SUPERSTITION.
Great and powerful as the Indian conceives himself to be, firm and
undaunted as he really is, braving all seasons and weathers, careless
of dangers, patient of hunger, thirst and cold, and fond of displaying
the native energy of his character even in the midst of tortures, at
the very thought of which our own puny nature revolts and shudders;
this Lord of the Creation, whose life is spent in a state of constant
warfare against the wild beasts of the forest and the savages of the
wilderness, who, proud of his independent existence, strikes his breast
with exultation and exclaims “_I am a man!_”--the American Indian has
one weak side, which sinks him down to the level of the most fearful
and timid being, a childish apprehension of an occult and unknown
power, which, unless he can summon sufficient fortitude to conquer it,
changes at once the hero into a coward. It is incredible to what a
degree the Indians’ superstitious belief in witchcraft operates upon
their minds; the moment that their imagination is struck with the idea
that they are bewitched, they are no longer themselves; their fancy is
constantly at work in creating the most horrid and distressing images.
They see themselves falling a sacrifice to the wicked arts of a vile
unknown hand, of one who would not have dared to face them in fair
combat; dying a miserable, ignominious death; a death, to which they
would a thousand times prefer the stake with all its horrors. No tale,
no tradition, no memorial of their courage or heroic fortitude will
go down with it to posterity; it will be thought that they were not
deserving of a better fate. And, (O! dreadful thought to an Indian
mind!) that death is to remain forever unrevenged;--their friends,
their relations, the men of their own tribe, will seek the murderer in
vain; they will seek him while, perhaps, he is in the midst of them,
unnoticed and unknown, smiling at their impotent rage, and calmly
selecting some new victim to his infernal art.
Of this extraordinary power of their conjurers, of the causes which
produce it, and the manner in which it is acquired, the Indians as
may well be supposed, have not a very definite idea. All they can
say is that the sorcerer makes use of a “deadening substance,” which
he discharges and conveys to the person that he means to “_strike_,”
through the air, by means of the wind or of his own breath, or throws
at him in a manner which they can neither understand nor describe. The
person thus “_stricken_,” is immediately seized with an unaccountable
terror, his spirits sink, his appetite fails, he is disturbed in his
sleep, he pines and wastes away, or a fit of sickness seizes him,
and he dies at last a miserable victim to the workings of his own
imagination.
Such are their ideas and the melancholy effects of the dread they feel
of that supernatural power which they vainly fancy to exist among them.
That they can destroy one another by means of poisonous roots and
plants, is certainly true, but in this there is no witchcraft. This
prejudice that they labour under can be ascribed to no other cause than
their excessive ignorance and credulity. I was once acquainted with a
white man, a shrewd and correct observer, who had lived long among the
Indians, and being himself related to an Indian family, had the best
opportunities of obtaining accurate information on this subject. He
told me that he had found the means of getting into the confidence of
one of their most noted sorcerers, who had frankly confessed to him,
that his secret consisted in exciting fear and suspicion, and creating
in the multitude a strong belief in his magical powers, “For,” said he,
“such is the credulity of many, that if I only pick a little wool from
my blanket, and roll it between my fingers into a small round ball, not
larger than a bean, I am by that alone believed to be deeply skilled
in the magic art, and it is immediately supposed that I am preparing
the deadly substance with which I mean to strike some person or other,
although I hardly know myself at the time what my fingers are doing;
and if, at that moment, I happen to cast my eyes on a particular man,
or even throw a side glance at him, it is enough to make him consider
himself as the intended victim; he is from that instant effectually
_struck_, and if he is not possessed of great fortitude, so as to be
able to repel the thought, and divert his mind from it, or to persuade
himself that it is nothing but the work of a disturbed imagination, he
will sink under the terror thus created, and at last perish a victim,
not indeed, to witchcraft, but to his own credulity and folly.”
But men of such strong minds are not often to be found; so deeply
rooted is the belief of the Indians in those fancied supernatural
powers. It is vain to endeavour to convince them by argument that
they are entirely founded in delusion and have no real existence. The
attempt has been frequently made by sensible white men, but always
without success. The following anecdote will shew how little hope there
is of ever bringing them to a more rational way of thinking.
