Note 468 — THE WAMPANOAGS IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY An Ethnohistorical Study (continued 2)

“... they train up the most forward and likeliest boys, from their childhood, in great hardness, and make them abstain from dainty meat, observing divers orders prescribed, to the end that when they are of age, the devil may appear to them; causing to drink the juice of sentry and other bitter herbs, till they cast, which they must disgorge into the platter, and drink again and again, till at length through the extraordinary oppressing of nature, it will seem to be all blood; and this the boys will do with eagerness at the first, and so continue till by reason of faintness, they can scarce stand on their legs, and then must go forth into the cold. Also they beat their shins with sticks, and cause them to run through bushes, stumps and brambles to make them hardy and acceptable to the devil, that in time he may appear unto them.”; Ibid., p. 360.