Untitled - Smithsonian Institution

oIbrechts] the swimmer MANUSCRIPT 77
ing this operation. It will keep your teeth sound as long as you live.
The Tuscarora know exactly the same toothache-preventive practice.
In order not to be afflicted with boils this is the remarkable and
unappetizing advice given: Swallow the body of a living daddy-long-
legs (na-'kwsuli'), after first having pulled its legs off.
The awe-inspiring collection of Cherokee sacred and medicinal
formulas contain quite a few that are to be recited to avert evil and
disease; most of them are prayers of the kind which are called in
German "Segen"; some of them are boheved to insure a safe journey
if recited before setting out; others are claimed to make the recitant
invulnerable in war or strife, as one in Ms. Ill; others again are held to
keep the feet from being frost bitten (cf. Formula No. 60, p. 258), when
walking on the snow, etc.
In none of these cases is anj?^ material object used, however, and they
are therefore not further discussed here.
Change From Within— Influence From Without
In the course of this chapter attention has been called to a couple of
instances where the use of "surgical" instruments can actually be
caught in the process of an evolution. (See p. 69.)
Also, in the paragraph sketching a fev/ of the leading Cherokee
medicine men, there will be occasion to point out a change in practice
resulting from a modification in conception and outlook.
There are some more instances where Cherokee conceptions and
ideas mth regard to disease can be shown to have undergone, or to be
in the act of undergoing, some important changes.
In this respect it has been fortunate indeed that such a keen
observer as James Mooney repeatedly visited the tribe, his first visit
dating as far back as 1887. At that time it was still possible to obtain
information on a great many questions on which no light could now
be shed by any of the present medicine men. MoreoA'-er, at that time
the explanation and exegesis of the older informants was free of
skepticism and sophistication.
Much of what Mr. Mooney collected could now no longer be obtained,
and this in itself partly illustrates the process of change which
the Cherokee, as every other of the Aro.erican Indian tribes, is under-
going. Having Mooney's statements as to what conditions were like
in the eighties, and comparing them withthe state of things in 1926-27,
it is possible to see in what respects ideas have changed, in how far
opinions have altered.
Forty-five years seem a short span of time for fundamental changes
to occur in the belief and the ritual of a community living so secluded a
life as do the Cherokee in their mountains, but it should be borne in
mind that they have been exposed to white influence for many gener-
ationS; and that even more than a hundred years ago there existed,