EOTH] SEXUAL LIFE 311 



whipping takes place also at the second menstrual period, but not 

 subsequently (ScR, ii, 316). Among the Puinavis Indians of the 

 Ynirida [upper Orinoco], the "Devil" who three days before has 

 been making terrible music m the forest at last enters the house of 

 the poor young girl, who tries to take to flight. A piai at this moment 

 runs up and, binding her eyes (Sect. 255), leads her through the 

 village while the Devil all by himself is making a frightful hubbub. 

 Now is the time for the festival of the beating with the sticks, when 

 the men strike the unfortunate girl, who dares not complain. At last 

 a young man, admiring her courage, takes her place, and exposes 

 himself to the blows of the company; if he bears the pain without 

 murmuring she chooses him for her husband (Cr, 532). [Compare 

 Sect. 276.] With the l^aupes River Indians, "all relatives and 

 friends of the parents are assembled, bringing, each of them, pieces 

 of sipo (an elastic climber); the girl is then brought out, perfectly 

 naked, into the midst of them, when each person present gives her 

 five or sLx severe blows with the sip6 across the back and breast till 

 she falls senseless, and it sometimes happens, dead. If she recovers 

 it is repeated four times at intervals of six hours, and it is considered 

 an ofi'ence to the parents not to strike hard. During this time numer- 

 ous pots of all kinds of meat and fish have been prepared, when the 

 sip6s are dipped in them and given to her to lick ' and she is then con- 

 sidered a woman and allowed to eat anything, and is marriageable. 

 The boys undergo a somewhat similar ordeal [at puberty, as the girls] 

 but not so severe, which initiates them into manhood, and allows them 

 to see the Jurupari music" (ARW, 34.5). 



273. Wliat may be regarded as remaining puberty ordeals to which 

 the young girl has to submit at her first menstruation, and to a minor 

 degree at all her subsequent ones, are certain procedures connected 

 with her isolation, with water, fire, cooking, and cooking apparatus, 

 and with the hair. In the "old daj-s" of the Pomeroon Arawaks, the 

 girl would remain with her mother in a separate logic, or in a spe- 

 cially constructed compartment of the house. The former would be 

 distinguished by hanging from the posts waste shreds of the ite {Mau- 

 ritia) palm, that is, the leaves from which the outer fibrous layer, for 

 making twine, has already been removed. The specially constructed 

 room was called the aibona-lehi. The Warraus are said to have used a 

 separate closed house. With the Makusis, at the first signs, the girl 

 is separated from all intercourse with the occupants of the hut; her 

 hammock is taken from its usual place and slung in the highest part of 

 the hut, where the poor creature is exposed to all the smoke which, if 

 that be possible, is now increased. For the first few days she must not 

 leave her hammock at all during the daytime. When the most active 



1 Compare the licking of the stick by the Kaaaima devotee to obtain purification (Sect. 3S9). 



