[123] Erskine, op. cit. p. 275 sq.
[124] Buning, in Glimpses of the Eastern Archipelago, p. 74.
[125] Cieza de Leon, Segunda parte de la Crónica del Perú, ch. 25, p. 100.
[126] Waitz-Gerland, Anthropologie der Naturvölker, vi. 158 sqq. (Polynesians). Casalis, Basutos, p. 303. Ribot, Psychology of the Emotions, p. 295 sq. Schurtz, Speiseverbote, p. 26. Cf. Spencer and Gillen, Native Tribes of Central Australia, p. 324.
Even among peoples very notorious for cannibalism there are individuals who abhor the practice. Dr. Schweinfurth asserts that some of the Niam-Niam “turn with such aversion from any consumption of human flesh that they would peremptorily refuse to eat out of the same dish with any one who was a cannibal.”[127] With reference to Fijian cannibalism Dr. Seemann observes:—“It would be a mistake to suppose that all Fijians, not converted to Christianity, are cannibals. There were whole towns, as for instance Nakelo, on the Rewa river, which made a bold stand against this practice, declaring that it was tabu forbidden to them by their gods, to indulge in it. The common people throughout the group, as well as women of all classes, were by custom debarred from it. Cannibalism was thus restricted to the chiefs and gentry, and again amongst them there is a number … who never eat human flesh, nor go near the biers when any dead bodies have been brought in, and who abominate the practice as much as any white man does.”[128] It should also be remembered that many cannibals eat human flesh not as ordinary food, but only in special circumstances, and that their cannibalism is often restricted to the devouring of some small part of the victim’s body.
[127] Schweinfurth, op. cit. ii. 18 sq.
[128] Seemann, Viti, p. 179 sq. Cf. Williams and Calvert, op. cit. p. 179.
The dislike of cannibalism may be a complex feeling. In many instances sympathy for the dead is undoubtedly one of its ingredients. It is true that endo-anthropophagy is frequently described as a mark of affection, but on the other hand there are many cannibals who never eat their dead friends though they eat strangers or foes. Some cannibals exchange their own dead for those of another tribe so as to avoid feeding on their kinsmen;[129] the natives of Tana, in the New Hebrides, are said to do so “when they happen to have a particular regard for the deceased.”[130] But neither affection nor regard can be the reason why savages abstain from eating their enemies. I think that aversion to cannibalism is most likely, in the first instance, an instinctive feeling akin to those feelings which regulate the diet of the various animal species. Although our knowledge of their habits in this respect is defective, there can be little doubt that carnivorous animals as a rule refuse to eat members of their own species; and this reluctance is easy to understand considering its race-preserving tendency.
[129] Arbousset and Daumas, Exploratory Tour to the Cape of Good Hope, p. 123. Steinmetz, Endokannibalismus, pp. 22, 47.
[130] Brenchley, op. cit. p. 209.