WHOLE VOL. ARAUCANIAN CHILD LIFE — HILGER 269 



placenta, also. And that is what we could have done for these two 

 women, and they might have lived." 



NAVEL CORD 



The attending woman ties off the umbilical cord with a thread and 

 severs the cord beyond this. The navel is given no treatment. In- 

 formants agreed that the cord was kept by the mother, after it fell 

 off, but they differed as to its disposal. Some dried the cord 

 thoroughly, then ground it to powder, and gave a little of it in water 

 to the child whenever the child was sick ; others merely stored it with 

 other personal things. "But with all the moving around we have had 

 to do since they took our land from us, the ones I kept got lost." A 

 70-year-old man listened with interest to the Arapaho way of sewing 

 the cord into a beaded bag (Hilger, 1952, pp. 22-23) and remarked, 

 "That was not the custom ever around here." Today, the cord is 

 buried inside the house near the wall. 



PLACENTA, CAUL 



If the placenta was being ejected with difficulty, the woman was 

 given a decoction of finely powdered root of apio boiled in chicha 

 (fermented fruit juice), or, if no chicha was at hand, in water. 

 In extreme cases she was given her own urine to drink, hoping that 

 gagging would eject the placenta; if this brought no result, gag- 

 ging was increased by giving her the urine of several persons present. 

 In general, today as formerly, the placenta is buried near the wall 

 within the house or close to the outside of it. In several instances it 

 was known to have been discarded as refuse. 



Most informants had not heard of a child born with a caul ; several 

 who did were older than 60. They knew that a child so born could be 

 expected to grow up to be an intelligent person. "That is why my 

 son grew up to be so intelligent; but when he is intoxicated he cer- 

 tainly loses his intelligence; he is stupid then." The caul was dried 

 and either stored or buried within the house, very near to the outside 

 of it. "Such a thing you do not throw away ; the good fortune of the 

 child depends on it." 



STERILIZING THE EYES OF THE NEWBORN BABY 



Usually the milk of the baby's mother is dropped into the baby's 

 eyes, "so that it will not have sore eyes." Occasionally today aniline 

 dye is used. 



