After the feast was over I held a service, and told how sin was injected into us by the evil spirit, but that all are invited to the heavenly feast. My address was listened to in perfect silence, and the nodding heads showed that some, at least, understood it. When I finished speaking, a poor woman, thinking she must offer something, gave me her baby—a naked little creature that had never been washed in its life. I took it up and kissed it, and the poor woman smiled. Yes, a savage woman can smile.
As already stated, many different tribes of Indians dwell in the Chaco, and each have their different customs. In the Suhin tribe the rite of burial may be thus described. "The digger of the grave and the performer of the ceremony was the chief, who is also a witch-doctor, and I was told that he was about to destroy the witch-doctor who had caused the man's death. A fire was lit, and whilst the digging was in progress a stone and two pieces of iron were being heated. Two bones of a horse, a large bird's nest built of sticks, and various twigs were collected. The skin of a jaguar's head, a tooth, and the pads of the same animal were laid out. A piece of wax and a stone were also heated; and in a heap lay a hide, some skins for bedding, and a quantity of sheep's wool. The grave being finished, the ceremony began by a wooden arrow being notched in the middle and waxed, then plunged into the right breast of the corpse, when it was snapped in two at the notch, and the remaining half was flung into the air, accompanied with a vengeful cry, in the direction of the Toothli tribe, one of whose doctors, it was supposed, had caused the man's death. Short pointed sticks, apparently to represent arrows, were also daubed with wax, two being plunged into the throat and one into the left breast, the cry again accompanying each insertion. One of the jaguar's pads was next taken, and the head of the corpse torn by the claws, the growl of the animal being imitated during the process. An incision was next made in the cheek, and the tooth inserted; then the head and face were daubed with the heated wax. The use of the wax is evidently to signify the desire that both arrows and animal may stick to the man if he be attacked by either. The arrows were plunged, one into the right breast downwards, and another below the ribs, on the same side, but in an upward direction, a third being driven into the right thigh. They also spoke about breaking one of the arms, but did not do so. An incision being made in the abdomen, the heated stone was then placed within the body. They place most reliance upon the work of the stone. The ceremony is known by the name of 'Mátaimáng' stone, and all the other things are said to assist it. Meteorites, when seen to pass along the sky, are regarded with awe; they are believed to be these stones in passage. The body was placed in the grave with the head to the west, the jaguar's head and pads being first placed under it. A bunch of grass, tied together, was placed upon the body; then the bird's nest was burned upon it. The bones were next thrown in, and over all the various articles before mentioned were placed. These were to accompany the soul in its passage to the west. In this act the idea of a future state is more distinctly seen than ever it has been seen amongst the Lenguas, who burn all a man's possessions at his death. The ceremony finished, the grave was covered in, logs and twigs being carelessly thrown on the top, apparently simply to indicate the existence of a grave. The thing which struck me most was the intense spirit of vengeance shown."
Notwithstanding such terrible savagery, however, the Indian has ideas of right and wrong that put Christian civilization to shame. The people are perfectly honest and truthful. I believe they cannot lie, and stealing is entirely unknown among them.
Many are the experiences I have had in the Chaco. Some of them haunt me still like ghostly shadows. The evening camp-fire, the glare of which lit up and made more hideous still my savage followers, gorging themselves until covered with filth and gore. The times when, from sheer hunger, I have, like them, torn up bird or beast and eaten it raw. The draughts of water from the Indian hole containing the putrefying remains of some dead animal; my shirt dropping off in rags and no wash for three weeks. The journeys through miles of malarial swamps and pathless wilderness. The revolting food, and the want of food. Ah! the memory is a bad dream from which I must awake.
