CHAPTER IIL 



PEIESTLY DUTIES OF DESCENDANTS. 



594. As we have before seen ( 87), it is in some cases 

 the custom to destroy corpses for the purpose of preventing 

 resurrection of them and consequent annoyance by them; 

 and in other cases where no such measure of protection is 

 taken, the dead are, without discrimination between relatives 

 and others, dreaded as causers of misfortunes and diseases. 

 Illustrations of this belief as existing among various savages 

 were given in Part I, Chaps. XVI, XVII. Here is another 

 from jSFew Britain. 



The Matukanaputa natives &quot;bury their dead underneath the hut 

 which was lately inhabited by the deceased, after which the relatives 

 go for a long canoe journey, staying away some months . . . they 

 say . . . the spirit of the departed stays in his late residence for some 

 time after his death, and eventually finding no one to torment goes 

 away for good ; the surviving relatives then return and remain there 

 as formerly.&quot; 



Even where ghosts are regarded as generally looking on their 

 descendants with goodwill, they are apt to take offenco and 

 to need propitiation. We read of the Santals that from the 

 silent gloom of the adjacent grove 



&quot; the byegone generations watch their children and children s children 

 playing their several parts in life, not altogether with an unfriendly 

 eye. Navertheless the ghostly inhabitants of the grove are sharp 

 critics, and deal out crooked limbs, cramps and leprosy, unless duly 

 appeased.&quot; 



But while recognizing the fact that ghosts in general aro 

 usually held to be more or less malicious, we find, as might 



