CHAPTER IX. 



PREVALENT DISEASES. 



I HAVE ])reviously remarked that in these islands the duties of 

 the sorcerer and the medicine-man are frequently combined. 

 The same man, who can remove a disease by exorcism and by ill- 

 wishing can bring sickness and death upon any obnoxious individual, 

 may also be able in the estimation of the people to procure a fair 

 A\dnd for an intended vova^^e, or to brinof about rain in a season of 

 drought. I had more than one opportunity of satisfying myself of 

 the fact that the medicine-man often trades upon the credulity of 

 his patients, and that he is himself aware that all his charms and 

 incantations are mere trickery. In Santa Anna his services are 

 often employed to procure the recovery of a sick man, and by some 

 form of incantation he pretends to appease the anger of the offended 

 spirit to whom the illness is attributed. Captain Macdonald, who 

 has long resided in this island, informed me that when on one 

 occasion he had relieved by medicine the sufferings of a native who 

 had in vain employed the exorcisms of the village physician to 

 effect his cui-e, the success of his treatment did not detract in any 

 way from the reputation of the medicine-man, who, having informed 

 himself of the progress of the patient, after Captain Macdonald had 

 given his remedy, foretold his recovery and took to himself the 

 whole credit of the cure. 



In the island of Ugi chunam (burnt lime) is one of the domestic 

 remedies employed in sickness, being rubbed into the skin of the 

 patient by his friends. The chunam of some men is supposed to 

 be more efficacious than that of others, and messengers may be sent 

 from one end of the island to the other to procure it. One of our 

 Treasury natives, who was employed on board, had a reputation as 

 medicine-man. His method of treatment in the case of one of his 

 own comrades consisted in tying a particular leaf ai ound the limbs 



