and the difficulty is infinitely increased when the
enquirer has little or no knowledge of their language." Dr. Hagen had,
indeed, an excellent interpreter and intelligent assistant in the person
of a missionary, Mr. Hoffmann; but Mr. Hoffmann himself admitted that he
had no clear ideas as to the religious views of the Tamos; however, in
his opinion they are entirely destitute of the conception of God and of
a Creator. Yet among the Tamos of Bogadyim, Dr. Hagen tells us, a belief
in the existence of the soul after death is proved by their assertion
that after death the soul (_gunung_) goes to _buka kure_, which seems to
mean the village of ghosts. This abode of the dead appears to be
situated somewhere in the earth, and the Tamos speak of it with a
shudder. They tell of a man in the village of Bogadyim who died and went
away to the village of the ghosts. But as he drew near to the village,
he met the ghost of his dead brother who had come forth with bow and
arrows and spear to hunt a wild boar. This boar-hunting ghost was very
angry at meeting his brother, who had just died, and drove him back to
the land of the living. From this narrative it would seem that in the
other world the ghosts are thought to pursue the same occupations which
they followed in life. The natives are in great fear of ghosts (_buka_).
Travelling alone with them in the forest at nightfall you may mark their
timidity and hear them cry anxiously, "Come, let us be going! The ghost
is roaming about." The ghosts of those who have perished in battle do
not go to the Village of Ghosts (_buka kure_); they repair to another
place called _bopa kure_. But this abode of the slain does not seem to
be a happy land or Valhalla; the natives are even more afraid of it than
of the Village of Ghosts (_buka kure_). They will hardly venture at
night to pass a spot where any one has been slain. Sometimes fires are
kindled by night on such spots; and the sight of the flames flickering
in the distance inspires all the beholders with horror, and nothing in
the world would induce them to approach such a fire. The souls of men
who have been killed, but whose death has not been avenged, are supposed
to haunt the village. For some time after death the ghost is believed to
linger in the neighbourhood of his deserted body. When Mr. Hoffmann went
with some Tamos to another village to bring back the body of a fellow
missionary, who had died there, and darkness had fallen on them in t