upon fome fea-otter’s hair mixed with fulphur. If any
ibrcerer is prefent, it is then his turn to play his tricks in
the dark ; if not, the. guefts immediately retire to their
huts, which are made on that occafion of their canoes
and mats. The natives, who have feveral wives, do not
withhold them from their guefts ; but where the owner
of the hut has himfelf but one wife, he then intakes the
offer of a female fervant.
Their hunting feafon is principally from the end of
October to the beginning of December, during which,
time they kill large quantities o f young fea-bears for their
clothing. They pafs all December in.feaftings and di-
verfions fimilar to that above mentioned: with this difference,
however, that the men dance in wooden nialks,.
reprefenting various fea-animals, and painted red, green,
or black, with coarfe coloured earths found upon thefe
iflands.
During thefe feftivals they vifit each other from village
to village, and from ifland to ifland. The feafts.
concluded, mafks and drums are. broken to pieces,, or de-
pofited in caverns among the rocks, and never afterwards
made ufe of. In fpring they go out to kill old fea-
bears, fea-lions, and whales. During fummer, and even
in winter when it is calm, they row out to fea, and catch
cod and other fifh. Their hooks are of bone; and for
lines
lines they , make ufe of a firing made of a long tenacious
fea-weed, which is fometimes found in thofe feas near one
hundred and fixty yards, in length.
Whenever they are wounded in any encounter, or
bruifed by any accident, they apply a fort of yellow root
to the wound, and faft for fome time. When their
head achs,. they open a vein in that part With a ftone
lancet. When they want to glue the points of their arrows
to the fhaft, they ftrike their nofe till it bleeds, and:
ufe the blood as glue.
Murder is not punifhed amongft them, for they have
no judge. With refpedt to their ceremonies of burying
the dead, they are as follow : The bodies of poor people
are wrapped up in their own clothes, or in mats ; then
laid in a grave, and covered over with earth. The bodies
of the rich are put, together with their clothes and arms,
in a fmall boat made of the wood driven afhore by the
fea : this boat is hung upon poles placed crofs-ways; and.
the body is thus left to rot in the open air.
The cuftoms and manners of the inhabitants of the
Aleutian Ifles are nearly fimilar, to thofe of the inhabitants
of the Fox Iflands. The former indeed are rendered
: