South and South Central Africa: A record of fifteen years' missionary labors among primitive peoplesDavidson, Hannah Frances
History
South and South Central Africa: A record of fifteen years' missionary labors among primitive peoples
Davidson, Hannah Frances
Brethren in Christ Church -- Missions; Missions -- Rhodesia; Ndebele (African people); Tsonga (African people)
These people also have their own remedies. When one is suffering with
pain in any part of the body, a very common remedy is to resort to
cupping. For this purpose they use the horns of animals, usually of
goats. I once watched one woman cupping another. With a knife or piece
of sharp tin, she made two incisions in the flesh where the pain was.
She then placed the large end of the horn on this, and with her mouth on
the small end she removed all the air from the horn, which soon became
filled, or nearly so, with blood. Leaving this horn on the place, she in
a similar manner applied another horn, until three or four had been
applied at various places. She then carefully removed them, one at a
time. Since the object had been to extract the blood, it had certainly
been successful, and in some respects the natives are only half a
century behind--that is all.
In some diseases they very readily come to us, and sometimes fifteen or
twenty are present at once, awaiting their turn. At other times we are
called to the villages to minister to them. Once some natives came from
the nearest village to say that a woman was dying. Her husband at the
time was one of the carriers for the brethren on their trip north. We
hastened over and found her in a little dark hut, where we could see
nothing, so they were told to carry her out into the light, that we
might see her. The livid spots, spongy gums, and extreme debility all
helped to indicate a bad case of scurvy. She was seemingly in the last
stages, and we were fearful that the call for help had come too late. It
was a year of great scarcity of food among the natives, and from the
report she must have been living chiefly on a sort of greens, with no
salt even to season it. It was now about dark, and they said that if
something was not done at once she could scarcely live until morning. We
looked to the Lord for direction and then hastened home to procure the
needed food, which in this instance was quite simple, salt water, and
boiled-down grape juice, with a little vinegar. These were used
carefully during the night, and in the morning she had improved
sufficiently to eat other food. In a few days she was able to be up, and
her husband, on the way home, was informed that she had been raised from
the dead.
As the work advanced, we arranged to use one of the huts for a hospital,
where those who desired might remain and be treated, and a number
availed themselves of the opportunity. Both Mr. and Mrs. Taylor were
quite successful in medical work, and some difficult cases came for
treatment. In this year Brother Taylor treated some very severe wounds,
ulcers, cancer, a boy with his hands blown to pieces by gunpowder, a
native badly lacerated by a leopard, and an European who had
accidentally shot himself, in addition to other cases. We have also had
opportunity at other times of ministering to white people.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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