140 PICTS' HOUSES. 



ghost ; in some cases this applies to bis house, which is either 

 deserted or used as a grave. Thus, some of the North American 

 tribes, for instance, the Cherokees and Cbichasaws, buried the 

 dead under the couch on which he died.* The Indians of 

 the Amazons also bury their dead under their houses, which, 

 however, are not therefore abandoned by the living. 



Among the New Zealanders, on the contrary, according to 

 Mr. Taylor, "when the owner died, and was buried in his 

 house, it was left with all it contained ; the door was tied up 

 and painted with ochre, to show it was made tapu, and then 

 no one ever entered it again." ( In many villages, he says, 

 nearly half the houses belonged to the dead. 



The islanders of Torres Straits also used the ordinary huts 

 as dead houses. J 



Denham also states that in the great central African king- 

 dom of Bornou " every one is buried under the floor of his 

 own house, without monument or memorial ; and among the 

 commonalty the house continues occupied as usual, but among 

 the great there is more refinement, and it is ever afterwards 

 abandoned." The same is the case with the Dahomans, 

 Yorubans, Fantees, and other African races. || Other races, 

 as, for instance, some of the Tibeto-Burman^l" tribes and the 

 natives of Madagascar ** erect miniature houses over craves. 



O ' O 



It is still more significant that the Esquimaux themselves 

 frequently leave the dead in the houses which they occupied 

 when alive.-f-f Nor can any one compare the plan of a 



* Jones, Antiquities of the South- || Barton's Mission to Daliome, 



ern Indians, p. 114. vol. ii. p. 2. 



t New Zealand and its Inliabi- IT McMahon, Karens of the 



tants, p. 101. Golden Chersonese, pp. 91, 318. 



t M'Gillivray, Voyage of the ** Sibree, Madagascar and its 



Rattlesnake, vol. ii. p. 48. People, pp. 166, 251. 



Travels in Africa, vol. iv. pp. ft Ross' Arctic Expedition, 1829 



55130. 1833, p. 290. 



