Their Buildings. Their Buildings which are very long and capable of entertaining 200 or 300 People, are made of the Bark of tall Trees, fixed with one End to the Ground, and leaning to, and fupporting one another at the Top, like fome of our Barns, the Roof of which defcends almoft to the Ground, and ferves inflead of the fide Walls. They have Wood fo hard, that they cleave it and make Swords of it and Grills to broil their Meat on. Their Beds. Their Beds, which are of Cotton, are hung up to the Roof, like our Seamen's Hammocks, and hold but one Perfon, for the Wives lie apart from their Hufbands. Their Meals, their Drink, and their Bread. They They rife with the Sun, and immediately fall to eating, when they make one Meal, which ferves them for the whole Day. do not then drink, (as Suidas reports of fome People of the Eaft, who never drank at their Meals) but they drink feveral Times in a Day, and to a hearty Pitch. Their Liquor is made of a certain Root, and is of the Colour of Claret; and they always drink it Lukewarm. It will not keep above two or three Days, has a brisk Savour, is not at all heady, is very good for the Stomach, but proves laxative to those who are not used to it, tho' to thofe who are, it a very pleasant Beverage. Instead of Bread, they make use of a certain white Compound, like Coriander Comfits; which I have tasted, and found to be sweet, but a little flat. Their Paftimes. They spend the whole Day in Dancing. The young Men go out to hunt the wild Beaft with Bows and Arrows. Part of their Women, in the mean Time, are employed in warming their Drink, which is their chief Employment. One of their old Men, in the Morning before they fall to eating, preaches to the whole Houshold, in common, walking from one End of the Houfe to the other, feveral Times repeating the fame Sentences, till he has gone all round the Family, (for their Buildings are at least 100 Yards long;) to whom he only recommends two Things, Valour against their Enemies, and Love to their Wives. And they never fail to put them in Mind how much much they are the more obliged to it, because it is the Women who provide them their Drink warm, and well relifhed. In feveral Places, and at my House amongst others, may be feen the Form of their Beds, Swords, and Wooden Gauntlets, with which they guard their Writs in Battle, and their Canes hollow at one End, by the Sound of which they keep Time in their Dancing. They fhave all their hairy Parts, and much more nicely than we, without any Razor but what is of Wood or Stone. They believe the Eternity of the Soul's Du- They believe ration, and that thofe who have deferved the Immortawell of the Gods, 'are lodged in that Part of the Firmament where the Sun rifes; and the Damned in the Weft. lity of the Soul. Their Priefts and Prophets, and how they their Morality are treated, if their Prophe cies prove falfe. They have I know not what kind of Priests and Prophets, who live in the Mountains, and are seldom feen by the People. Whenever they come down to them there is a great Festival, and a folemn Affembly of the People from many Villages, (or Barns, as I have defcribed them, which are about a French League from one another.) The Prophet then fpeaks to them in Publick, exhorting them to their Virtue and their Duty: But their whole Syftem of Morality, confift in these two Articles, Refolution in War, and Affection to their Wives. He also foretells to them Things to come, and what they muft expect will be the Event of their Enterprizes, and he either perfuades them to, or diffuades them from War, but woe be to him if he does not guefs right, for if it happens to them otherwife than he foretold, they condemn him for a falfe Prophet; and if they can catch him, cut him in a thousand Pieces. For this Reafon, if any one finds himself mistaken, he keeps out of Sight. Divination is a Gift of God, therefore to abufe it is an Imposture that ought to be punished. Among the Scythians, when their Diviners failed in their Predictions, they were bound Hand and Foot, and laid on a Cart loaden with Falle Prophets burnt by the Scythians. Furze, and drawn by Oxen, on which they were burnt to Death. Book I. Death*. they who only meddle with Things within the Sphere of Human Capacity, are excufable in doing the best they can: But as for thofe other People that come and delude us, with Affurances of an extraordinary Faculty, beyond our Understanding, ought they not to be punished for not making good their Promise, and for the Temerity of their Impolture? The Wars of the Savages, their Weapons and Manner of Fighting. They have Wars with the Nations that are beyond their Mountains, farther within the Main-land, to which they go ftark naked, without any Weapons, but Bows or WoodenSwords, pointed at the End like the Heads of our Javelins. Their Obftinacy in Battles is wonderful, as they never end without great Effufion of Blood, for they know not what it is to be frightened and to run away. Every one brings home for a Trophy the Head of fome Enemy that he has killed, which he fets up over the Door of his House. They eat their