56 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 34 



of the uterine fundus under similar conditions by the white physician, 

 namely, more eflfective uterine contractions. 



Among some tribes steaming the lower part of the body is occasion- 

 ally resorted to as a help to speedy delivery. Decoctions, especially 

 that of cedar (Juniperus sec), are drunk, particularly among the 

 Pueblos; and there are prayers and ceremonial observances, as well 

 as appropriate fetishes. Internal examination of the patient is 

 resorted to only when she is in great distress. When strong manual aid 

 is needed it is given by the husband, a brother, or a medicine-man. 

 After birth the cord is usually cut and tied. Delivery of the placenta 

 generally follows in a short time, on the average more promptly than 

 among the whites. 



To determine the exact progress of labor would require numerous 

 precise personal observations impossible for the stranger to make, 

 and information obtained through mere incjuiry is necessarily unsatis- 

 factory. 



After confinement the woman remains on the skin or mat as long 

 as exhausted or weak. The generative organs, external and internal, 

 receive no special attention or merely superficial cleansing. Save 

 in exceptional cases, the woman generally rises earlier than is the 

 custom among whites; not seldom the first, but usually the second 

 or third day ; and she does not take as much care against exposure as 

 the white woman. The period of her confinement to the house 

 diflfers among the various tribes, and is a matter of purely religious 

 custom. 



There are well-authenticated instances in which an Indian woman 

 has given birth to a child on a journey, and after a shorter or longer 

 time has resumed travel, or where she brought forth one day and was 

 at work the next. Similar cases, however, occur among the whites. 



Among all of the'tribes after childbirth the mother is dieted in dif- 

 ferent ways. This observance is partly ]:»rophylactic, partly religious. 



Abnormal positions of the child are infrecjiient, but their occurrence 

 is well known and dreaded among all the tribes. The same may 

 be said of puerperal troubles, which, however, are also rare, the 

 pvierperium being freer of abnormalities and diseases than among 

 whites. Twins are not uncommon; triplets are very rare, and are 

 regarded as something uncanny; of more than three children at a 

 birth none of the persons questioned had ever heard. Monstrosities 

 are rare, but occur among all the tribes ; if of a pronounced kind the 

 child is not allowed to live. 



The delivery itself is nowhere surrounded with much secrecy, and 

 female members of the family, in some instances also male relatives 

 and even children, may be present. 



Tribal details.^ Among the White Mountain Apache after childbirth 

 the woman, unless too weak, runs about among the bushes outside 



