ative. So in Porto
Rico: not a man is to be found there to-day who is a pure-blooded
aborigine. Even their relics and monuments, their traditions and
history, were obliterated by their conquerors--the race that destroyed
the libraries of the Moors and the picture records of the Aztecs. Few
even of their burial places are known, although the Cave of the Dead,
near Caguana, was so named because of the Indian skeletons found in it.

Some of the tools and implements of stone found on the island are
so strange that one cannot even guess their purpose. Of the heavy
stone collars that have been preserved, a priest holds that they
were placed about the necks of the dead, that the devil might not
lift them out of their graves, but this sounds like an invention of
the church, for there is no proof that a belief in the devil existed
among these people. They had a god, as well as minor spirits, and sang
hymns to them; they had some crafts and arts, for they made canoes,
huts, chairs, nets, hammocks, pottery, weapons, and implements,
and, although the fierce Caribs vexed them now and again, they were
accounted as the gentlest and most advanced of the native people in the
Antilles. Speaking of the hammock, that is one of their devices that
the world has generally adopted, and the name is one of the few Indian
words that have survived the Spanish oppressions, though there are many
geographic titles. Other familiar survivals are the words hurricane,
canoe, tobacco, potato, banana, and a few other botanical names.

It is probable that these Boriquenos were allied in speech and custom,
as well as in blood, to their neighbors the Haytiens, of whom saith
Peter Martyr, "The land among these people is common as sun and
water. 'Mine' and 'thine,' the seeds of all mischief, have no place
among them. They are content with so little that in this large country
they have more than plenty. They live in a golden world without toil,
in open gardens, not intrenched, defended, or divided. They deal truly
with one another, without laws, judges, or books. He that will hurt
another is an evil man, and while they take no pleasure in superfluity,
they take means to increase the roots that are their food--diet so
simple that their health is assured." Still, it is known that in their
defence against the marauding Caribs the Porto Ricans were courageous,
and had become adept with arrow and club, and it was believed by some
of the first explorers that they ate