THE CHILD AS HEALER AND PHYSICIAN.
Fingunt se medicos quivis idiota, sacerdos, Iudæus, monachus, histrio,
rasor, anus. [Any unskilled person, priest, Jew, monk, actor, barber,
old woman, turns himself into a physician.]--_Medical Proverb_.
_The Child as Healer and Physician_.
Though Dr. Max Bartels' (397) recent treatise--the best book that has
yet appeared on the subject of primitive medicine--has no chapter
consecrated to the child as healer and physician, and Mr. Black's
_Folk-Medicine_ (401) contains but a few items under the rubric of
personal cures, it is evident from data in these two works, and in many
other scattered sources, that the child has played a not unimportant
rôle in the history of folk-medicine. Among certain primitive peoples
the healing art descends by inheritance, and in various parts of the
world unbaptized children, illegitimate children, and children born out
of due time and season, or deformed in some way, have been credited with
special curative powers, or looked upon as "doctors born."
In Spain, to kiss an unbaptized child before any one else has done so,
is a panacea against toothache (258. 100). In north-eastern Scotland, "a
seventh son, without a daughter, if worms were put into his hand before
baptism, had the power of healing the disease (ring-worm) simply by
rubbing the affected part with his hand. The common belief about such a
son was that he was a doctor by nature" (246. 47). In Ireland, the
healing powers are acquired "if his hand has, before it has touched
anything for himself, been touched with his future medium of cure. Thus,
if silver is to be the charm, a sixpence, or a three-penny piece, is put
into his hand, or meal, salt, or his father's hair, 'whatever substance
a seventh son rubs with must be worn by his parents as long as he
lives.'" In some portions of Europe, the seventh son, if born on Easter
Eve, was able to cure tertian or quartan fevers. In Germany, "if a woman
has had seven sons in succession, the seventh can heal all manner of
hurt,"--his touch is also said to cure wens at the throat (462. III.
1152). In France, the _marcou_, or seventh son, has had a great
reputation; his body is said to be marked with a _fleur-de-lis_,
and the cure is effected by his simply breathing upon the diseased part,
or by allowing the patient to touch a mark on his body. Bourke calls
attention to the fact that among the Cherokee Indians of the
southeastern United States is this same belief that the seventh son is
"a natural-born prophet with the gift of healing by touch" (406. 457).
In France similar powers have also been attributed to the fifth son. The
seventh son of a seventh son is still more famous, while to the
twenty-first son, born without the intervention of a daughter,
prodigious cures are ascribed.
Nor is the other sex entirely neglected. In France a "seventh daughter"
was believed to be able to cure chilblains on the heels (462. III.
1152), and in England, as recently as 1876, the seventh daughter of a
seventh daughter claimed great skill as an herb-doctor.
In northeastern Scotland, "a posthumous child was believed to possess
the gift of curing almost any disease by looking on the patient" (246.
37), and in Donegal, Ireland, the peasants "wear a lock of hair from a
posthumous child, to guard against whooping-cough," while in France,
such a child was believed to possess the power of curing wens, and a
child that has never known its father was credited with ability to cure
swellings and to drive away tumours (462. III. 1152).
Twins, in many countries, have been regarded as prodigies, or as endowed
with unusual powers. In Essex, England, "a 'left twin' (_i.e._ a
child who has survived its fellow-twin) is thought to have the power of
curing the thrush by blowing three times into the patient's mouth, if
the patient is of the opposite sex" (469. 307). Among the Kwakiutl
Indians of British Columbia, twins are said to be able to cure disease
by swinging a rattle, and in Liberia (Africa) they are thought to
possess great healing powers, for which reason most of them become
doctors (397. 75).
In Sweden, "a first-born child that has come into the world with teeth
can cure a bad bite." In Scotland, "those who were born with their feet
first possessed great power to heal all kinds of sprains, lumbago, and
rheumatism, either by rubbing the afflicted part, or by trampling on it.