why. After having treated their Prisoners a good while in the handfomeft Manner they can think of, the Perfon who has the Property of them invites a great Number of his Acquaintance, and when they are come, ties a Cord to one of the Prisoners Arms, by one End of which he holds him fome paces Distance, that he may not Hurt him, and gives to the Friend he loves beft, the other Arm, to hold in the fame Manner, and then they two, in Prefence of the whole Affembly, run him through the Body with their Swords. This done, they roaft him and eat him in common, and fend fome Slices of him to their abfent Friends. They do not do this, as it is imagined, for the Sake of Nourishment, as the Scythians did of old, but to denote the laft Degree of Revenge; as will appear by this. That perceiving, that when the Portuguese had taken any Prifoners, they inflicted another fort of Death upon them, which was to fet them in the Earth up to the Waift, to let fly their Arrows at the upper Part, and then to hang them; they were of Opinion that thefe People of the other World, (as they had made their Neighbours acquainted with a great many Vices, and *Herodot. lib. iv. P. 279. far far outftripped them in all forts of Mischief) had a Reafon for taking this Sort of Revenge, and that it must be more fevere than theirs, and fo began to leave their old Way, and to follow this. I am not forry that we should here take Notice of the barbarous Cruelty of fuch an Action; but rather that, while we judge fo nicely of their Faults, we are so blind to our own. I think there is more Barbarity in Eating a Man alive than when he is dead; in tearing a Body Limb from Limb, by Racks and Torments, while it has the Senfe of Feeling, in Roafting it by degrees, in caufing it to be bit and worried by Dogs and Swine (as we have not only read but lately feen, not between veteran Enemies, but between Neighbours and fellow Citizens, and what is worfe, under pretence of Piety and Religion) than in Roafting and Eating it after it is dead. Chryfippus* and Zeno, the two Heads of the Stoical Sect, were of Opinion that there was no Hurt in making Use of our dead Bodies to any Purpose whatfoever, to ferve our Occafions and even for our Nourishment, as our Ancestors, when befieged by Cafar in the City Alexia, refolved to keep themfelves from being ftarved to Death by the Bodies of their old Men, Women and other Perfons, incapable of bearing Arms. Vafcones (fama eft) alimentis talibus ufi, 'Tis faid the Gafcons with fuch Meats as thefe, And the Phyficians fcruple not to make use of human Flesh every Way, either inwardly or outwardly for our Health. But the Savages here treated of, never maintained any Opinion fo enormous as to excufe Treafon, Difloyalty, Tyranny, and Cruelty, which are our familiar Vices: We may therefore ftile them barbarous, with an Eye to the Laws of Reason, but not in refpect to ourselves, who exceed them in all Kinds of Barbarity. VOL. I. R Diog. Laert, in the Life of Chryfippus, lib. vii, fect. 188. Their The Savages of Their Warfare is quite noble and generous, and is as excufable and commendable as that human Malady is capable of, it having no Foundation with them but the fole Jealousy of Virtue. They do not contend for the Conqueft of new Lands, for thofe they poffefs ftill enjoy that natural Fertility, which furnishes them without Labour and Toil, with fuch an abundance of all Neceffaries, that they have no need to inlarge their Borders. ner. They are alfo happy in this Circumstance Their Modera- that they defire no more than what the Neceffities of Nature demand, every Thing be tion. yond that, being to them fuperfluous. Their Cordiality to one another. Men of the fame Age generally call one another Brothers, thofe who are younger, Children, and the old Men are Fathers to all. These leave to their Heirs in common, the full Poffeffion of their Goods and Chattels, without any Divifion or any other Title than what Nature beftows upon her Creatures, at bringing them into the World. All that they get by any Victory over their Neighbours. If their Neighbours come over the Mountains to attack them and obtain a Victory over them, all that the Conquerors gain by it is Glory, and the Advantage of proving their Superiority in Valour and Prowefs; for they take no Spoils from the Vanquished, but return home to their own Country, where they have no Want of any Neceffaries, nor of that happy Knowledge how to live contentedly in their Condition. And thefe in their Turn do the fame. They demand no other Ranfom of the Prifoners they take, than the Confeffion and Acknowledgment of being vanquifhed. But there is not a Man of them to be found in a whole Century, who had not rather perifh, than abate an Ace of the Grandeur of his invincible Courage, either by a Look or Word. There is not one who had not rather be killed and eaten, than fo much as open his Mouth to defire he may not be fo treated. They indulge them with full Liberty, that their Lives may be fo much the dearer to them; yet commonly accoft them with Menaces of their approaching Death, of the Torments which they are |