rt time, constitutes
the object of their frivolous worship. They have a strong veneration
for the dead; and during several years it is their practice to visit
their graves, and there to leave a little tobacco or betel. The bow
and arrows which once belonged to the deceased are hung up over his
grave on the day of his interment; and every night, according to
the belief of his surviving comrades, he rises up out of his grave,
and goes to hunt in the forest.

Interments take place without any ceremony. The dead body is laid at
full length in a grave, which is covered up with earth. But whenever
one of the Ajetas is dangerously ill, and his recovery despaired of,
or that he has been even slightly wounded by a poisoned arrow, his
friends place him seated in a deep hole, with the arms crossed over
his breast, and thus inter him while living.

I thought of speaking to my interpreter on religion, and asked her
if she did not believe in a Supreme Being--an all-powerful Divinity,
on whom all nature--even we ourselves--depend in all things; and who
had created the firmament, and who was looking on at our acts. She
looked at me with a smile, and said: "When I was young, amongst
your brothers, I remember that they spoke to me of a master, who, as
they said, had Heaven for his dwelling-place; but all that was lies;
for see"--(she here took up a small stone and threw it into the air,
saying, in a very serious tone)--"how can a king, as you say, remain
in the sky any more than that stone?" What answer could I give to
such reasoning? I left religion aside, to put to her other questions.

I have already stated that the Ajetas did not often wait for the death
of a person to put him into the ground. As soon as the last honours are
rendered to a deceased, it is requisite, conformably to their usages,
to take revenge for his death. The hunters of the tribe to which he
belonged set out, with their lances and their arrows, to kill the first
living creature which should appear before their eyes--be it man,
stag, wild boar, or buffalo. From the moment they start in search
of a victim, they take care, in every part of the forest through
which they pass, to break the young shoots of the arbustus shrub,
by pointing its tops in the direction which they are following. This
is done to give a caution to their friends, and other passers-by,
to avoid those places in which they are searching for a victim, for
if one of themselves fell into their hands,