The chief virtue lay in the feet" (246. 45). In Cornwall, England, the
mother of such a child also possessed the power to cure rheumatism by
trampling on the patients. The natives of the island of Mas, off the
western coast of Sumatra, consider children born with their feet first
specially gifted for the treatment of dislocations (397. 75). Among the
superstitions prevalent among the Mexicans of the Rio Grande region in
Texas, Captain Bourke mentions the belief: "To cure rheumatism, stroke
the head of a little girl three times--a golden-haired child preferred"
(407. 139). The Jews of Galicia seek to cure small-pox by rubbing the
pustules with the tresses of a girl, and think that the scrofula will
disappear "if a _Bechôr_, or first-born son, touches it with his
thumb and little finger" (392 (1893). 142).
The power of curing scrofula--touching for the "King's Evil"--possessed
by monarchs of other days, was thought to be hereditary, and seems to
have been practised by them at a tender age. In England this "cure" was
in vogue from the time of Edward the Confessor until 1719, when,
according to Brewer, the "office" disappeared from the Prayer-book. The
French custom dated back to Anne of Clovis (A.D. 481). In the year of
his coronation (1654 A.D.), when Louis XV. was but eleven years old, he
is said to have touched over two thousand sufferers (191. 308).
_Blood of Children_.
In the dark ages the blood of little children had a wide-spread
reputation for its medicinal virtue. The idea that diseased and withered
humanity, having failed to discover the fountain of eternal youth, might
find a new well-spring of life in bathing in, or being sprinkled with,
the pure blood of a child or a virgin, had long a firm hold upon the
minds of the people. Hartmann von Aue's story, _Der arme Heinrich_,
and a score of similar tales testify of the folk-faith in the
regeneration born of this horrible baptism--a survival or recrudescence
of the crassest form of the doctrine that the life dwells in the blood.
Strack, in his valuable treatise on "Human Blood, in Superstition and
Ceremonial," devotes a brief section to the belief in the cure of
leprosy by means of human blood (361. 20-24). The Targumic gloss on
Exodus ii. 23--the paraphrase known as the Pseudo-Jonathan--explains
"that the king of Egypt, suffering from leprosy, ordered the first-born
of the children of Israel to be slain that he might bathe in their
blood," and the Midrasch Schemoth Rabba accounts for the lamentation of
the people of Israel at this time, from the fact that the Egyptian
magicians had told the king that there was no cure for this loathsome
disease, unless every evening and every morning one hundred and fifty
Jewish children were slain and the monarch bathed twice daily in their
blood. Pliny tells us that the Egyptians warmed with human blood the
seats in their baths as a remedy against the dreaded leprosy.
According to the early chroniclers, Constantine the Great, on account of
his persecution of the Christians, was afflicted with leprosy, which
would yield neither to the skill of native nor to that of foreign
physicians. Finally, the priests of Jupiter Capitolinus recommended a
bath in the blood of children. The children were gathered together, but
"the lamentations of their mothers so affected the Emperor, that he
declared his intention of suffering the foul disease, rather than be the
cause of so much woe and misery." Afterwards he was directed in a dream
to Pope Sylvester, was converted, baptized into the Church, and restored
to health (361. 22).
Other instances of this fearful custom are mentioned in the stories of
Percival (in the history of the Holy Grail), of Giglan de Galles et
Geoffrey de Mayence, and the wide-spread tale of Amicus and Amelius and
its variants, Louis and Alexander, Engelhard and Engeltrut, Oliver and
Arthur, etc., in all of which one of the friends is afflicted with
leprosy, but is cured through the devotion of the other, who sacrifices
his own children in order to obtain the blood by which alone his friend
can be restored to health. Usually, we are told, God rewards his
fidelity and the children are restored to life.
