On first visiting the reservation in the summer of 1887, I devoted
considerable time to collecting plants used by the Cherokees for food
or medicinal purposes, learning at the same time their Indian names
and the particular uses to which each was applied and the mode of
preparation. It soon became evident that the application of the
medicine was not the whole, and in fact was rather the subordinate,
part of the treatment, which was always accompanied by certain
ceremonies and “words.” From the workers employed at the time no
definite idea could be obtained as to the character of these words.
One young woman, indeed, who had some knowledge of the subject,
volunteered to write the words which she used in her prescriptions,
but failed to do so, owing chiefly to the opposition of the half-breed
shamans, from whom she had obtained her information.