336 



The Aborigines of Brazil. 



II 



with an expression of profound admiration, and listens to the 

 noise of the stones rattling against each other, as to an 

 oracle. He and the female doctors, who resemble him, 

 are thence called Maraca-Imbara (Rattle Whirlers,) a name 

 by which the missionaries designate a sorcerer or magician. 

 Sometimes the Paje brings with him a tame snake, which he 

 makes to dance while he is busied about the patient. 

 Application of Remedies, 



The relations witness all this as dumb and timid specta- 

 tors, till at last they break forth in the cry " Pocanga," " Me- 

 dicine," " Medicine." The Paje's remedies are now sent for, 

 if he has not brought them along with him. No one can 

 assist him in compounding them, unless perhaps some old 

 female of the family happens to be present. I have already 

 said that he seldom thinks of preparing his remedies before 

 hand. If they be vegetable ones, he must first go to the 

 woods and fetch them. The stalks, roots, wood, &c. if in- 

 tended for internal use, are prepared in a hot, rarely a cold in- 

 fusion, or in a decoction. The Indian ascribes high medicinal 

 powers to the feculent matters which are deposited from 

 plants well rubbed and stirred about in water. The practice 

 therefore of bruising roots, barks, stalks or leaves between 

 stones, or in wooden mortars, is very common. Besides these 

 modes of applying remedies, the Paje also makes poultices 

 with boiled herbs, and salves or balsams, in which the natural 

 balsamic gums play a conspicuous part. He is acquainted 

 with many emetic plants : but when he has not got them, he 

 excites vomiting by irritation of the throat, which he causes 

 by thrusting into it some leaves rolled together. 



As to his remedies from the animal kingdom, the Paje 

 commonly has them all ready in his hut, where they are rol- 

 led up in a palm leaf, or kept in the hollow of a bamboo. 



In cases of wounding, the first procedure of the Paje is to 

 bend himself with great gravity over the patient, apply his 

 mouth to the wound, and then suck freely. If the wound is 



