MENTAL CHARACTERISTICS; CARE OF THE BODY; FOOD; FEASTS; HOUSEHOLD UTENSILS; RELIGION AND SUPERSTITIONS.
THUS they treat their enemies; but at home they cultivate peace and carefully avoid quarrels, except those which the fury of drunkenness has aroused. Fortunate would they be if Europe had never introduced this scourge among them! They know nothing of anger, and at first were greatly surprised when the Fathers censured their faults before the assembly; they thought that the Fathers were madmen, because among peaceful hearers and friends they displayed such vehemence. These people seek a reputation for liberality and generosity; they give away their property freely and very seldom ask any return; nor do they punish thieves otherwise than with ridicule and derision. If they suspect that any one seeks to accomplish an evil deed by means of false pretences, they do not restrain him with threats, but with gifts. From the same desire for harmony comes their ready assent to whatever one teaches them; nevertheless they hold tenaciously to their native belief or superstition, and on that account are the more difficult to instruct. For what can one do with those who in word give agreement and assent to everything, but in reality give none? They kindly relieve the poverty of the unfortunate; they provide sustenance for widows and old men in their bereavement, except when, with old age, vitality is withering away, or some grievous disease arises; for then they think it better to cut short an unhappy existence than to support and prolong it. Whatever misfortune may befall them, they never allow themselves to lose their calm composure of mind, in which they think that happiness especially consists. They endure many days' fasting, also diseases and trials, with the greatest cheerfulness and patience. Even the pangs of childbirth, although most bitter, are so concealed or conquered by the women that they do not even groan; and if a tear or a groan should escape any one of them, she would be stigmatized by everlasting disgrace, nor could she find a man thereafter who would marry her. Friends never indulge in complaint or expostulation to friends, wives to their husbands, or husbands to their wives. They treat their children with wonderful affection, but they preserve no discipline, for they neither themselves correct them nor allow others to do so. Hence the impudence and savageness of the boys, which, after they have reached a vigorous age, breaks forth in all sorts of wickedness. Moreover, they exercise the same mildness which they exhibit toward their children and relatives, toward the remainder of their tribe and their countrymen. If any person has injured another by means of a rude jest (for they are commonly very talkative, and are ready jesters), the latter carefully conceals it, or lays it up, and in retaliation injures his detractor behind his back; for to jest in the victim's presence, or to make a verbal attack, face to face, is characteristic of religion. There is nothing which they are more prone to use as a counter-allegation, when provoked, than to charge a man with a lack of intelligence. For they claim praise because of their intelligence, and not without good reason. No one among them is stupid or sluggish, a fact which is evident in their inborn foresight in deliberation and their fluency in speaking. Indeed, they have often been heard to make a peroration so well calculated for persuasion, and that off-hand, that they would excite the admiration of the most experienced in the arena of eloquence.
Their bodies, well proportioned, handsome because of their height, vigorous in strength, correspond to their minds. They have the same complexion as the French, although they disfigure it with fat and rancid oil, with which they grease themselves; nor do they neglect paints of various colors, by means of which they appear beautiful to themselves, but to us ridiculous. Some may be seen with blue noses, but with cheeks and eyebrows black; others mark forehead, nose and cheeks with lines of various colors; one would think he beheld so many hobgoblins. They believe that in colors of this description they are dreadful to their enemies, and that likewise their own fear in line of battle will be concealed as by a veil; finally, that it hardens the skin of the body, so that the cold of winter is more easily borne. Besides these colors, which are usually applied or removed according to the pleasure of each person, many impress upon the skin fixed and permanent representations of birds or animals, such as a snake, an eagle, or a toad, in the following manner: With awls, spear-points, or thorns they so puncture the neck, breast or cheeks as to trace rude outlines of those objects; next, they insert into the pierced and bleeding skin a black powder made from pulverized charcoal, which unites with the blood and so fixes upon the living flesh the pictures which have been drawn that no length of time can efface them. Some entire tribes—that especially which is called the Tobacco nation, and also another, which is called the Neutral nation—practice it as a continuous custom and usage; sometimes it is not without danger, especially if the season be somewhat cold or the physical constitution rather weak. [347] For then, overcome by suffering, although they do not betray it by even a groan, they swoon away and sometimes drop dead. They praise small eyes and turned-up and projecting lips. Some shave their hair, others cultivate it; some have half the head bare, others the back of the head; the hair of some is raised upon their heads, that of others hangs down scantily upon each temple. They detest a beard as a monstrosity, and straightway pull out whatever hair grows upon their chins. The men as well as the women pierce the lobes of their ears, and place in them earrings made of glass or shells. The larger the hole, the more beautiful they consider it. They never cut their nails. They ridicule the Europeans, because the latter wipe off the mucus flowing from the nose with white handkerchiefs, and say: "For what purpose do they preserve such a vile thing?" In dancing, they bend the body, with the head lowered, in the form of a bow, and move their arms like those who knead dough, at the same time emitting hoarse grunts. They gird the lower portion of the belly with a broad piece of bark or hide or a parti-colored cloth, and leave the rest of the body naked. The women wear skins hanging from the shoulders and neck to the knees. They wear belts and bracelets ingeniously manufactured from Venus shells,[71] which we commonly call porcelain, or from porcupine quills; and necklaces made in this fashion they value highly. They make very neat mats from marisco (a variety of marine rush); with these they cover their floors, and also take their rest upon them, or upon the soft furs of the seal or the beaver. In winter they sleep about a fire constantly burning in the middle of the lodge, in summer under the open sky.
