An alcoholic traveling preacher and Fluteboy, his sidekick, run scam sermons and phony testimonials to the power of the Word for donations from an illerate populous in colonial American. The preacher’s main attraction to the power of Satan is boy that believes he is a bird with a broken wing. The preacher keeps the deformed and handicapped boy in a cage  The preacher’s brand of side-show religion proves lucrative and brings in ample donations to buy the preacher liquor and while ‘saving’ a few souls.  This  sheriff of the nearby town to the camp site where they capture Birdboy. He is brought to ‘justice’ when he is subjected to an exorcisim known as a witch-pricking. 

In spite of endless tortuous pricks with needles, the town witch-pricker can not find any evidence that the boy was possessed by the Devil. Near death from his wounds, he is laid out in his blood soaked robes on a raft and sent down the river to die. Devastated by the treatment of his friend, Fluteboy runs along the shoreline, following the journey of the raft when suddenly he sees Birdboy stand upright for the first time, his white robes blowing in the winds.