CHAP, ii.] WEST INDIES. 51 



the fond conceit that their departed relations were 

 secret spectators of- their conduct ; that they still 

 sympathized in their sufferings, and participated in 

 their welfare. To these notions, so flattering to our 

 wishes, perhaps congenial to our nature, they ad- 

 ded others of a dreadful tendency ; for, considering the 

 soul as susceptible of the same impressions, and pos- 

 sessing the same passions, as when allied to the body, 

 it was thought a religious duty to their deceased he- 

 roes, to sacrifice at their funerals some of the captives 

 which had been taken in battle. f Immortality seem- 

 ed a curse without military glory : they allotted to the 

 virtuous and the brave the enjoyment of supreme fe- 

 licity, with their wives and their captives, in a sort of 

 Mahometan paradise. To the degenerate and the 

 cowardly they assigned a far different portion : these, 

 they doomed to everlasting banishment beyond the 

 mountains; to unremitting labour, in employments 

 that disgrace manhood: and this disgrace they sup- 

 posed would be heightened by the greatest of all afflic- 

 tions, captivity and servitude among the Arrowauks. J 



It might seem, that this idea of a state of retribu- 

 tion after death necessarily flowed from a well-found- 

 ed belief in the existence of an all-wise and almighty 

 Governor and Judge of the Universe; but we arc 

 told, notwithstanding, that the minds of the Charaibes 

 were not elevated to this height. "They admitted," 



f Rochefort, c. xix. p. 484. Du Tertre, c. ii. p. 41*. Purchas, 

 vol. iv. p. 127.4. 



Rochefort, c. xiv. p. 485, 