Neither table nor chair can be seen in the hut. They squat upon their haunches like monkeys; this is their custom while eating, deliberating or conversing. They greet approaching friends with silly laughter, more often exclaiming, ho, hho, hhho. When they eat they do not take beverages with their food, nor do they drink often, but only once after eating. Whoever entertains his friends at a feast neither sits with them nor touches any part of the food, but divides it among the feasters; or, if he has some one act as carver, sits apart fasting and looks on. While eating they keep silence; they reject salt and condiments; they consider it a sin to throw the bones to the dogs; they either burn them in the fire or bury them in the ground. For, they say, if the bears, beaver, and other wild animals which we capture in hunting should know that their bones were given to dogs and broken to pieces, they would not suffer themselves to be taken so easily. They wipe off upon their hair the grease which is collected from fatty foods; sometimes they smear their cheeks or arms for the sake, as they say, of elegance and health; for they think that not only is the skin made resplendent with grease, but that the limbs are thus strengthened. For no other food do they have such fondness as for Sagamita. It is a relish made from flour, especially that of Indian corn, mixed with oil, which as a flavor is held in especial esteem among them. Therefore, in feasts the first course consists of oil or fat, in hard and compact lumps, into which they bite as we do into a piece of bread or an apple. Before pots, kettles and other vessels of the sort were brought to them from France, they used receptacles of closely joined bark; but, because they could not place them with safety over the flames, they devised the following way of cooking meat: They cast a large number of flint stones into the fire until they had become red-hot. Then they would drop these hot stones one after another into a vessel full of cold water and meat. In this manner the water was heated and the meat cooked more quickly and more easily than one would suppose. For wiping their hands they use the shaggy back of a dog, also powder of rotten wood. The last-named is used by mothers, in the place of wash-cloths, to clean the dirt from their infants; it is also used as a mattress to support the weary body. They do not cleanse their cooking utensils. The more they are covered with thick grease, so much the better are they, in their judgment. They consider it disgraceful and arrogant to walk while conversing. They dislike the odor of musk, and consider it a downright pest in comparison with a piece of rancid meat or moldy fat.
There, are six hundred matters of this sort in which their customs differ very widely from those of Europeans; but they are less removed from the faults of the latter, and either equal or excel them. They have received stimulants of the appetite, and drinks hostile to a good and sound mind, from European traders, who think much of profit, even when tainted with the disgrace of a wicked traffic. They continue to exist so long as they have anything to eat; they store up nothing for to-morrow, or for the winter; nor do they greatly dread famine, because they are confident of their ability to bear it for a long time. In feasts it is the rule, by general consent and custom of the race, that all the food shall be consumed. If any one eats sparingly and urges his poor health as an excuse, he is beaten or ejected as ill-bred, just as if he were ignorant of the art of living. The principal article of their household utensils is the pot or kettle in which the meat is cooked. They measure property by the number of kettles, and in the beginning conceived a high opinion of the king of France, for no other reason than because he was said to possess a good many kettles. How great is the impunity and wantonness of licentiousness among men uncivilized and free from all restraint, especially among the youth, maybe readily observed; for the elder men confine their lust within fixed limits, after the violence of their passions has subsided, and an erring woman does not go unpunished.
There is among them no system of religion, or care for it. They honor a Deity who has no definite character or regular code of worship. They perceive, however, through the twilight, as it were, that some deity does exist. What each boy sees in his dreams, when his reason begins to develop, is to him thereafter a deity, whether it be a dog, a bear, or a bird. They often derive their principles of life and action from dreams; as, for example, if they dream that any person ought to be killed, they do not rest until they have caught the man by stealth and slain him. It is wearisome to recount the tales which they invent concerning the creation of the world. Soothsayers and worthless quacks fill with these the idle and greedy ears of the people in order that they may acquire an impious gain. They call some divinity, who is the author of evil, "Manitou," and fear him exceedingly. Beyond doubt it is the enemy of the human race, who extorts from some people divine honors and sacrifices. Concerning the nature of spirits, they go none the less astray. They make them corporeal images which require food and drink. They believe that the appointed place, for souls, to which after death they are to retire, is in the direction of the setting sun, and there they are to enjoy feasting, hunting, and dancing; for these pleasures are held in the highest repute among them.
When they first heard of the eternal fire and the burning decreed as a punishment for sin, they were marvelously impressed; still, they obstinately withheld their belief because, as they said, there could be no fire where there was no wood; then, what forests could sustain so many fires through such a long space of time? This absurd reasoning had so much influence over the minds of the savages, that they could not be persuaded of the truth of the gospel. For, plainly, in the physical man, as some one from Sts. Peter and Paul says, the entire system of knowledge is based on vision. Nevertheless, a clever and ingenious priest overcame their obstinacy. He confidently declared that the lower world possessed no wood, and that it burned by itself. He was greeted by the laughter of the crowd of savages. "But," said he, "I will exhibit to you a piece of this land of Avernus, in order that, since you do not believe the words of God, you may trust the evidence of your own eyes." The novelty and boldness of the promise aroused their curiosity. Upon the appointed day they assembled from the whole neighborhood, and sat down together in an immense plain, surrounded by hills like an amphitheater. Twelve leading men of the tribe, persons of dignity and sagacity, were chosen to watch the priest, in order that neither fraud nor sorcery might be concealed. He produced a lump of sulphur and gave it to the judges and inspectors to be handled; after examining it with eyes, nose, and hand, they admitted that it was certainly earth. There stood near by a kettle containing live coals. Then the priest, under the eyes of the people at a distance, while the judges were gaping with their noses thrust down toward the coals, shook some grains from the lump of sulphur upon the coals, which suddenly took fire and filled the curious noses with a stifling odor. When this had been done a second and a third time, the crowd arose in astonishment, placing their hands flat over their mouths, by which gesture they signify great surprise; and believed in the word of God that there is a lower world.