision for three or four years, fearing that a bad year may befall them. The women attend to the planting and harvesting, as I have said before, and to procuring a supply of wood for winter. All the women aid each other in procuring this provision of wood, which they do in the month of March or April, in the order of two days for each. Every household is provided with as much as it needs; and if a girl marries, each woman and girl is expected to carry to the newly married one a parcel of wood for her provision, since she could not procure it alone, and at a season when she has to give her attention to other things.