The Native Races (Vol. 1-5). Hubert Howe Bancroft

of a very inspiring nature; drums, consisting of a section of hollow tree covered with skin, which are generally beaten with the hand, and flutes of bamboo with four stops on which eight notes are played with different degrees of speed for variety, being the usual instruments. The Guajiqueros also use the chirimaya, two flutes joined in one mouthpiece; the syrinx, or Pan's pipe; a long calabash with a narrow opening at the small end, into which the performer blows suddenly, at intervals, to mark time; and a sort of drum consisting of a large earthen jar, over the mouth of which a dressed skin is tightly stretched. To the centre of the skin, and passing through an opening in the bottom, is attached a string which the performer pulls, the rebound of the membrane producing a very lugubrious sound. In western Honduras the so-called strum-strum is much used. This is a large gourd cut in the middle, and covered with a thin board having strings attached. The marimba, and the jews-harp which has been introduced by the trader, are, however, the favorite instruments for a quiet reunion, and the few tunes known to them are played thereon with admirable skill and taste. Songs always accompany their dances and are usually impromptu compositions on suitable subjects, gotten up for the occasion by the favorite singers of the village, and rendered in a soft, but monotonous and plaintive tone. They have no national melodies, but on the receipt of any good or bad message, their feelings generally find vent in a ditty embodying the news. Talking is a passion with them, and as soon as a piece of news is received at a village, two or three younger men will start with their women and children for the next hamlet, where it is discussed for hours by the assembled population, who in their turn dispatch a messenger to the next village, and thus spread the news over the whole country in a very short time. In story-telling, those who concoct the biggest lies receive the most applause. Of course, the pipe must be smoked on these occasions, but as their own tobacco has become too mild for them, recourse is had to the vilest description of American leaf. When this is wanting, the smoke-dried leaves of the trumpet and papah-tree are used by men as BEVERAGES OF HONDURAS. well as women. The favorite drink is mishla, prepared chiefly from cassava-roots; but others from bananas, pine-apples, and other fruits are also used. A number of young women provided with good teeth, untiring jaws, and a large supply of saliva, are employed to chew about half of the boiled and peeled roots requisite to make a canoeful of liquor, the remainder being crushed in a mortar. This delectable compound is stirred with cold water, and allowed to ferment for a day or two, when it assumes a creamy appearance, and tastes very strong and sour. Plantains are kneaded in warm water, and then allowed to stand for a few days till the mixture ferments, or the fruit is left in the water in small pieces, and the kneading performed in the cup previous to drinking. A fermented drink from powdered cacao and indigenous sugar-cane juice is called ulung, and pesso is the name given to another made from crushed lime-rinds, maize and honey; in early times mead was a favorite drink in Honduras. The cocoa-nut palm yields monthly a large quantity of liquor known as caraca. The tip of the undeveloped shoots are cut off, and the branch bent down so as to allow the fluid to drip into a calabash placed beneath. Its seeds, when crushed and steeped in hot water give the acchioc.999

      MOSQUITO CUSTOMS.

