INDIAN HOME LIFE. 97 



and what you possess, also, is reckoned as his, if he 

 want it. When he offers to you his house and all in 

 it, it is no idle custom without meaning, for even 

 his household furniture, if there be any, is at your 

 disposal. 



The ancient Caribs, if we may credit the statements 

 of early writers, believed in some sort of a future 

 state, and also that their departed friends were secret 

 witnesses of their conduct. "The brave had the 

 enjoyment of supreme felicity with their wives and 

 captives ; the cowardly were doomed to everlasting 

 banishment be} r ond the mountains. This was their 

 next world. They dimly recognized a Divinity, a 

 great creator of all things, and vaguely offered their 

 homage and sacrifice." 



It is supposed that each person had his tutelar deity ; 

 it may have been a tree or a rock. The northern 

 tribes, the Arowaks, had their zemes, or household 

 gods, when discovered by the Spaniards. "The 

 Caribs erected a rustic altar of banana leaves and 

 rushes, whereon they placed the earliest of their 

 fruits and choicest of their viands, as peace-offerings 

 to incensed omnipotence. They could not be in- 

 sensible to the existence of a great ruler, when the 

 convulsions of nature were so great as they witnessed 

 in the earthquake and hurricane." 



In religion, at the present time, the Caribs of Do- 

 minica are Roman Catholic, and are very observant of 

 the rites of the church. Upon the occasion of the 

 priest's monthly visit, nearly all flock to hear him, 

 even if they do not obey his injunctions ; and the sick 

 are brought, and the dying, to obtain the sacrament. 

 At the close of service, one Sabbath, word was 

 7 



