72 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. I33 



THEFT, INTOXICATION 



According to Chilean police, Araucanians are law-abiding citizens. 

 When an Araucanian is arrested, it is, almost without exception, either 

 for theft or for an injury inflicted on a non-Araucanian during a fist 

 fight while intoxicated. The Sisters at the mission stations corrob- 

 orated this. Cooper lists theft as one of the chief crimes of the 

 Araucanians (1946, p. 726). 



Cattle were known to have been stolen in the areas covered by the 

 present study, "for no good reason." In one area a man stole chickens 

 "for a good reason" — to feed his hungry family. He owned no land, 

 cattle, or sheep, and was unable to find enough work to buy food. 

 One evening he was caught stealing chickens from the coop of a 

 non-Araucanian. The non-Araucanian reprimanded him, then gave 

 him two additional chickens and sent him home. The next day she 

 engaged him in work for pay and urged Araucanian neighbors to do 

 so also and to share food with the man's family. They did so, but 

 they did not cease from expressing a wish to both the non-Araucanian 

 and the man that he move his family to where relatives lived. "After 

 all, both he and his wife have relatives ; this is no place for him." 



When the Sisters' house in Alepue was being destroyed by fire 

 (1939), all movable things were carried out or were thrown out of 

 windows, and were lying about the place for several days. Not an 

 article was taken. For the following three weeks these articles were 

 stored in an empty, unlocked ruka, and nothing was missing when the 

 Sisters returned. In the early days, theft was punishable, even with 

 death ; today it is punished by Chilean courts with imprisonment. 



A family is sensitive to the accusation of theft against one of its 

 members. During the present study the key to a school door was 

 missing. Suspicion was cast on a certain boy by his schoolmates. 

 When the teacher questioned him he admitted that he had taken the 

 key, but had lost it. The boy's paternal grandmother and aunt came 

 to the teacher to assure her that the boy was no thief ; that he had 

 admitted taking the key only because of the pressure the schoolchil- 

 dren had exercised by their accusations ; that he had really been 

 frightened into admission ; that they would most certainly be ashamed 

 to have a thief in the family. In the afternoon the key was found in 

 the schoolyard by children playing there. 



Formerly, in general, Araucanian men drank to excess only when 

 in a group ; rarely did women drink to excess. Occasions when it was 

 expected that men would drink to intoxication were the end of the 

 threshing of each family's harvest and at the completion of the erec- 



