The use of the paricá is one of the characteristic customs of the Muras. The paricá is a powder. It is made from the dried seeds of a kind of Inga. It is a narcotic stimulating in the first instance, sedative or depressing afterwards. Once a year there is a paricá feast, where the “snuff” is indulged in to excess, and where the additional stimulants of dance, and song, and fermented liquors are superadded.
The other Indians are from the northern bank, on the frontier of Brazil and Bolivia. They cannot be said to represent any particular tribe. If they give an idea of the general character of a South American Indian of the parts in question it is sufficient. All the current descriptions are of this general character. The figures before us approach, however, the Ticunas Indians of Osculati, the nearest. Ticunas, however, is a term of a somewhat lax import; inasmuch as it means any of the Indians who use the Ticunas poison, or come from the country which produces it.
Weapons, &c., from the Amazons.
GROUP XI.
INDIANS FROM BRITISH GUIANA.
These are from casts taken from life during Sir R. Schomburgk’s expedition. All belong to the great Carib stock, and speak dialects of the widely-spread Carib language.
This is a point of importance. In Brazil the predominant language is the one alluded to under the name of Tupi—the basis of the Lingoa Geral (General Language) or Lingua Franca.
In other respects, the leading characteristics are the same, or similar; the details being more or less different. Some tribes, for instance, flatten the head, or tattoo the body; which the others do not. Some burn, others bury the dead. With the Carabisi, for instance, in ordinary cases the hammock in which the death took place, serves as a coffin, the body is buried, and the funeral procession made once or twice round the grave; but the bodies of persons of importance are watched and washed by the nearest female relations, and when nothing but the skeleton remains, the bones are cleaned, painted, packed in a basket and preserved. When, however, there is a change of habitation they are burned; after which the ashes are collected, and kept.
The Macusi, on the other hand, buries his dead in a sitting posture without coffins, and with but few ceremonies.
The Arawak custom is peculiar. When a man of note dies, his relations plant a field of cassava. They lament loudly. But when twelve moons are over, and the cassava is ripe, they reassemble, feast, dance, lash each other cruelly, and severely with whips. The whips are then hung up on the spot where the person died. Six moons later a second meeting takes place; and this time the whips are buried.