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66 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 99
Moreover, "in all cases of sickness, the doctor abstains from all
food imtU he is done treating the patient for the day. This usually
means imtil about noon, but in serious cases the doctor sometimes
fasts until nearly sundown. He must not eat in the house of the
patient but may eat in the yard outside." (Mooney, Notes.) There
is a marked tendency nowadays to abolish this custom stipulating
that the treating medicine man should also observe the taboos.
Fasting is a restriction that is rather frequently imposed upon the
patients, but we should have no misgivings. The proof that no sanitary
consideration is to blame is obvious; the patient conscientiously fasts
untU sunset, or in some cases until noon, when he is allowed to gorge
himself with food as if he were the most robust and healthy individual
on earth.
With regard to the second group of taboos, tbose referring to the
care of the patient and to his behavior, the most important one is the
segregation of the patient. There is nothing to be added to the
excellent account given of this custom by Mooney, SFC, pages 330-
332. It is still alive and thrivmg. It more than once happened to
me when I went to call on a sick member of the tribe that I was only
admitted after having sustained a rigorous cross-examination as to
the "conditio physiologica uxoris meae," etc. (See p. 35.)
In some cases (documentary evidence of all this will be found in the
formulas themselves) there are various injunctions to be observed
such as the following:
If the disease is caused by birds, all feathers are to be removed from
the cabin. (Feathers and quills are usually kept in the house to
feather the arrows.)
Nor should the children made ill by the birds be taken outside, lest
the shadow of a bird, flying overhead, might fall on it and aggravate
the ailment.
In diseases associated with the buffalo no spoon or comb made of
buffalo horn, nor a hide of that animal, was to be touched. This
taboo has been gleaned from a very old prescription, the age of which
is shown by its contents; the buffalo has been extinct in the Cherokee
country so long that the present Cherokee do not even remember
what the animal looks like.
The numerous injunctions and restrictions to be observed by a
pregnant woman have been listed together. (See p. 120.)
In some diseases, especially in those of the urinary passages, sexual
intercourse is prohibited. It is possible that a long time ago the
medicine man himself had to observe injunctions of contioence as long
as he had a patient of this kind under treatment, but I have not been
able to gather definite information on this score.
Attention should be drawn, finally, to the fact that the taboo may
depend on the number of simples used, as in Formula No. 55, or again,