The physicians of King Richard I. of England are said, in one of the
fictions which grew up about his distinguished personality, to have
utterly failed to give relief to the monarch, who was suffering from,
leprosy. At last a celebrated Jew, after exhausting his skill without
curing the monarch, told him that his one chance of recovery lay in
bathing in the fresh blood of a newborn child, and eating its heart just
as it was taken out of the body. That the king adopted this horrible
remedy we are left to doubt, but of Louis XI of France, several
chroniclers affirm that he went even farther than the others, and, in
order to become rejuvenated, drank large quantities of the blood of
young children. In all these cases the character of the child as fetich
seems to be present, and the virtues ascribed to the blood drawn from
children (not always killed) belong not alone to medicine, but also to
primitive religion (361. 23).
Even the dead body of a child or some one of its members plays a
_role_ in folk-medicine in many parts of the globe. Grimm cites
from a document of 1408 A.D., a passage recording the cure of a leper,
who had been stroked with the hand of a still-born (and, therefore,
sinless) child, which had been rubbed with salve (361. 34). In
Steiermark, so Dr. Strack informs us, "a favourite cure for birth-marks
is to touch them with the hand of a dead person, especially of a child"
(361. 35). Among the charges made by the Chinese against the foreigners,
who are so anxious to enter their dominions, is one of "kidnapping and
buying children in order to make charms and medicines out of their eyes,
hearts, and other portions of their bodies." This belief induced the
riot of June, 1870, an account of which has been given by Baron Hubner,
and similar incidents occurred in 1891 and 1892. Somewhat the same
charges have been made (in 1891, for example) by the natives of
Madagascar against the French and other foreigners (361. 37).
_Medicine-Men._
Among many primitive peoples, as is the case with the Zulus, Bechuana,
Japanese (formerly), Nez Perces, Cayuse, Walla-Wallas, Wascos, etc., the
office of "doctor" is hereditary, and is often exercised at a
comparatively early age (397. 275). Dr. Pitre has recently discussed
some interesting cases in this connection in modern Italy (322).
Among certain Indian tribes of the Rocky Mountain region of the
northwestern United States, although he cannot properly practise his art
until he reaches manhood, the "medicine-man" (here, doctor) begins his
candidacy in his eighth or tenth year. Of the "wizards," or "doctors" of
the Patagonians, Falkner says, that they "are selected in youth for
supposed qualifications, especially if epileptic" (406. 456). While
among the Dieyerie of South Australia, the "doctor" is not allowed to
practise before having been circumcised, or to enter upon the duties of
his office before completing his tenth year, those young people become
"doctors," who, as children, "have seen the devil," i.e. have seen in a
troubled dream the demon _Kutchie_, or have had the nightmare. The
belief is, that in this way, the power to heal has been imparted to the
child (397. 75). Among the Yuki Indians of California, "the
'poison-doctor' is the most important member of the profession. The
office is hereditary; a little child is prepared for holding it by being
poisoned and then cured, which, in their opinion, renders him
invulnerable ever afterward" (519. 131). Among the Tunguses, of Siberian
llussia, a child afflicted with cramps or with bleeding at the nose and
mouth, is declared by an old shaman ("medicine-man," or
"medicine-woman") to be called to the profession, and is then termed
_hudildon_. After the child has completed its second year, it is
taken care of by an old shaman, who consecrates it with various
ceremonies; from this time forth it is called _jukejeren_, and is
instructed by the old man in the mysteries of his art (482. III. 105).
With these people also the female shamans have the assistance of boys
and girls to carry their implements and perform other like services
(397. 66). An excellent account of shamanism in Siberia and European
Eussia has been given by Professor Mikhailovskii (504), of Moscow, who
gives among other details a notice of the _kamlanie_, or
spirit-ceremonial of a young shaman belonging to one of the Turkish
tribes of the Altai Mountains (504. 71). Among the Samoyeds and Ostiaks
of Siberia, "the shamans succeed to the post by inheritance from father
to son" (504. 86). On the death of a shaman, "his son, who desires to
have power over the spirits, makes of wood an image of the dead man's
hand, and by means of this symbol succeeds to his father's power. Those
destined to be shamans spend their youth in practices which irritate the
nervous system and excite the imagination."
