Untitled - Smithsonian Institution

OlbbIchts] the swimmer MANUSCRIPT 113
be called by any other name than that of prestidigitation. Yet I
remain firmly convinced that ho was in unquestionably good faith in
this regard.
One of the more sinister persons in the profession is Jo. (70 years
old, widower). He is looked upon by all the others not only as an
outsider but as an impostor. This opinion I am rather inclined to
believe as doing justice to the facts, the more so as I have never been
able to induce him to work with me, in spite of his reputed greedy
love of money. He is a member of the Cherokee Council and a
preacher for one of the two Churches that makeefi'orts to evangelize the
people. It is quite a proposition to try to analyze Jo.'s personality,
as it is very intricate. Since he is a preacher, which to him is paramount
to being a full-fledged member of the intelligentsia of the white
people, he considers it just as necessary to belong to the leading
personalities of his own people; for this reason he becomes a medicine
man, or rather pretends to be one. Since, now, being a preacher
gives him the right and the authority to expound and explain the
hidden and secret meanings of Holy Writ to his congregation, he
thinks he also has the privilege of altering Cherokee traditional and
medical lore to suit his opinion; that is where he comes in open conflict
with the conservatives in general, and most of all with the ensign
bearers of conservatism, the medicine men.
To give an instance : Whereas tradition teaches that the future can
only be divulged by definitely specified means (beads, ''brown
stone," etc.), and by an elaborate ritual, Jo. pretends that he can
prophecy without any such paraphernalia; that he simply sees the
future happenings and events; that he has a revelation, as we would
say.
Such a statement, to the mind of those of the medicine men that are
sincere, is nothing short of blasphemy, and to those that are not quite
so honest, it is even more odious, because when you take away from
such a ceremony as divination all the mysterious uncanny, aweinspiring
proceedings, such as twisting the beads, intently watching
the dangling brown stone, praying to the Ancient Fire prior to dropping
the sacred tobacco over it—if all this is done away with, what
remains to impress the clients?
Yet the influence which Jo. has as a preacher and as a councillor
makes it possible for him to be a heretic and not be ostracized, and
to be a blasphemer and not to starve.
Knowing as he does the disdain he is held in by the other medicine
men, Jo. plays tit for tat, never letting an occasion pass to "make
them mad." The primordial quality of a Cherokee medicine man,
devotion to his patients, whether from a true moral incentive or from
mere love of the fee, is absolutely foreign to Jo., and as I know him,
I am honestly convinced that on the rare occasion a patient ascribes