ucceed them in their holy function. They tell us their god will be
angry with them if they should discover that part of their knowledge; so
they suffer only the rattlesnake root to be known, and such other
antidotes, as must be immediately applied, because their doctors can't
be always at hand to remedy those sudden misfortunes which generally
happen in their hunting or traveling.

They call their physic wisoccan, not from the name of any particular
root or plant, but as it signifies medicine in general. So that Heriot,
De Bry, Smith, Purchase and De Laet, seem all to be mistaken in the
meaning of this word wighsacan, which they make to be the name of a
particular root; and so is Parkinson in the word woghsacan, which he
will have to be the name of a plant. Nor do I think there is better
authority for applying the word wisank to the plant vincetoxicum
indianum germanicum, or winank to the sassafras tree.

The physic of the Indians consists for the most part in the roots and
barks of trees, they very rarely using the leaves either of herbs or
trees; what they give inwardly, they infuse in water, and what they
apply outwardly, they stamp or bruise, adding water to it, if it has not
moisture enough of itself; with the thin of this they bath the part
affected, then lay on the thick, after the manner of a poultice, and
commonly dress round, leaving the sore place bare.

Sec. 42. They take great delight in sweating, and therefore in every town
they have a sweating house, and a doctor is paid by the public to attend
it. They commonly use this to refresh themselves, after they have been
fatigued with hunting, travel, or the like, or else when they are
troubled with agues, aches, or pains in their limbs. Their method is
thus: the doctor takes three or four large stones, which after having
heated red hot, he places them in the middle of the stove, laying on
them some of the inner bark of oak beaten in a mortar, to keep them
from burning. This being done, they creep in six or eight at a time, or
as many as the place will hold, and then close up the mouth of the
stove, which is usually made like an oven, in some bank near the water
side. In the meanwhile the doctor to raise a steam, after they have been
stewing a little while, pours cold water on the stones, and now and then
sprinkles the men to keep them from fainting. After they have sweat as
long as they can well endure it, they sally out, and (though it be in
the depth of win