Among the Buryats of southern Siberia, it is thought that "the dead
ancestors who were shamans choose from their living kinsfolk a boy who
is to inherit their power. This child is marked by signs; he is often
thoughtful, fond of solitude, a seer of prophetic visions, subject,
occasionally, to fits, during which he is unconscious. The Buryats
believe that at such a time the boy's soul is with the spirits, who are
teaching him; if he is to be a white shaman, with the western spirits;
if he is to be a black shaman, among the eastern spirits." Usually, the
youth does not enter upon his duties until he has reached his twentieth
year (504.87).
The tribes of the Altai believe that "the ability to shamanize is
inborn; instruction only gives a knowledge of the chants, prayers, and
external rites." There is in early life an innate tendency to sickness
and frenzy, against which, we are told, the elect struggle in vain
(504.90): "Those who have the shamanist sickness endure physical
torments; they have cramps in the arms and legs, until they are sent to
a _kam_ [shaman] to be educated. The tendency is hereditary; a
_kam_ often has children predisposed to attacks of illness. If, in
a family where there is no shaman, a boy or a girl is subject to fits,
the Altaians are persuaded that one of its ancestors was a shaman. A
_kam_ told Potanin that the shamanist passion was hereditary, like
noble birth. If the _kam's_ own son does not feel any inclination,
some one of the nephews is sure to have the vocation. There are cases of
men becoming shamans at their own wish, but these _kams_ are much
less powerful than those born to the profession." Thus the whole
training of the _kam_ from childhood up to exercise of his official
duties is such as "to augment his innate tendencies, and make him an
abnormal man, unlike his fellows." When fully qualified, he functions as
"priest, physician, wizard, diviner."
_Moses_.
Of the childhood of Moses Oriental legend has much to say. One story
tells how the daughter of Pharaoh, a leper, was healed as she stretched
out her hand to the infant whom she rescued from the waters of Nile.
Well thus resumes the tale (547.122):--
"The eldest of the seven princesses first discovered the little ark and
carried it to the bank to open it. On her removing the lid, there beamed
a light upon her, which her eyes were not able to endure. She cast a
veil over Moses, but at that instant her own face, which hitherto had
been covered with scars and sores of all the most hideous colours
imaginable, shone like the moon in its brightness and purity, and her
sisters exclaimed in amazement, 'By what means hast thou been so
suddenly freed from leprosy?' 'By the miraculous power of this child,'
replied the eldest. The glance which beamed upon me when I beheld it
unveiled, has chased away the impurity of my body, as the rising sun
scatters the gloom of night.' The six sisters, one after the other, now
lifted the veil from Moses' face, and they, too, became fair as if they
had been formed of the finest silver. The eldest then took the ark upon
her head, and carried it to her mother, Asia, relating to her in how
miraculous a manner both she and her sisters had been healed."
We also learn that when Moses was six years old, being teased by Pharaoh
until he was angry, he kicked the throne over so that the king fell and
injured himself so that he bled at the mouth and nose. The intercession
of Asia and the seven princesses seemed vain, and the king was about to
thrust Moses through with his sword, when "there flew a white cock
toward the king, and cried: 'Pharaoh, if thou spill the blood of this
child, thy daughters shall be more leprous than before.' Pharaoh cast a
glance upon the princesses; and, as if from dread and fright, their
faces were already suffused with a ghastly yellow, he desisted again
from his bloody design" (547. 127).
_Child-Saints._
To other heroes, kings, saints, the power to heal which characterized
their years of discretion is often ascribed to them in childhood,
especially where and when it happens that the same individual is
prophet, priest, and king. In the unnumbered miracles of the Church
children have often figured. Lupellus, in his life of St. Frodibert
(seventh century A.D.), says: "When Frodibert was a mere child he cured
his mother's blindness, as, in the fulness of love and pity, he kissed
her darkened eyes, and signed them with the sign of the cross. Not only
was her sight restored, but it was keener than ever" (191. 45). Of St.
Patrick (373-464 A.D.) it is told: "On the day of his baptism he gave
sight to a man born blind; the blind man took hold of the babe's hand,
and with it made on the ground a sign of the cross." Another account
makes the miracle a triple one: "A blind man, taking hold of St.
Patrick's right hand, guided it into making on the ground a cross, when
instantly three miracles ensued: (1) A spring of water bubbled from the
dry ground; (2) the blind man, bathing his eyes with this water,
received his sight; and (3) the man, who before could neither write nor
read, was instantly inspired with both these gifts" (191. 237).
Brewer relates other instances of the miraculous power of the
child-saint from the lives of St. Genevieve (423-512, A.D.), St. Vitus,
who at the age of twelve caused the arms and legs of the Emperor
Aurelian to wither, but on the Emperor owning the greatness of God, the
"child-magician," as the monarch had termed him, made Aurelian whole
again; St. Sampson (565 A.D.), who cured a fellow schoolboy of a deadly
serpent's bite; Marianne de Quito (1618-1645 A.D.), who cured herself of
a gangrened finger (191. 442).
In his interesting chapters on _Fairy Births and Human Midwives_,
Mr. Hartland informs us that young girls have sometimes been called upon
to go to fairy-land and usher into the world of elves some little sprite
about to be born. Instances of this folk-belief are cited from
Pomerania, Swabia, Silesia. Rewards and presents are given the maiden on
her return, and often her whole family is blest, if she has acted well
(258. 37-92).
Close, indeed, are often the ties between the saint and the physician;
the healer of the soul and the healer of the body are frequently the
same. Other links bind the doctor to the hero and to the god. Of
AEsculapius, the great son of Apollo, exposed in childhood by his
mother, but nurtured by the goat of the shepherd Aresthanas, and guarded
by his dog, when he grew up to manhood, became so skilled in the uses of
herbs and other medicines that he received divine honours after his
death and came to be looked upon as the inventor of medicine as well as
god of the healing art.
_Origin of the Healing Art_
With some primitive peoples even the child is their. AEsculapius, at
once human and divine, hero and god. An Iroquois legend recorded by Mrs.
Smith attributes to a boy the discovery of witch-charms: "A certain boy
while out hunting came across a beautiful snake. Taking a great fancy to
it, he caught it and cared for it, feeding it on birds, etc., and made a
bark bowl in which he kept it. He put fibres, down, and small feathers
into the water with the snake, and soon found that these things had
become living beings. From this fact he naturally conjectured that the
snake was endowed with supernatural powers." So he went on
experimenting, and discovered many of the virtues of the snake water:
rubbing it on his eyes would make him see in the dark and see hidden
things; pointing his finger, after having dipped it in the bowl, at any
one would bewitch that person; by using it in certain other ways he
could become like a snake, travel very fast, even become invisible;
deadly indeed were arrows dipped in this liquid, and pointing a feather
so dipped at any game-animal would cause it to start for the creature
and kill it. In this fashion the boy learned the secret art of
witchcraft. Afterwards, by experimenting, he discovered, among the
various roots and herbs, the proper antidotes and counteracting agents
(534, 69, 70).
In his detailed account of the medicine-society of the Ojibwa, Dr.
Hoffman tells how the mysteries of the "Grand Medicine" were taught to
the Indians by the Sun-spirit, who at the request of the great Manido,
came down to earth and dwelt among men in the form of a little boy,
raising to life again his dead play-mate, the child of the people who
adopted him. After his mission was fulfilled, he "returned to his
kindred spirits, for the Indians would have no need to fear sickness, as
they now possessed the Grand Medicine which would enable them to live.
He also said that his spirit could bring a body to life but once, and he
would now return to the sun, from which they would feel his influence."
So the institution of "medicine" among the Ojibwa is called
_Kwí-wí-sens' we-di'-shi-tshi ge-wi-nip_, "Little-boy-his-work"
(473. 172,173).