2^0 



ON SYMPATHY AND FASCINATION. 



ears against the sounds thus uttered, and that will not hearken to or be 

 charmed by the voice of the enchanter, however skilful the enchant- 

 ment. 



The sacred books abound in allusion to this popular tradition ;* they are 

 equally to be met with in the writings of the Greek and Roman poets, 

 and even in the Sanscrit moralists, as, for example, in the Hitopadesa of 

 Vishnusarman, probably of a higher antiquity than the psalmist himself, 

 who tells us in his book of aphorisms, that " as a charmer draweth a ser- 

 pent from his hole, so a good wife taking her husband from his place of 

 torture, enjoyeth happiness with him."t 



There a^ some philosophers and historians, who have ventured to dis- 

 believe that any such extraordinary power has ever been possessed by any 

 people. The very cautious writers of the Ancient Universal History ex- 

 press no small degree of skepticism upon this point :| and M. Denon, one 

 of the chief of the literati that accompanied Bonaparte to Egypt, has been 

 bold enough to laugh at t\\e assertion, and to regard every pretension to 

 such a power as a direct imposture. He offers, however, no sufficient 

 ground for his ridicule, and is flatly contradicted by the concurrent testi- 

 mony of ail the best travellers, both to Africa and South America. Mr. 

 Bruce is very full and very explicit upon the subject. He distinctly states, 

 from minute personal observation, that " all the blacks in the kingdom of 

 Sennaar, whether Funge or Nuba, are perfectly armed {by nature) against 

 the bite of either scorpion or viper. They take the cerastes (or horned 

 serpent, being the most common, and one of the most fatal of all the viper 

 tribes) in their hands at all times, put them in their bosoms, and throw them 

 to one another, as children do apples or balls ;"§ during which sport the 

 serpents are seldom irritated to bite, and when they do bite, no mischief 

 ensues from the wound. The Arabs of the same (fbuntry, however, he 

 tells us as distinctly, have not this protection naturally ; but from their in- 

 fancy, they acquire an exemption from the mortal consequences attending 

 the bite of these animals, by chewing a particular root, and washing them- 

 selves with an infusion of particular plants in water. 



The Nuba and Funge, however. Or those who are preserved naturally 

 from the bite and venom of the viper and scorpion, are also highly skilful in 

 the knowledge and application of these roots, and other parts of plants, to 

 those who have no natural protection or charm. Mr. Bruce has given a 

 particular account of several of these plants, some of which seem only ^ 

 capable of acting against the power of the serpent, others only against that | 

 of the scorpion, and a third sort against both. And in either instance, | 

 where they secure against the bite or sting, and thus operate as a proven- I 

 tive or prophylactic, they also secure equally against the poison, when intro- | 

 duced into the system by a wound, and thus operate as an antidote. 



In South America the natural charm does not seem to be possessed by 

 any tribe : but the artificial charm obtained by the use of peculiar plants, 

 is known as extensively, and employed as successfully, as in Africa, and is 

 found to possess the same double virtue of an antidote and a preventive. 

 One of the most satisfactory accounts of this singular fact is contained in 

 a memoir, drawn up in 1791, by Don Pedro d'Orbies y Vargus, a native 

 of Santa Fe, which details a long and accurate list of experiments which 



* Ps. Iviii. 5. ; as also Jer. viii. 17. ; Deut. XTiii. 11. t Transl. of Sir William Jones 

 + Vol. iii. p. 491. Appendix. § Travels, Appendix, p. SOS. 



