VERACITY. 483 



bors, are nearly always reprobated by travelers for their untruth- 

 fulness ; as are also the members of larger societies consolidated 

 by conquest under despotic rulers. 



Says Burton of the Dakotas " The Indian, like other savages, 

 never tells the truth." Of the Mishmis, Griffith writes" They 

 have so little regard for truth, that one can not rely much on what 

 they say." And a general remark, a propos of the Kirghiz, is to 

 the same effect. " Truth, throughout Central Asia, is subservient 

 to the powerful, and the ruler who governs leniently commands 

 but little respect." 



Of the settled societies, the first to be named is the Fijian. 

 Williams tells us that 



"Among the Fijians the propensity to lie is so strong, that they seem to have 

 no wish to deny its existence. . . . Adroitness in lying is attained by the constant 

 use made of it to conceal the schemes and plots of the Chiefs, to whom a ready 

 and clever liar is a valuable acquisition. . . . ' A Fijian truth ' has been regarded 

 as a synonym for a lie." 



Of kindred nature, under kindred conditions, is the trait displayed 

 by the people of Uganda. 



" In common with all savage tribes, truth is held in very low estimation, and 

 it is never considered wrong to tell lies ; indeed, a successful liar is considered a 

 smart, clever fellow, and rather admired." 



So, too, was it among the ancient semi-civilized peoples of Central 

 America. De Laet says of certain of them, living under a despotic 

 and bloody regime "they are liars, like most of the Indians." 

 And concerning the modern Indians, who may be supposed to 

 have preserved more or less the character of their progenitors, 

 Dunlop writes : 



"I never have found any native of Central America, who would admit that 

 there could be any vice in lying ; and when one has succeeded in cheating an- 

 other, however gross and infamous the fraud may be, the natives will only remark, 

 ' Que hombre vivo ' (What a clever fellow)." 



A like fact is given by Mr. Foreman in his work on the Philip- 

 pine Islands. He says the natives do not " appear to regard lying 

 as a sin, but rather as a legitimate, though cunning, convenience." 



The literatures of ancient semi-civilized peoples yield evidence 

 of stages during which truth was little esteemed, or rather, during 

 which lying was tacitly or openly applauded. As we saw in a re- 

 cent chapter ( 127) deception, joined with atrocity, was occasion- 

 ally inculcated in the early Indian literature as a means to per- 

 sonal advancement. "We have proof in the Bible that, apart from 

 the lying which constituted false witness, and was to the injury 

 of a neighbor, there was among the Hebrews but little reproba- 

 tion of lying. Indeed it would be remarkable were it otherwise, 



