He Follow'd The Direction Of His Dream,
And Became Perfectly Well In A Short Time.
Now, I suppose,
no Man has so little Sense as to believe this Fable; yet it lets us see
What they intend thereby, and that it has, doubtless, work'd Feats enough,
to gain it such an Esteem amongst these Savages, who are too well versed
in Vegetables, to be brought to a continual use of any one of them,
upon a meer Conceit or Fancy, without some apparent Benefit
they found thereby; especially, when we are sensible,
they drink the Juices of Plants, to free Nature of her Burdens,
and not out of Foppery and Fashion, as other Nations are oftentimes
found to do. Amongst all the Discoveries of America,
by the Missionaries of the French and Spaniards, I wonder none of them
was so kind to the World, as to have kept a Catalogue of the Distempers
they found the Savages capable of curing, and their Method of Cure;
which might have been of some Advantage to our Materia Medica at home,
when deliver'd by Men of Learning, and other Qualifications,
as most of them are. Authors generally tell us, that the Savages
are well enough acquainted with those Plants which their Climate affords,
and that some of them effect great Cures, but by what Means,
and in what Form, we are left in the dark. {Sassafras.}
The Bark of the Root of the Sassafras-Tree, I have observ'd,
is much used by them.
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