The other side, you say? Yes, there is another. A cloudless blue sky overhead. The gorgeous air-flowers, delicate and fragrant. Trees covered with a drapery of orchidaceae. The loveliest of flowers and shrubs. Birds of rainbow beauty, painted by the hand of God, as only He can. Flamingoes, parrots, humming-birds, butterflies of every size and hue. Arborescent ferns; cacti, thirty feet high, like huge candelabra. Creeping plants growing a hundred feet, and then passing from the top of one ever-vernal tree to another, forming a canopy for one from the sun's rays. Chattering monkeys. Deer, with more beautiful eyes than ever woman had since Eve fell. The balmy air wafting incense from the burning bush; and last, but oh, not least, the joy in seeing the degraded aborigine learning to love the "Light of the World"! Yes, there are delights; but "life is real, life is earnest," and a meal of algarroba beans (the husks of the prodigal son of Luke XV.) is not any more tempting if eaten under the shade of a waving palm of surpassing beauty.
The mission station previously referred to lies one hundred miles in from the river bank, three hundred miles north of Asuncion, among the Lengua Indians. As far as I am aware, no Paraguayan has ever visited there. The missionaries wish their influence to be the only one in training the Indian mind. The village bears the strange name of Waikthlatemialwa (The Place Where the Toads Arrived). At the invitation of the missionaries, I was privileged to go there and see their work. A trail leads in from the river bank, but it is so bad that bullock carts taking in provisions occupy ten and twelve days on the journey. Tamaswa (The Locust Eater), my guide, led me all during the first day out through a palm forest, and at night we slept on the hard ground. The Indian was a convert of the mission, and although painted, feathered and almost naked, seemed really an exemplary Christian. The missionaries labored for eleven years without gaining a single convert, but Tamaswa is not the only "follower of Jesus" now. During the day we shot a deer, and that evening, being very hungry, I ate perhaps two pounds of meat. Tamaswa finished the rest! True, it was only a small deer, but as I wish to retain my character for veracity, I dare not say how much it weighed. This meal concluded, we knelt on the ground. I read out of the old Book: "I go to prepare a place for you," and Locust Eater offered a simple prayer for protection, help and safety to the God who understands all languages.
My blanket was wet through and through with the green slime through which we had waded and splashed for hours, but we curled ourselves up under a beer barrel tree and tried to sleep. The howling jaguars and other beasts of prey in the jungle made this almost impossible. Several times I was awakened by my guide rising, and, by the light of a palm torch, searching for wood to replenish the dying fire, in the smoke of which we slept, as a help against the millions of mosquitos buzzing around. Towards morning a large beast of some kind leaped right over me, and I rose to rekindle the fire, which my guide had suffered to die out, and then I watched until day dawned. As all the deer was consumed, we started off without breakfast, but were fortunate later on in being able to shoot two wild turkeys.
That day we rode on through the endless forest of palms, and waded through a quagmire at least eight miles in extent, where the green slime reached up to the saddle-flaps. On that day we came to a sluggish stream, bearing the name of "Aptikpangmakthlaingwainkyapaimpangkya" (The Place Where the Pots Were Struck When They Were About to Feast). There a punt was moored, into which we placed our saddles, etc., and paddled across, while the horses swam the almost stagnant water. Saddling up on the other side, we had a journey of thirty miles to make before arriving at a waterhole, where we camped for the second night. I don't know what real nectar is, but that water was nectar to me, although the horses sniffed and at first refused to drink it.
At sunset on the third day we emerged from the palm forest and endless marshes, and by the evening of the fourth day the church, built of palm logs, loomed up on the horizon. Many of the Indians came out to meet us, and my arrival was the talk of the village. The people seemed happy, and the missionaries made me at home in their roughly-built log shanties. Next morning I found a gift had been brought me by the Indians. It was a beautiful feather headdress, but it had just been left on the step, the usual way they have of making presents. The Indian expects no thanks, and he gives none. The women received any present I handed them courteously but silently. The men would accept a looking-glass from me and immediately commence to search their face for any trace of "dirty hairs," probably brought to their mind by the sight of mine, but not even a grunt of satisfaction would be given. No Chaco language has a word for "thanks."
[Illustration: TAMASWA (THE LOCUST EATER) PROCURING FOOD. This young man could put the point of his arrow into a deer's eye a hundred yards distant]