PLATE XLI.
STONE AXE HEAD (BORO)
STRING OF MAGIC STONES (ANDOKE)
Whatever goes wrong in tribal life, from a pain in the finger to a hurricane, the malice of an enemy working through the evil spirits is held to be responsible, as will be shown more fully hereafter. It is the medicine-man’s business not only to frustrate their malicious purposes, but also to discover who is the foe inciting their wickedness by magical influences. Mischief can be wrought without any bodily presence.[310] Revenge is also possible by the exercise of similar extra-natural powers. For instance, if a child is lost, or killed by a tiger, the bereaved parents call the tribal medicine-man to their assistance. If the hunters sent out to retaliate upon the tiger-foe fail to capture or overcome it, the medicine-man proceeds to work magic. This may be quite simple, for it is possible that in his solitary wanderings in the bush he may have the luck to come across the lost youngster. In this case he “re-creates” the child by the potency of his magic-working, and secures an unshakable reputation by producing it alive in due course. Should such luck not befall him he can but return with a tale of vengeance wreaked on the tiger, and a tiger-tooth—not necessarily of fresh extraction—in proof of that same. Then it is his duty to discover which might be the wicked tribe that sent the tiger, or had it sent at their instigation, as he would have to ascertain who had sent sickness were it the death of an adult that was under investigation. The procedure is the same whether the trouble be a house blown down by the wind or any other catastrophe. The tribe assembles for a solemn palaver, and the medicine-man, frenzied with drugs, eventually “divines” who is the enemy. The final decision usually is that the tribe had better go to war at once lest worse befall them.
The medicine-man invariably has a considerable say in intertribal policy. War is never made without his advice, and in addition to his duties as tribal avenger and healer, he must warn the tribe of impending hostilities.[311] Should hostilities break out, or a death occur, during a white man’s visit to a tribe, he would possibly find himself in considerable personal danger. Success to the tribe might in part be attributed to his virtue, but disaster would certainly be considered due to his malign presence, a point the medicine-man would not be slow in urging against the visitor.
The white stranger, with his foreign magic—for magic every other thing he possesses must seem to the unsophisticated child of the bush—in any circumstances is regarded with some jealousy by the professional magic-workers of the tribes. Naturally, therefore, it is with extreme difficulty that any details of their methods and doings can be learnt. It goes without saying that the medicine-man regards any inquisitive stranger as a potential rival, is on his guard against bluff or bribery, and never willingly gives so much as an opening for exchange of professional confidences. It is the hardest thing in the world to obtain information from the Indian, for every Indian will say “I don’t know,” or “Pia”—because it is so—in order to avoid having to explain his beliefs to the white man. I tried to bluff, and by feigning to possess magical gifts hoped to draw the local exponent into a rival display, but with no encouraging results. What I could gather had to be done with circumspection, a bit here, a trifle there, a note from a chance remark, a comment from another.
The expulsion of the evil spirit causing sickness is a matter requiring invariably much noise and fury. The maloka is always dark, be it day or night, and the gloom is not broken by torches for the medicine-man’s visit, nor are the smouldering fires kicked into a blaze. The doctor, well under the influence of drugs, works himself to a state of wild exaltation. He beats the floor with a palm branch, shakes his rattle vigorously, and makes the most appalling noises. He will imitate the beasts and birds of the forest, and—as he must be a skilled ventriloquist if he has any claims whatsoever to magic gifts—the sounds apparently come from every side. This is to demonstrate the embodying of the spirits of the nether world, the active causation of all ill. Also it is to summon to his assistance all friendly spirits, or all over whom he has attained magical influence. He carries on conversations with the assumed speakers, and intermittently howls, and shrieks, and beats the air with his palm branches. The greater the noise, the wilder the excitement, the more potent is the magic of the medicine-man. South of the Japura he does not blow smoke over the patient, but he makes use of both tobacco juice and coca. He further drugs himself most probably with some such powerful agent as aya-huasca, though that is not supposed to be known to these tribes. The medicine-man also doses himself with a drink made from a certain liana. When thoroughly intoxicated with it he will run away, and shortly go into profound slumber. In this comatose state he is supposed to hold intercourse with the unseen world, to wander in spirit to other places, and, as a result of what he has hereby learnt, to be able to foretell the future when he awakes.
Magic-making in cases of sickness includes the blowing, sucking, and so forth, already described. The relatives of the patient will discourse at length on the story of the sickness, and the medicine-man will either announce who sent it himself or expound the sick person’s dreams and therefrom deduct the source of evil. The official explanation and verdict is always given in the most ambiguous phraseology, so that whatever happens the medicine-man may be able to twist his dictum to the desired equivalent of “I told you so.”
As already described the invalid may be given a strong narcotic drink, the decoction of a root, and carried out to a small clearing made in the bush. There he is left under a rough shelter. No one may speak to him, or pass him while he lies there, otherwise he will die. The relations go out of sight, and guard the bush tracks, to prevent any such passage. If the patient die the medicine-man asserts very positively that some one has transgressed, knowingly or unknowingly, and so caused the fatal ending. I saw such a case on one occasion and was prayed by the Indians not to go anywhere in the direction of the sick man.
Should a man’s wife fall ill her relatives may, if they are within reasonable distance, come and take her away. Koch-Grünberg mentions a case among the Bara Indians where two men came from another tribe and removed their sick sister. They were treated with a show of hostility and followed—as the ailing woman took her healthy children away—for some distance into the bush. But no tribal quarrel ensued, the hostility appears to have been merely ceremonial. This is typical of what might occur among any friendly tribes.