340 



The Aborigines of Brazil. 



I 



11 



I 





The first of these is practised on the chest in diseases of the 

 whole system, or on the inflamed part in local affections. 

 The Paje performs it with the beak of a hawk or of a toucan, 

 or with the spine of a ray- fish (Raja.) Venesection is also 

 performed with this spine, or with the sharp tooth of a Coati 

 (Nasua,) and among several races in the east of Brazil, as the 

 Coroados, Puris, and Botocudos, by shooting into the vein 

 from a small bow a little arrow armed with a piece of rock 

 crystal. A vein in the calf of the leg is most frequently select- 

 ed, more rarely one at the elbow or on the temples. Blood- 

 letting is very often used as a precautionary measure. Young 

 married women are in the habit of losing, almost regularly at 

 the end of the rainy season, a large quantity of blood to 

 prevent conception. Baron V. Eschwege states, that he once 

 found a number of women bathing in a river, and saw an old 

 man open a vein in each of them. Missionaries have told me, 

 that they have frequently seen this operation performed simul- 

 taneously on several women. This custom is connected with 

 the general wish which they feel to cause abortion, and save 

 themselves the troubles of pregnancy. I have seen cases, in 

 which the unnatural mothers struck their bodies violently 

 with this design. The women also are often bled about the 

 time of child-birth. In obstinate tooth-aches, the Paje punc- 

 tures the gums. Broken limbs are put up in the splint-like 

 leaf- stalks of the Assai palm, [Euterpe oleracea, and edulis,) 

 the proper setting of the bones being of course frequent- 

 ly neglected. For dressings he uses various fresh or boiled 

 plants, or a dog's skin, fresh taken off. In large open wounds, 

 the Paje frequently uses fire to hasten recovery. The wound 

 ed member is thickly enveloped in the inner bark of trees, and 

 is often half- roasted on a prop, beneath which burning coals are 

 placed. The patient bears this painful procedure with his 

 usual indifference, and strange to say, it generally causes rapid 

 cure by the first intention. I can, as an eye-witness, affirm 

 the recovery of an Indian, whose skin had been pierced with 



