DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.70300#0283
SELF-TORTURE IN THE EAST INDIES.
249
the tree, and a person makes a mark with his dusty fingers,
where the hooks are to be put Another person immedi-
ately gives him a smart clap on one side of the back, and
pinches up the skin hard with his thumb and fingers, while
another passes the hook through, taking hold of about an
inch of the skin—the other hook is then in like manner put
through the skin of the other side of the back, and the man
gets up on his feet. As he is rising, some water is thrown in
his face. He then mounts on a man’s back, or on some
other eminence, and the strings which are attached to the
hooks in his back, are tied to the rope at one end of the hori-
zontal bamboo, and the rope at the other end is held by
several men, who, drawing it down, raise up the end on
which the man swings, and by their running round with
that rope, the machine is turned. In swinging, the man
describes a circle of about thirty feet in diameter; and he
carries a basket containing the herbs before offered to Seeb,
which are thrown down by handfuls; but I saw nobody
pick them up.
“ Only two men swung this year, at this place, and one of
them only five minutes ; the other swung a quarter of an
hour, and smoked his hooka as he was whirled round. In less
than two days, I examined his back, which was quite well,
and scarcely a mark of the hooks left. I saw a man, when
he descended, chew some piper betel, the juice of which he
injected from his mouth into the wounds ; he then applied
two leaves of the same plant, and tied on a cloth ; no other
application was used, except a squeezing up of the wounds
with the hand, and setting the knee of another man against
his breast, which he pushed hard, holding his shoulders
by his hands. I asked the man if the pain was not great ?
He said no—it was much like the bite of an ant.”
In page 28, Mr. Thomas says—" The two iron flesh-
hooks pass through the integuments on each side the back-
bone, and they are suspended above forty feet in the air, and
249
the tree, and a person makes a mark with his dusty fingers,
where the hooks are to be put Another person immedi-
ately gives him a smart clap on one side of the back, and
pinches up the skin hard with his thumb and fingers, while
another passes the hook through, taking hold of about an
inch of the skin—the other hook is then in like manner put
through the skin of the other side of the back, and the man
gets up on his feet. As he is rising, some water is thrown in
his face. He then mounts on a man’s back, or on some
other eminence, and the strings which are attached to the
hooks in his back, are tied to the rope at one end of the hori-
zontal bamboo, and the rope at the other end is held by
several men, who, drawing it down, raise up the end on
which the man swings, and by their running round with
that rope, the machine is turned. In swinging, the man
describes a circle of about thirty feet in diameter; and he
carries a basket containing the herbs before offered to Seeb,
which are thrown down by handfuls; but I saw nobody
pick them up.
“ Only two men swung this year, at this place, and one of
them only five minutes ; the other swung a quarter of an
hour, and smoked his hooka as he was whirled round. In less
than two days, I examined his back, which was quite well,
and scarcely a mark of the hooks left. I saw a man, when
he descended, chew some piper betel, the juice of which he
injected from his mouth into the wounds ; he then applied
two leaves of the same plant, and tied on a cloth ; no other
application was used, except a squeezing up of the wounds
with the hand, and setting the knee of another man against
his breast, which he pushed hard, holding his shoulders
by his hands. I asked the man if the pain was not great ?
He said no—it was much like the bite of an ant.”
In page 28, Mr. Thomas says—" The two iron flesh-
hooks pass through the integuments on each side the back-
bone, and they are suspended above forty feet in the air, and