As an instance of the Indian belief in omens, I remember that once a small species of wild turkey alighted in a clearing, and kept running round and round in circles. This was taken by the Indians to mean that people were coming to the maloka who might be either friends or enemies. This gave rise to an excited discussion as to which would be the more likely event of the two. It so happened that a party of friendly Indians did arrive that same evening. Casement relates how a large wood ibis descended among a crowd of Witoto and Muenane in the compound at Occidente.[373] A Muenane wished to shoot the bird, and when persuaded to leave it unmolested, expostulated that the ibis must have been sent by their enemy the Karahone to bring disaster upon them. As a rule, it strikes me, an enemy would appear in a less kindly guise than that of an ibis. In my case no attempt was made by the Okaina to interfere with the bird in any way, in fact it was looked upon as a friend who came to give due notice of approaching visitors, and therefore was to be regarded with gratitude.
CHAPTER XVIII
Darkness feared by Indians—Story-telling—Interminable length of tales—Variants—Myths—Sun and moon—Deluge traditions—Tribal stories—Amazons—White Indians tradition—Boro tribal tale—Amazonian equivalents of many world tales—Beast stories—Animal characteristics—Difference of animal characteristics in tale and tabu—No totems—Indian hatred of animal world.
Darkness is full of mysterious horrors to the Indian, nor can one wonder that he fills with imaginary demons the weird and terrifying solitudes of the bush by night. The children are openly afraid of the dark, because of the tigers that may then be prowling about, let alone less substantial perils. Adults are not so frank with regard to their fears, but as a matter of course all occupations cease at sun-down, and every one makes for the sheltered warmth of the maloka. There, by the flickering firelight, after the contents of the family hot-pot have been discussed, long tales are told. First one and then another takes up the burden of recital. The chatter dies slowly, maybe it will linger on by the fire of some verbose story-teller, till the chill of coming dawn brings the sleepers from their hammocks to stir the smouldering embers into a blaze, and to gather round them waiting for daybreak to dispel the evil agents of the night.
The tales are endlessly long, and so involved that they are utterly unintelligible to the stranger until they have been repeated many times. Then the drift of myth and tradition, the meaning of fable and story, may be broadly grasped. To win it comprehensively in detail is a matter of time, patience, and intimate knowledge of the speaker’s tongue. Moreover, the tales have such numerous variations, and are so grafted the one on to the other, according to the momentary fancy of the narrators, that it is exceedingly difficult to differentiate between a variant of a known story and one that may in its essentials have been hitherto unheard.
“It is,” postulates Dr. Rivers, “not the especially familiar and uniform which becomes the object of myth.”[374] The mythopœic influence of that which is seldom seen would lead us to expect that among these Indians, sunk in “the gloom of an eternal under-world of trees,”[375] the heavenly bodies would play a prominent part in tribal folk-tale and myth. But so far as the stars are concerned this is not the case at all;[376] they seem to be ignored; and, as regards the sun and moon, it is the sun—contrary to usual tropical custom—that is the most important, the moon—as with more northern peoples—occupies the subordinate position of wife. Her inconstant appearances are accounted for by the suggestion mentioned in the previous chapter that she is sent periodically by the sun her husband to drive away the evil spirits of the night that await the stray or heedless loiterers in the forest thickets. But this protective character is denied to the moon by other tribes, and some South American Indians will hide young infants lest the moon should injure them.[377]
What I cannot but consider the most important of their stories are the many myths that deal with the essential and now familiar details of everyday life in connection with the manihot utilissima and other fruits. The tale that follows does not purport to be a literal translation of the myth as related to me, or in my hearing. I have merely attempted to put together, infinitely more concisely than any Indian raconteur would ever dream of doing, the various details of the local story and belief:
The Good Spirit when he came to earth showed the Indians a manioc plant, and taught them how to extract the evil spirit’s influence.[378]