On The Opposite Bank Of The River
They Had Left Their Wives And Several Children, With Whom They Frequently
Discoursed; And We Observed That These Last Manifested Neither Suspicion
Or Uneasiness Of Our Designs Towards Their Friends.
Having refreshed ourselves, we found leisure to enter into conversation
with them.
It could not be expected that they should differ materially
from the tribes with whom we were acquainted. The same manners and pursuits,
the same amusements, the same levity and fickleness, undoubtedly characterised
them. What we were able to learn from them was that they depend but little
on fish, as the river yields only mullets, and that their principal support
is derived from small animals which they kill, and some roots (a species
of wild yam chiefly) which they dig out of the earth. If we rightly
understood them, each man possesses two wives. Whence can arise
this superabundance of females? Neither of the men had suffered the extraction
of a front tooth. We were eager to know whether or not this custom obtained
among them. But neither Colbee nor Boladeree would put the question for us;
and on the contrary, showed every desire to wave the subject.
The uneasiness which they testified, whenever we renewed it, rather served
to confirm a suspicion which we had long entertained, that this is a mark
of subjection imposed by the tribe of Cameragal, (who are certainly
the most powerful community in the country) on the weaker tribes around them.
Whether the women cut off a joint of one of the little fingers, like those
on the sea coast, we had no opportunity of observing.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 141 of 247
Words from 37990 to 38261
of 66960
