nes
and said that he would sell one of these to me; if I put it into
warm water it would cure me. This was not quite to my liking, as I
wanted him to perform the magical feat of sucking maggots out of the
skin. He complied with my request, and told me to go ahead to my camp,
whither he would follow me soon. On his arrival I offered him some
food, as my case was not urgent, but he declined, and proceeded
to cure me. A saddle blanket was spread out for me to kneel on,
and my Mexican and Indian attendants were told to retire, while he
made his examination. Having ascertained that I had a headache,
he took my head between his dirty hands, pressed it, applied his
lips to my right ear, and commenced to suck very energetically. This
was rather trying to my nerves, though not unendurably so. Presently
he let go his hold, and spit out quite a lot of blood into a cup an
Indian boy was holding out to him. He repeated the operation on my
left ear with the same result. "More pain?" he asked. "Yes," I said,
"in my right hand." He immediately grabbed that member in his mouth,
biting almost through the skin over the pulse, and after having
sucked for a little while, deposited contents, of a similar nature,
into the cup from his mouth. It was afterward found that the blood
was mixed with a considerable number of grass seeds, which had been
the cause of my illness. I had not known that I was so "seedy."

The curing is often performed at dances, during the night, as
the family who give the feast expect to receive, in return for
all their trouble and expense, the benefit of the shaman's magic
powers, whether any of them are ill or not. Once a man, his wife,
and his child had been cured with tesvino, but nevertheless they still
anxiously looked to the shaman for more treatment, apparently feeling
that they needed more strength against coining evil. The woman said:
"Yesterday I fell into the water and got wet and felt ill, and in the
night I dreamed that I was dead and that you cured me." To this the
doctor replied, "Yes, that is why I came to cure you." Then, yielding
to their beseeching glances, he daubed them again, this time holding
their hands and with a little cross in his left hand. Then he said:
"Now you need not be afraid; I have cured you well. Do not walk about
any more like fools and do not get wet again." And they were content.

There is a shaman near Baqueachic (baka = bamboo reed) who has a
great reputation for curing cattl