INTERIOR OF THE CATE1W. 483 



of oiir planet, they attained that height.* In this tomb of 

 a whole extinct tribe we soon counted nearly eix hundred 

 skeletons well preserved, and regularly placed. Every 

 skeleton reposes in a sort of basket made of the petioles 

 of the palm-tree. These baskets, which the natives call 

 mapires, have the form of a square bag. Their size is pro- 

 portioned to the age of the dead ; there are some for infants 

 cut off at the moment of their birth. "We saw them from 

 ten inches to three feet four inches long, the skeletons in 

 them being bent together. They are all ranged near each 

 other, and are so entire that not a rib or a phalanx is 

 wanting. The bones have been prepared in three different 

 manners, either whitened in the air and the sun, dyed red 

 with anoto, or, like mummies, varnished with odoriferous 

 resins, and enveloped in leaves of the heliconia or of the 

 plantain-tree. The Indians informed us that the fresh 

 corpse is placed in damp ground, that the flesh may be 

 consumed oy degrees ; some months afterwards it is taken 

 out, and the flesh remaining on the bones is scraped off 

 with sharp stones. Several hordes in Gruiana still observe 

 this custom. Earthen vases half-baked are found near the 

 mapires or baskets. They appear to contain the bones of 

 the same family. The largest of these vases, or funeral 

 urns, are five feet high, and three feet three inches long. 

 Their colour is greenish-grey, and their oval form is pleasing 

 to the eye. The handles are made in the shape of croco- 

 diles or serpents; the edges are bordered with painted 

 meanders, labyrinths, and grecques, in rows variously com- 

 bined. Such designs are found in every zone among 

 nations the farthest removed from each other, either with 

 respect to their respective positions on the globe, or to the 

 degree of civilization which they have attained. They still 

 adorn the common pottery made by the inhabitants of the 

 little mission of Maypures ; they ornament the bucklers of 

 the Otaheitans, the fishing-implements of the Esquimaux, 



* I saw no vein, no hole (four) filled with crystals. The decomposi- 

 tion of granitic rocks, and their separation into large masses, dispersed in 

 the plains and valleys in the form of blocks and balls with concentric 

 layers, appear to favour the enlarging of these natural excavations, which 

 resemble real cavern*. 



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