GUAM AND ITS PEOPLE. 499 



In their j^cmumiiI iippeiirance, lanoiuio-e, and customs tho people of 

 Guam bore a resemblance- to the Tagalos and Visayans of the Philip- 

 pine Islands. The vocabulary, however, was distinct, with the excep- 

 tion of a few words of ^lalayan afiinity widely spread over the I'acitic 

 (such, for instance, as th(^ names of sky. fowl, liiv. and a few others). 

 Their grammatical form,, were very diti'erent from those of the Polyne- 

 sians, tenses ])eino- expressed by the reduplication of syllables and the 

 insertion and prehxing- of particles to the root of th*^ verb. 



Befon^ marriage it was customary for yovuig men to live in concu- 

 binage with girls, whom they purchased from their parents by pres- 

 ents. This did not injure a girl's prospects for marriage afterwards. 

 Frequently a luimber of young men and young girls would live 

 together in a large public house. Aft(M' marriage^ a husband contcMited 

 himself with one wife and a wife with one husband at a time. 

 Divorces were fre([uent, the children and household propert}" always 

 going with the wife. The most frequent cause of divorce was jeal- 

 ousy. If a woman disco^■ered her husl)an(l to be unfaithful, she called 

 together the other women of her village, who armed themselves with 

 spears and proceeded to th(^ house of the otfender. They would them 

 destroy any growing cro[)s he might own and menace him with the 

 spears until he was forced to tlee from tho house. Then th(\y took 

 possession of everything they could tind, and sometimes even destroyed 

 the house itself. AVhen a wife was unfaithful, the husband had a 

 right to chastise her paramour, l)ut she went free from punishment. 



Caste distinctions were recognized and very strictly observed. The 

 chiefs, called chamorris, owned vast plantations and cocoanut groves, 

 which were handed down generation after generation to the heirs. A 

 chief's rightful successor was his brother or his nephew, who, on 

 coming into possession of the familv estate, changed his name to that 

 of the chief ancestor of the family. 



The people were naturally superstitious. They venerated the bones 

 of their anc(\stors, keeping the skulls in their houses in small baskets, 

 and practicing certain incantations before thenr when it was desired 

 to attain certain objec-ts. The spirits of the dead were called aniti, 

 and were supposed to dwell in the forests, often visiting the villages, 

 causing bad dreams and haviuii" especial sway over the fisheries. 

 People dying a violent death went to a place called Zazarraguan, or 

 the house of Chayh, where they sutfered torture fi'om i\ro and inces- 

 sant blows. Those dying natiu'al death went to a subterranean })ara- 

 dise where there were groves of cocoanuts, plantations of bananas, 

 sugar cane, and other fruits in abundance. Certain men called 

 makahna resembled the kahunas of the Hawaiians. They were sup- 



dalla scorza interna die sta fra la corteccia il legno della palnia. Esse non lavarono 

 allacampagna, ma stanno in casa tessendo stuoie, cestedi palma, e altri siniili lavori 

 facendo necessawj alia famiglia. — Pigafetta, i>. 51. 



