DORSEY-s WANTON] THE BILOXI AND OFO LANGUAGES 7 



site formerly occupied by the Acolapissa Indians. Whether they had 

 been on the southern shore of Lake Pontchartrain up to this time 

 can not be determined. It is probable that between 1722 and 1730 

 they drifted back toward Pascagoula river, for Dumont, whose infor- 

 mation applies to the latter date, speaks of them as if they were then 

 near neighbors of the Pascagoula tribe. The method employed by 

 these two peoples in disposing of the bodies of their chiefs is thus 

 described by him:® 



The Paskagoulas and the Billoxis never inter their chief when he is dead, but they 

 have his body dried in the fire and smoke so that they make of it a veritable 

 skeleton. After having reduced it to this condition they carry it to the temple (for 

 they have one as well as the Natchez) and put it in the place occupied by its prede- 

 cessor, which they take from the place which it occupied to place it with the bodies of 

 their other chiefs in the interior of the temple, where they are all ranged in succes- 

 sion on their feet like statues. With regard to the one last dead, it is exposed at the 

 entrance of the temple on a kind of altar or table made of canea and covered with a 

 very fine mat worked very neatly in red and yellow squares {qiiarreaux) with the 

 skin of these same canes. The body of the chief is exposed in the middle of this 

 table upright on its feet, supi^orted behind by a long pole painted red, the end of 

 which passes above his head and to which he is fastened at the middle of the body by 

 a creeper. In one hand he holds a war club or a little ax, in the other a pipe, and 

 above his head is fastened, at the end of the pole which supports him, the most 

 famous of all the calumets which have been presented to him during his life. It 

 may be added that this table is scarcely elevated from the earth half a foot, but it is 

 at least six feet wide and ten long. 



It is to this table that they come every day to serve food to the dead chief, plac- 

 ing before him dishes of hominy, parched or smoke-dried grain, etc. It is there 

 also that at the beginning of all the harvests his subjects offer him the first of all the 

 fruits which they can gather. All of this kind that is presented to him remains on 

 this table, and as the door of the temple is always open, as there is no one appointed 

 to watch it, as consequently whoever wants to enters, and as besides it is a full quar- 

 ter of a league distant from the village, it happens that there are commonly stran- 

 gers — hunters or savages — who profit by these dishes and these fruits, or that they 

 are consumed by animals. But that is all the same to these savages, and the less 

 remains of it when they return next day the more they rejoice, saying that their 

 chief has eaten well, and that in consequence he is satisfied with them, although he 

 has abandoned them. In order to open their eyes to the extravagance of this prac- 

 tice it is useless to show them what they can not fail to see themselves, that it is not 

 the dead man who eats it. They reply that if it is not he it is at least he who offers 

 to whomsoever he pleases what has been placed on the table, that after all that was 

 the practice of their father, of their mother, of their relations, that they do not have 

 more wisdom than they had, and that they do not know any better way than to fol- 

 low their example. 



It is also before this table that during some months the widow of the chief, his 

 children, his nearest relations, come from time to time to pay him a visit and to 

 make him a speech as if he were in a condition to hear. Some ask him why he has 

 allowed himself to die before them. Others tell him that if he is dead it is not their 

 fault, that he has killed himself by such a debauchery or by such a strain. Finally 

 if there had been some fault in his government they take that time to reproach him 

 with it. However, they always end their speech by telling him not to be angry 

 with them, to eat well, and that they will always take good care of him. 



a M^moires Historiques sur la Louisiane, i, pp. 240-243. 



