VEGETABLE PRODUCTS USED BY NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS. 171 
against the notion that the “ medicine men ” are equivalent to the “ doctors,”— 
not so; they are mere sorcerers, and though practising medicine, in so far as 
sorcery and superstition are concerned, yet the healing art proper is in the hands 
of old women, who are supposed to be skilful that way, and large fees are some¬ 
times exacted from their patients. Surgery they know little or nothing about. 
I know a very celebrated (and also a very brave) chief, who had rheumatism of 
the knee-joint. He diagnosed it to be caused by dirt getting in, and accord¬ 
ingly he absolutely proceeded to bore a hole through the patella, in order that 
he might get a stream of water in, to wash out the foul joint! For fractures 
they use, as w r e do, splints. On one occasion I was travelling in the mountains, 
my only companion an Indian boy, who, at a distance of several miles from the 
nearest abode of man, fell and snapped the femur; luckily it was not displaced. 
With the aid of cedar [Thuja) bark,—used as pasteboard splints,—and tearing the 
boy’s shirt into bandages, I managed to reduce the fracture; I then raised the 
boy as well as I could on my back. In this manner the north-western surgeon 
and his patient took their way through forest and through swamps, over fallen 
trees, and crawling along cliffs, and fording swollen mountain-streams until we 
reached an Indian village, where I committed him to more skilful nurses. 
Aided by a good constitution and wonderful good luck, the boy recovered, and 
when last I visited that part of the country, I found him perfectly well, and 
that my fame had grown very great in the land. The liber of Abies Mertens- 
iana , Lindl., is sometimes used as sticking-plaster. Their knowledge of the 
virtues of plants are, as I have said, merely empirical, but nevertheless they are 
used sometimes in acts “ more honoured in the breach than in the observance.” 
No crime is more common among Indian women than that of procuring abor¬ 
tion. They generally accomplish this by mechanical means, but some species 
of plants are also used, such as a species of orchid. From the plant, root, leaves, 
and stems is formed a decoction which is drunk by the women several times a 
day, until the effect is produced. It is said to be very effectual. The scrapings 
of a human skull are used in the same way, and some species of shells are looked 
on as what old Master Pomet would cali “ the sovereignest remedy on earth,” 
for the same purpose. The infusion of the young cones of various species of pine 
and fir is thought to be very useful in preventing women bearing any children. 
The roots of a geranium are also used among the Lilloets in British Columbia, 
for the same purpose. Among the Pondereille Indians the rattles of a rattle¬ 
snake are thought to ease labour. I have heard much from the Hudson’s Bay 
officers about the virtues of a species of Valeriana (?), called “kunko,” by the 
M‘Leod’s Lake and other Takali tribes in British Columbia, as a specific in rheu¬ 
matism. The berries of Symphocarjpus racemosus, Mich., are used about 
Lilloet for colds. JBerberis aquifolium , Pursh (the u Oregon grape ”), the juice 
of a JBetula, Echhiopanax horridum , Sm., and an infusion of leaves of Abies 
Douglasii , or other fir, under the name of “ spruce-tea,” are all held in great 
estimation among the Indian and frontiers-men in venereal diseases.* A decoc¬ 
tion of the roots of the Berberis has long been held in great esteem among the 
Indian tribes in the north, and is equally w r ell known and valued among the back¬ 
woodsmen and frontier-miners, hunters, and others accustomed to mingle much 
among the native races. It is an excellent tonic, and there seem to be some 
good grounds for this universal appreciation of its properties as a curative in 
syphilitic and other venereal diseases, now becoming so rife among the Indians 
and on the frontier. I saw the roots of some species of Umbelliferce (Arch- 
angelica peregrina, Nutt.?) employed with manifestly good effect as a poultice 
to inflammatory swellings. A decoction of Achlys triphylla, DC., is used as 
* The roots of Aralea nudicaulis are said to be used by the Crees in venereal diseases* 
They also apply the bruised bark to recent wounds (Hook. 1. c .fide Richardson, i. 274). 