      No name for a supreme good spirit is found in the vocabulary of the Mosquitos; all their appeals are addressed to Wulasha, the devil, the cause of all misfortunes and contrarieties that happen. The intercessors with this dread being are the sukias, or sorceresses, generally dirty, malicious old hags, who are approached with gifts by the trembling applicant, and besought to use their power to avert impending evils. They are supposed to be in partnership with their devil, for whom they always exact the half of the fee before entering upon any exorcising or divination. These witches exercise a greater power over the people than the chief—a power which is sustained by the exhibition of certain tricks, such as allowing poisonous snakes to bite them, and handling fire, which they have learned from predecessors during their long preparation for the office, passed amidst exposure and fasts in the solitude of the wilderness. The people of Honduras had also evil sorcerers who possessed the power of transforming men into wild beasts, and were much feared and hated accordingly; but their priests or hermits who live in communion with materialized gods, in small, elevated huts, apart from the villages, enjoyed the respect of all, and their advice was applied for on every matter of importance. None but the principal men could approach them without the necessary offering of maize and fowl, and they humbly knelt before them to receive their oracular answer. Preparatory to important undertakings, dogs, cocks, and even men were sacrificed to obtain the favor of their idols, and blood was drawn from tongue, ears, and other members of the body. They thought it likewise necessary to their welfare to have naguals, or guardian spirits, whose life became so bound up with their own that the death of one involved that of the other. The manner of obtaining this guardian was to proceed to some secluded spot and offer up a sacrifice: with the beast or bird which thereupon appeared, in dream or in reality, a compact for life was made, by drawing blood from various parts of the body. Caribs and Woolwas assemble at certain periods every year, to propitiate controlling spirits with ceremonies transmitted from their forefathers. A variety of ghosts, as Lewire, the spirit of the water, are supposed to play their pranks at night, and it is difficult to induce anyone to leave the hut after dark, unless in company. The belief in dreams is so firmly rooted that their very course of life is influenced by it. Every dream has a direct or indirect meaning; thus, a broken calabash betokens loss of wife; a broken dish, the death of a mother. Among other superstitions, it was believed that the lighting of an owl upon the house-top would be followed by the death of an inmate; when thunder roared, cotton-seed was burned; broken egg-shells and deer-bones were carefully preserved lest the chickens or the deer should die or disappear. Aware of the peculiar influence of the moon on man and matter, they are careful not to sleep in its glare, nor to fish when it is up, and mahogany-cutters abstain from felling trees at certain periods for fear the wood may spoil. They are wonderfully good pathfinders, and will pass through the densest forest without guiding marks; as swimmers they are not to be surpassed. Their mode of greeting a friend is very effusive, according to Dampier. One will throw himself at the feet of another, who helps him up, embraces him, and falls down in his turn to be assisted up and comforted with a pressure. Cockburn says that the Honduras people bend one knee to the ground and clap their hands in token of farewell.1000

      MOSQUITO MEDICAL TREATMENT.

      Their licentious life, and fruit and fish diet, with limited use of salt, have left their constitution very susceptible to epidemics as well as other diseases. The most common disorders are affections of the bowels, such as dysentery and diarrhœa, but chills, rheumatism, consumption, and measles are not unfrequent. Children suffer much from worms, and their abdomen is sometimes enormously swollen. A very painful, though not dangerous eye-disease termed unkribikun is prevalent; and the burrowing of the tick in the skin causes wounds and inflammation if the fly be not speedily removed; the chegoe, or sand-flea, attacks the feet in the same manner. But small-pox and leprosy are the greatest scourges of this country, the former having here as elsewhere in America committed enormous ravages among the population. Leprosy—that living death reflecting the sins of former generations, so capricious in the selection of its victims, taking the parent, yet leaving the child intact, or seizing upon the offspring without touching its mother—may certainly be less destructive, but it is nevertheless fearful in its effect; half of the natives of the Mosquito country being more or less marked by it, either in the shape of white or livid spots, or red, white, and scabbed bulpis. All sickness and affliction is supposed to be the work of the evil spirit who has taken possession of the affected part; sukias must, therefore, be called in to use their incantations and herbs against the enemy. The witch appears with her face painted in hideous devices, and begins operations by placing some herbs beneath the pillow of the patient, blowing smoke over him, rubbing the body with the hands, and muttering strange words. If this is not effective, a decoction is made from the herbs, to be used as a drink or fomentation, and the patient is fenced in with painted sticks, with strict orders to let no one approach; the witch herself bringing the food to the patient, whistling a plaintive strain and muttering over the invalid for some time to chase away the evil. No pregnant woman, or person who has lately buried a friend, must come near the house during the illness, nor must any one pass to the windward of it, lest the sick be deprived of breath; any presumed breach of these injunctions leaving a safe loophole for the sorceress, in case her remedies fail. During epidemics, the sukias consult together and note their dreams, to ascertain