Sometime about the year 1776, a Quaker trader of the name of John
Anderson, who among the Indians was called _the honest Quaker trader_,
after vainly endeavouring to convince those people by argument that
there was no such thing as witchcraft, took the bold, and I might say
the rash, solution to put their sorcerers to the test, and defy the
utmost exertions of their pretended supernatural powers. He desired
that two of those magicians might be brought successively before him
on different days, who should be at liberty to try their art on his
person, and do him all the harm that they could by magical means,
in the presence of the chiefs and principal men of the village. The
Indians tried at first to dissuade him from so dangerous an experiment;
but he persisted, and at last they acceded to his demand; a conjurer
was brought to him, who professed himself fully competent to the task
for which he was called, but he could not be persuaded to make the
attempt. He declared that Anderson was so good and so honest a man, so
much his friend and the friend of all the Indians, that he could not
think of doing him an injury. He never practised his art but on bad
men and on those who had injured him; the great Mannitto forbid that he
should use it for such a wicked purpose as that for which he was now
called upon.
The Indians found this excuse perfectly good, and retired more
convinced than ever of the abilities of their conjurer, whom they now
revered for his conscientious scruples.
The one who was brought on the next day was of a different stamp. He
was an arch sorcerer, whose fame was extended far and wide, and was
much dreaded by the Indians, not only on account of his great powers,
but of the wicked disposition of his mind. Every effort was made to
dissuade Mr. Anderson from exposing himself to what was considered
as certain destruction; but he stood firm to his purpose, and only
stipulated that the magician should sit at the distance of about twelve
feet from him; that he should not be armed with any weapon, nor carry
any poison or any thing else of a known destructive nature, and that
he should not even rise from his seat, nor advance towards him during
the operation. All this was agreed to, the conjurer boasting that he
could effect his purpose even at the distance of one hundred miles. The
promised reward was brought and placed in full view, and both parties
now prepared for the experiment.
The spectators being all assembled, the sorcerer took his seat, arrayed
in the most frightful manner that he could devise. Anderson stood firm
and composed before him at the stipulated distance. All were silent
and attentive while the wizard began his terrible operation. He began
with working with his fingers on his blanket, plucking now and then
a little wool and breathing on it, then rolling it together in small
rolls of the size of a bean, and went through all the antic tricks to
which the power of bewitching is generally ascribed. But all this had
no effect. Anderson remained cool and composed, now and then calling
to his antagonist not to be sparing of his exertions. The conjurer now
began to make the most horrid gesticulations, and used all the means
in his power to frighten the honest Quaker, who, aware of his purpose,
still remained unmoved. At last, while the eyes of all the spectators
were fixed on this brave man, to observe the effects of the sorcerer’s
craft upon him, this terrible conjurer, finding that all his efforts
were in vain, found himself obliged to give up the point, and alleged
for his excuse “that the Americans[199] eat too much salt provisions;
that salt had a repulsive effect, which made the powerful invisible
substance that he employed recoil upon him; that the Indians, who eat
but little salt, had often felt the effects of this substance, but that
the great quantity of it which the white men used effectually protected
them against it.”
The imposition in this instance was perfectly clear and visible,
and nothing was so easy as to see through this sorcerer’s miserable
pretence, and be convinced that his boasted art was entirely a
deception; but it was not so with the Indians, who firmly believed
that the salt which the Americans[199] used was the only cause of his
failure in this instance, and that if it had not been for the salted
meat which Mr. Anderson fed upon, he would have fallen a victim as well
as others to the incantations of this impostor.
I have received this story from the mouth of Mr. Anderson himself,
who was a most respectable gentleman, and also from several credible
Indians who were present at the time. After this bold and unsuccessful
experiment, it is impossible to expect that the superstitious notions
of the Indians on the subject of witchcraft can ever by any means be
rooted out of their minds.[200]