SEPULCHRAL CAVE. 241 



they had reached to that height. In this tomb of a 

 whole extinct tribe we soon counted nearly 600 

 skeletons in good preservation, and arranged so 

 regularly that it would have been difficult to make 

 an error in numbering them. Each skeleton rests 

 upon a kind of basket formed of the petioles of 

 palms. These baskets, which the natives call ma- 

 pires, have the form of a square bag. Their size is 

 proportional to the age of the dead ; and there are 

 even some for infants which had died at the moment 

 of birth. We saw them from ten inches and a half 

 to three feet six inches and a half in length. All 

 the skeletons are bent, and so entire that not a rib 

 or a bone of the fingers or toes is wanting. The 

 bones have been prepared in three different ways, 

 whitened in the air and sun, died red with onoto, a 

 colouring matter obtained from the Bixa orellana; 

 or, like mummies, covered with odorous resins, and 

 enveloped in leaves of heliconia and banana. The 

 Indians related to us that the corpse is first placed 

 in the humid earth, that the flesh may be consumed 

 by degrees. Some months after, it is taken out, and 

 the flesh that remains on the bones is scraped off 

 with sharp stones. Several tribes of Guiana still 

 follow this practice. Near the mapires or baskets 

 there were vases of half-burnt clay, which appeared 

 to contain the bones of the same family. The 

 largest of these vases or funeral urns are three feet 

 two inches high, and four feet six inches long. 

 They are of a greenish-gray colour, and have an 

 oval form, not unpleasant to the eye. The handles 

 are made in the form of crocodiles or serpents, and 

 the edge is encircled by meanders, labyrinths, and 

 grecques, with narrow lines variously combined. 

 These paintings are seen in all countries, among 

 nations placed at the greatest distances from each 

 other, and the most different in respect to civiliza- 

 tion. The inhabitants of the little mission of May- 

 pures execute them at the present day on their most 



