58 IN THE GUIANA FOREST. 



to be put off with evasions. It is generally 

 supposed that the name is considered so inti- 

 mately connected with the personality that to 

 know it is as bad as our ancestors thought it to 

 let a witch have a lock of their hair. If generally 

 known perhaps some enemy might get hold of it 

 and do the owner much harm. Whether there is 

 any other superstition connected with the name is 

 doubtful as the whole subject is so very obscure. 

 It appears that boys are given the names of game 

 animals, and girls those of trees and birds, but we 

 make this statement with some hesitation, as on 

 this matter we have certainly been purposely 

 deceived on more than one occasion. Again, it 

 might be suspected, that something like the totem 

 system of the North Americans exists here, but 

 this is also obscure. We have heard of cases 

 where an Indian has been debarred from killing a 

 certain animal at particular times, as, for example, 

 when a child is born, and suspect that this is con- 

 nected with his name ; but we can do no more than 

 put it as a problem to be solved, if possible, in the 

 future. Writers on these people generally assume 

 that they have reasons for everything they do, but 

 this is hardly ever the case. Like children, they 

 do many things from impulse, and are governed 

 by very powerful instincts for which neither they 



