[8] Blumentritt, ‘Der Ahnencultus der Malaien des Philippinen-Archipels,’ in Mittheil. d. kais. u. kön. Geograph. Gesellsch. in Wien, xxv. 164 sqq.
[9] Brinton, Myths of the New World, p. 102.
[10] Codrington, quoted by Tylor, ‘Remarks on Totemism,’ in Jour. Anthr. Inst. xxviii. 147.
[11] Marsden, History of Sumatra, p. 292. The same belief prevails among the natives of the Malay Peninsula (Newbold, British Settlements in the Straits of Malacca, ii. 192).
[12] Meiners, Geschichte der Religionen, i. 212. Tylor, Primitive Culture, ii. 8.
[13] Bastian, Der Mensch in der Geschichte, ii. 323.
[14] Gray, China, i. 288.
[15] Wuttke, Der deutsche Volksaberglaube der Gegenwart, § 609, p. 396 sq.
But the survivors must not only avoid doing anything which might hurt the soul, they must also positively contribute to its comfort and subsistence. They often provide it with a dwelling, either burying the deceased in his own house, or erecting a tent or hut on his grave. Some Australian natives kindle a fire at a few yards’ distance from the tomb, and repeat this until the soul is supposed to have gone somewhere else;[16] others, again, are in the habit of wrapping the body up in a rug, professedly for the purpose of keeping it warm.[17] In the Saxon district of Voigtland people have been known to put into the coffin an umbrella and a pair of galoshes.[18] An extremely prevalent custom is to place provisions in or upon the grave, and very commonly feasts are given for the dead.[19] Weapons, implements, and other movables are deposited in the tomb; domestic animals are buried or slaughtered at the funeral;[20] and, as we have seen before, even human beings are sacrificed to the dead to serve them as companions or attendants, or to vivify their spirits with their blood, or to gratify their craving for revenge.[21]
[16] Roth, North-West-Central Queensland Aborigines, p. 165.