From our misfortunes, I named our encampment, on Wava Lagoon, “Fever Camp,” although so far from contracting the fever there, I am sure it was its open and elevated position which contributed to my recovery. The fever was rather due to over-exertion, and exposure at night; for the night-damps, on all low coasts under the tropics, are unquestionably deadly, and the traveler cannot be too careful in avoiding them. Early in the afternoon of the day of our departure from “Fever Camp,” we entered a large stream, flowing into the lagoon from the north-west, upon the banks of which, judging from the direction of the smoke we had seen, the Indian villages were situated. We were not mistaken. Before night we came to a village larger than that on the Rio Grande, but in other respects much the same, except that it stood upon the edge of an extensive savannah, instead of on the skirt of an impenetrable forest. Around it were extensive plantations of cassava, and other fruits and vegetables, growing in the greatest luxuriance, and indicating that the soil of the inland savannahs does not share the aridity of those nearer the coast. This was further evinced by the scarcity of pines, which were only to be seen on the ridges or gentle elevations with which the surface of the savannah was diversified.
Our appearance here created the same excitement which it had occasioned at the other places we had visited, and our reception was much the same with that which we had experienced on the Rio Grande. Instead, however, of being met by men with wands, we were welcomed by five old men, one of whom vacated his own hut for our accommodation. None here could speak either English or Spanish intelligibly, but the affinity between their language and that of my Poyer enabled him to make known our wants, and obtain all useful information. We were treated hospitably, but with the utmost reserve, and during my whole stay, but a single incident relieved the monotony of the village. This was a marriage—and a very ceremonious affair it was.
These Indians, I should explain, are called Towkas, or Toacas, and have, I presume, all the general characteristics and habits of the Cookras and Woolwas. These do, in fact, constitute a single family, although displaying dialectical differences in their language.
TOWKAS INDIANS.
Among all these Indians, polygamy is an exception, while among the Sambos it is the rule. The instances are few in which a man has more than one wife, and in these cases the eldest is not only the head of the family, but exercises a strict supervision over the others. The betrothals are made at a very early age, by the parents, and the affianced children are marked in a corresponding manner, so that one acquainted with the practice can always point out the various mates. These marks consist of little bands of colored cotton, worn either on the arm, above the elbow, or on the leg, below the knee, which are varied in color and number, so that no two combinations in the village shall be the same. The combinations are made by the old men, who take care that there shall be no confusion. The bands are replaced from time to time, as they become worn and faded. Both boys and girls also wear a necklace of variously-colored shells or beads, to which one is added yearly. When the necklace of the boy counts ten beads or shells, he is called muhasal, a word signifying three things, viz., ten, all the fingers, and half-a-man. When they number twenty, he is called ’all, a word which also signifies three things, viz., twenty, both fingers and toes, and a man. And he is then effectively regarded as a man. Should his affianced, by that time, have reached the age of fifteen, the marriage ceremony takes place without delay.
As I have said, a sleek young Towka was called upon to add the final bead to his string, and take upon himself the obligations of manhood, during my stay at the village. The event had been anticipated by the preparation of a canoe full of palm-wine, mixed with crushed plantains, and a little honey, which had been fermenting, to the utter disgust of my nostrils, from the date of my arrival. The day was observed as a general holiday. Early in the morning all the men of the village assembled, and with their knives carefully removed every blade of grass which had grown up inside of a circle, perhaps a hundred feet in diameter, situated in the very centre of the village, and indicated by a succession of stones sunk in the ground. The earth was then trampled smooth and hard, after which they proceeded to erect a little hut in the very centre of the circular area, above a large flat stone which was permanently planted there. This hut was made conical, and perfectly close, except an opening at the top, and another at one side, toward the east, which was temporarily closed with a mat, woven of palm-bark. I looked in without hinderance, and saw, piled up on the stone, a quantity of the dry twigs of the copal-tree, covered with the gum of the same. The canoe full of liquor was dragged up to the edge of the circle, and literally covered with small white calabashes, of the size of an ordinary coffee-cup.
At noon, precisely, all the people of the village hurried, without order, to the hut of the bridegroom’s father. I joined in the crowd. We found the “happy swain” arrayed in his best, sitting demurely upon a bundle of articles, closely wrapped in a mat. The old men, to whom I have referred, formed in a line in front of him, and the eldest made him a short address. When he had finished, the next followed, until each had had his say. The youth then got up quietly, shouldered his bundle, and, preceded by the old men, and followed by his father, marched off to the hut of the prospective bride. He put down his load before the closed door, and seated himself upon it in silence. The father then rapped at the door, which was partly opened by an old woman, who asked him what he wanted, to which he made some reply which did not appear to be satisfactory, when the door was shut in his face, and he took his seat beside his son. One of the old men then rapped, with precisely the same result, then the next, and so on. But the old women were obdurate. The bridegroom’s father tried it again, but the she-dragons would not open the door. The old men then seemed to hold a council, at the end of which a couple of drums (made, as I have already explained, by stretching a raw skin over a section of a hollow tree), and some rude flutes were sent for. The latter were made of pieces of bamboo, and were shaped somewhat like flageolets, each having a mouth-piece, and four stops. The sound was dull and monotonous, although not wholly unmusical.
Certain musicians now appeared, and at once commenced playing on these instruments, breaking out, at long intervals, in a kind of supplicatory chant. After an hour or more of this soothing and rather sleepy kind of music, the inexorable door opened a little, and one of the female inmates glanced out with much affected timidity. Hereupon the musicians redoubled their efforts, and the bridegroom hastened to unroll his bundle. It contained a variety of articles supposed to be acceptable to the parents of the girl. There was, among other things, a machete, no inconsiderable present, when it is understood that the cost of one is generally a large dory, which it requires months of toil to fashion from the rough trunk of the gigantic ceiba. A string of gay glass beads was also produced from the bundle. All these articles were handed in to the women one by one, by the father of the groom. With every present the door opened wider and wider, until the mat was presented, when it was turned back to its utmost, revealing the bride arrayed in her “prettiest,” seated on a crickery, at the remotest corner of the hut. The dragons affected to be absorbed in examining the presents, when the bridegroom, watching his opportunity, dashed into the hut, to the apparent utter horror and dismay of the women; and, grasping the girl by the waist, shouldered her like a sack, and started off at a trot for the mystic circle, in the centre of the village. The women pursued, as if to overtake him and rescue the girl, uttering cries for help, while all the crowd huddled after. But the youth was too fast for them; he reached the ring, and lifting the vail of the hut, disappeared within it. The women could not pass the circle, and all stopped short at its edge, and set up a chorus of despairing shrieks, while the men all gathered within the charmed ring, where they squatted themselves, row on row, facing outward. The old men alone remained standing, and a bit of lighted pine having meanwhile been brought, one of them approached the hut, lifted the mat, and, handing in the fire, made a brief speech to the inmates. A few seconds after an aromatic smoke curled up from the opening in the top of the little hut, from which I infer that the copal had been set on fire. What else happened, I am sure I do not know!