t h e w e s t i n d i e s
Of war as part of some horrible religious ceremony,
or of hideous feasts commemorating triumphs over
enemies. But this would hardly better the case or
the Caribs, and apparently they
if not regularly, eaters of human flesh. I t may b
that their progenitors in the mountains M M »
of South America had been nourished for genera-
tions upon animal food, and that when they came
• « r\( tVip islands where into possession of the islands wuc beasts whose I
life was in the blood were scarcely known, the craving
became irresistible, like that of starvmg men
at sea or in the Arc tic ice. Being naturally meat-
eaters they may have begun to devour the meal-
eating Arawaks who fell victims to their warlike
prowess, and doubtless the appetite grew b y what it
fed on T h e fierce and enterprising spirit of the
Carib may have been due to the fact that he was an j
eater of flesh, and it may have demanded the <diet o
flesh to maintain itself; and buman flesh affording
&M only available supply, he was impe led to de- |
vour h i j enemies and to restrain
pany ¿ f strangers. There is a remnant of the old
Carib stock in the island of Dominica and another
in S t Vincent, but in them there is no vestige of
the oid warlike spirit. T h e people till the soil and
live upon the fruits of the ground.
Spanish writers used to say that Cari mean man-
eater and was synonymous with cannibal; but it
meant nothing of the kind, and it was they who
derived 1 cannibal ” from it by an ingenious variation
from caribal or calibal, injecting into it a suggestion
of canine origin. T h e name had 1 s sour
in South America, in the region of the Calibe Mountains,
and seems to have merely meant people
being adopted by a race assuming to be the people
Uar excellence, as a certain ancient race took the name
|of “ Shem,” signifying “ name,” or pre-eminence.
The Caribs compressed the skulls of infants, but
[.not after the manner of the Arawaks. T h e y made
I the forehead high and square, instead of flat and
■sloping backward. Their language was different
■ from that of the weaker race, but a modification of
■the latter prevailed among their women, because
■these women were mostly captives from the Arawaks
lor descendants of such. T h e boys as they grew up
■followed the speech of their fathers and the girls that
■of the mothers, thus keeping up the distinction,
■which was less difficult with the simple tongue of a
■savage tribe than it would be with the complex
■language of a civilised people. T h e chiefs and warriors
are even said to have had a special lingo, in
»which they discussed affairs of state without the
need of secret sessions. T h e Caribs left relics of
¡their better days, which, with the not very accurate
Records of old Spanish chroniclers, show that they
|made ornaments of metal as well as of stone and
shell ; that they fabricated baskets and wove cotton
cloth as well as constructed canoes, and shaped
-weapons and implements of peace from wood and
bone and stone. There are rock inscriptions and
■arvings on some of the islands which may or may
not antedate the 1 discovery.” T h e y kindled fires
jay rubbing two sticks together, and they had rude
altars upon which offerings were made to the mys