to
dry, and when it is thoroughly dried, it is sewed up in a basket, and
set at the feet of the corpse, to which it belongs. In this place also
they set up a quioccos, or idol, which they believe will be a guard to
the corpse. Here night and day one or other of the priests must give
his attendance, to take care of the dead bodies. So great an honor and
veneration have these ignorant and unpolished people for their princes,
even after they are dead.

The mat is supposed to be turned up in the figure, that the inside may
be viewed.

[Illustration: _Lith. of Ritchies & Dunnavant Richmond._
Tab. 12 Book 3 Pag. 170]

TAB. 12. Represents the burial of the kings.

CHAPTER IX.

OF THE DISEASES AND CURES OF THE INDIANS.

Sec. 41. The Indians are not subject to many diseases; and such as they
have, generally come from excessive heats and sudden colds, which they
as suddenly get away by sweating. But if the humor happen to fix, and
make a pain in any particular joint, or limb, their general cure then is
by burning, if it be in any part that will bear it; their method of
doing this is by little sticks of lightwood, the coal of which will burn
like a hot iron; the sharp point of this they run into the flesh, and
having made a sore, keep it running till the humor be drawn off; or else
they take punk, (which is a sort of soft touchwood, cut out of the knots
of oak or hickory trees, but the hickory affords the best,) this they
shape like a cone, (as the Japanese do their moxa for the gout,) and
apply the basis of it to the place affected. Then they set fire to it,
letting it burn out upon the part, which makes a running sore
effectually.

They use sucking in sores frequently, and scarifying, which, like the
Mexicans, they perform with a rattlesnake's tooth. They seldom cut
deeper than the epidermis, by which means they give passage to those
sharp waterish humors that lie between the two skins, and cause
inflammations. Sometimes they make use of reeds for cauterizing, which
they heat over the fire, till they are ready to flame, and then apply
them upon a piece of thin wet leather to the place aggrieved, which
makes the heat more piercing.

Their priests are always physicians, and by the method of their
education in the priesthood, are made very knowing in the hidden
qualities of plants and other natural things, which they count a part
of their religion to conceal from everybody, but from those that are to
s