Show < i SCIENC i6AffiTSIJPRSTIT1ON I Where Charms Spells and Incantations Are Thought to Be More Effective Than Medicine T BY CLEVELAND MOFFETT I One of the mostimportant features i of American missionary effort in Tur II key isthe Avorkjlorie by American physicians phy-sicians in overcoming the superstition j j and prejudices that are almost universal I j univer-sal in the country regarding the cause I I and treatment of disease The popular belief 011 the vhole subject may be f summed up thus The cause of disease i is Gods will the proper treatment of I disease to be let atone since med I dling with it shoAVs distrust in Gods I j wise government Thus ifa Turk has smallpox he goes to bed and waits to I see whether ne is to die or live He I puts his trust in Kader fate and not I in pills or lotions and his family and I I friends would think it unworthY of a i good Moslem to shun the sicknttm or1 1 ito set him apart if i others are to take I the disease veIl and good it is so l ordered that is the business of the I Radar The consequence is that I wherever you go in Constantinople or in the interior you see many pockmarked pock-marked faces and constantly hear of i I smallpox about you I I An American missionary told me of I i I an experience of his in Caesarea that illustrates the condition of things allover i 1 all-over the country lie was invited to I address a prayer meeting one night I held in an Armenian house and did so I in the presence of a good number of I men and women After the exercises I II he noticed two children bundled up on a divan where they had been lying I unobserved by him during the prayers I and preaching What is the matter with the little I ones he asked going near them I They are sick said the mother I On turning back the yourgan the missionary saw at a glance what the illness was They have the smallpox he said Yes said the mother it is Gods willBut S S But you h ve exposed all these people I peo-ple to the contagion Dont you know that they may get the disease I Who knows replied the woman I with true oriental philosophy This happened among Christians Armenian Protestants who nevertheless are I n more enlightaned in these matters than the Moslems and among them it is encouraging to note there has been i much progress thanks toAmerican influence in-fluence and every year increasing numbers of them are coming to be vaccinated vac-cinated But it will be a long time before the Turks will trust a competent compet-ent doctor rather than Kader There are thousands of villages in Asia Minor where there is no one who even makes pretence of thorough medical med-ical knowledge the whole business of healing the sick being left to the wqm en with their herbs and balsams and to fate On our journey over the plains Ave cameto one village wherethere was an epidemic of eye disease a fbfm of opthalmia with swelling and discharge that causes great pain and unless properly treated endangers the sight No sooner had we entered our khan than several of the sufferers came to us in deepest distress and begged that we do something for their relief A lotion of zinc sulphate or some other simple remedy might have saved the situation but we had none to give them and all night long were kept awake by the weeping and groaning about us Wherever Wher-ever travelers go in the interior they are appealed to by the natives as if they were doctors the general idea being be-ing that any man with a European hat V I I I 1Ii I I I I j I The Magic EggA Curious Way of Preventing Disease is competent to treat all bodily ailments I ail-ments from toothache to fOCal let fever THE VIRTUES OF AN EGGSHELL And yet the task of a physician in Turkey is not an easy one for he finds working against him not only this discouraging dis-couraging conviction of the people that I whatever is must be but their oft proved preference for talismans and superstitious practices to any medicines he can give them How can one deal I scientifically with people who regard this as the proper way to treat a baby suffering from anything frcm croup to I stomach ache First get a hens egg then make seAerul round holes in the I shell and empty out the contents through these hples Then dip the perforated per-forated eggshell under water and lift it quickly over a basin so that the water it holds will stream into the basin ba-sin Repeat this operation 39 times until the basin has received 40 shells full of water streamed through the seven holes Finally wash the sick baby in the basin thus filled and there is nothing more to be done Of course the death rate among children is deplorably de-plorably high but that does not change the peoples belief And consider the following treatment for boils which is much in vogue 1 I S t S I among adults A man afflicted with Jobs comf > rters starts confidently down the road flinging over his shoulder I shoul-der nuts or raisins and neA r looks behind him though the city burn down I i His belief is that whoever picks up one of the nuts or raisins fromihe roadway j i will take with it one of his boils It j may be seen that the blending Qf sai I ence and charity in this proceeding 1 gives something truly oriental Of similar interest is the common method of curing feversor trying to cure them I by getting some wise old Armenian to bind the patients wrist with cotton cloth This is supposed to Bind the fever at the same time and render it harmless > The missionary doctors in Turkey find another serious obstacle to their efforts against contagion inthe method of distributing water to the various houses that is in operation in many cities arid villages The water supply usually comes from a spring or stream on high ground near the city and this I water whe needed in pne section or I another is simply turned down this street that its course being regulated regu-lated by temporary dams and for hours it will flow down a certain set pf streets and is at the disposition of residents in that Aicinitj Some hasten to wash their clothes in it others fill earthen jars AAith it while those who have Avells l direct part of it into their mouths which are set on the pavement covered with fiat stones Owing to this arrangement it will be seen that the wells are filled with water which has run unprotected along the public pub-lic streets where donkeys and bullocks are constantly passing where the I wemen tread out the clothes of the I weekly wash where all manner of refuse re-fuse accumulates and here the slops II from all the houses are regularly I thrown The slightest consideration wIll I i make it plain that there could scarcely I be devised a more perfect system for II tiansmitting cqntagion than this and how well it succeeds may be illustrated I i by oe case among many When the i cholera plague was raging in Asia Minor a feAV years ago the disease was l j brought to Caesarea by a man from Siva who died almost immediately on l I j his arrival That night his body waS washed in thecourtyard of the house TJi 5 5 5 i 5 i 5 I I 4 r C I MAGIC STONE SUPPOSED TO NUL LTFY THE EFFECTS OF EVIL EYE and the water usid was thrown out into the public street when it flowed into a public fountain not far distant The I next day scores of people drank at that fountain and the day after that scores of people were dying And it is interesting to note that while the little band of Americans in I the plaguestricKen region were mak ing a brave and successful stand = gains the disease fighting with the I Aveapbns of science the Armenians were making blood sacrifices to appease ap-pease the angry gods and were marching march-ing abbiit the city led by their priests tleir voices In I lifting dirgelike chants and were openly declaring that the missionaries had brought the plague I upon them by posting up certain sanitary sani-tary instrjictibns in advance If these instructions had not been posted up i the cholera would never have visited I them This is a specimen of their rea I sonin c I Ignorant as the people of Turkey are regarding the nature and treatment of disease and superstitious and foolish as they have been they are nevertheless learning after years of practical demonstration dem-onstration that there is no such talisman talis-man against bodily ills as knowledge and they are trusting themselves and their children more and more to the r American doctors and those of the natives i na-tives who are qualified to practice medicine med-icine The only trouble is that there I are 10000 people who need help for one phiysician who is able to give it A single sin-gle man let his devotion be what it may cannot care for all the sick n a regidn covering 100 square miles One missionary doctor of my acquaintance tells me that whenever he goes on a tour he is literally besieged by the sick so much so that he can scarcely find time to eat and to treat 150 patients I pa-tients in a day all strangers to him is nothing unusual for him To be sure the missionary doctor as a matter mat-ter of principle try to make the people I peo-ple pay some nominal sum for their services say Ii or S cents for a consul t I tation f they pay nothing they are i apt to conclude that the advice is worth nothing but there are thousands thou-sands who cannot even pay so small a I sum as that and they are treated free |