Reporter and farmer. [volume] (Webster, Day County, Dakota [S.D.]) 188?-1946, 1884-11-20
Dreams and Dreamers.

From Harper's Weekly.
Dreams are in the main referred by
che savage either 10 the entrance into
him of some outside spirit as among the
Feejeeans, who believe that the spirit
pf q living man will leave the body to
trouble sleeping folk-or to the real
doings of himself. When tina Green
lander dreams of Hunting, or fishing, or
SQUIRTING, he believes that the soul quits
the body; the Dyaks OF Borneo think
that during sleep the sonl sometimes
remains in the body or travels far away,
being endowed, whether present or alb.
sent, with conditions which in walking
moments are lacking. Wherever we
find a low state OF mental Developments,
The like belief exists. In Mr.. Thnrnim'e
elaborate work on the Indians of Guiana
we have corroboratiye evidence the
more valuable because Of its freshness.
He tells us that the dreams which come.
TO the Indian are to him as real as any
OF the events of his waking life. To
himjdream acts and waking acts differ
only IN N respect, namely, that the for
mer are done only by the spirit, the iat-
ter are done by the spirit in its body.
Seeirg other men asleep and afterward
hearing from them the things which
they suppose themselves 10 have done
when asleep, the Indian hgs no difficult
ty in reconciling that which he hears
with the fact that the bodies of the
sleepers were N his sight ard motion
less throughout the time of supposed
action, because he never questions that
the spirits, leaving the sleepers. played
them part in dream adventures.
In the Scandinavian Vatnsdala Saga
there is a curious account OF three Firms
who were shut up in a hut three nights,
and ordered by Ingimund, a Norwegian
chief, TO visit Iceland and inform hin OF
the line Of the country where he was to
settle. Their bodies became rigid, and
they sent their sons on their errand,
and on their awaking, at the end OF
three days, gave an accurate account OF
the Vatnsdal, in which Ingimund ulti.
mately dwelt. No wonder that ia med
laval times, when witches swept the air
and har2ied the cattle, ~swooning and
other forms of insensibility we're adj
duced in support Of the theory of soul
absence, or that we find among sayages
las the Teiads OF the Luzon Islands
objections to waking a sleeper, lest the
soul happens to be out of the hed-
q coroiiary TO this belief in soul ab
sence, fear arises lest it be proiongsdtc
the peril of the owner, and hence n
rough-and-l eady theory Of the cause Of
disease is framed, for savages rarely
die in their beds. That disease
Is g arrangement OF functions, in.
terrupting their natural action, and car
rying attendant pain as its Indication.
could not enter tue head OF the unciyiI-
lied; aud. indeed, among ourselves a
cold or fever is commonly thought OF as
an entity in the body which has stolen
IN, and, having been caught, must be
somehow expelled. With the universal
primitive belief in spiritual agencies
everywhere inhaled with the breath or
swallowed with the food or drink, ali
diseases were regarded as their work.
whether. as remarked above, through
undue absence Of the rightful spirit or
subtle entrance OF some hostile one.
II these be the causes to which sickness
es are due, obviously the only cnre IA 10
get rid OF them, and henes the sorcerer
OF the mediterranean ind their services
IN request IN casting ont the demon nv
force or enticing him BY cajolery, or Ia
BRINGING back the trualt seal.