is invisible and works
his fell purpose not by a sword or a spear but by magic. Thus the
Abipones, a now extinct tribe of horse Indians in Paraguay, used to
allege that they would be immortal and that none of them would ever die
if only the Spaniards and the sorcerers could be banished from America;
for they were in the habit of attributing every death, whatever its
cause, either to the baleful arts of sorcerers or to the firearms of the
Spaniards. Even if a man died riddled with wounds, with his bones
smashed, or through the exhaustion of old age, these Indians would all
deny that the wounds or old age was the cause of his death; they firmly
believed that the death was brought about by magic, and they would make
careful enquiries to discover the sorcerer who had cast the fatal spell
on their comrade. The relations of the deceased would move every stone
to detect and punish the culprit; and they imagined that they could do
this by cutting out the heart and tongue of the dead man and throwing
them to a dog to be devoured. They thought that this in some way killed
the wicked magician who had killed their friend. For example, it
happened that in a squabble between two men about a horse a third man
who tried to make peace between the disputants was mortally wounded by
their spears and died in a few days. To us it might seem obvious that
the peacemaker was killed by the spear-wounds which he had received, but
none of the Abipones would admit such a thing for a moment. They stoutly
affirmed that their comrade had been done to death by the magical arts
of some person unknown, and their suspicions fell on a certain old
woman, known to be a witch, to whom the deceased had lately refused to
give a water-melon, and who out of spite had killed him by her spells,
though he appeared to the European eye to have died of a spear-wound.[7]

[Sidenote: Belief of the Araucanians.]

Similarly the warlike Araucanians of Chili are said to disbelieve in
natural death. Even if a man dies peaceably at the age of a hundred,
they still think that he has been bewitched by an enemy. A diviner or
medicine-man is consulted in order to discover the culprit. Some of
these wizards enjoy a great reputation and the Indians will send a
hundred miles or more to get the opinion of an eminent member of the
profession. In such cases they submit to him some of the remains of the
dead man, for example, his eyebrows, his nails, his tongue, or the soles
of his fee