130 MORTUARY CUSTOMS OF NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS. 
EMBALMMENT OR MUMMIFICATION. 
Following and in connection with cave burial, the subject of iummi- 
fying or embalming the dead may be taken up, as most specimens of the 
kind have generally been found in such repositories. 
It might be both interesting and instructive to search out and discuss 
the causes which have led many nations or tribes to adopt certain pro- 
cesses with a view to prevent that return to dust which all flesh must 
sooner or later experience, but the necessarily limited scope of this work 
precludes more than a brief mention of certain theories advanced by 
writers of note, and which relate to the ancient Egyptians. Possibly at 
the time the Indians of America sought to preserve their dead from de- 
composition, some such ideas may have animated them, but on this point 
no definite information has been procured. In the final volume an 
effort will be made to trace out the origin of mummification among the 
Indians and aborigines of this continent. 
The Egyptians embalmed, according to Cassien, because during the 
time of the annual inundation no interments could take place, but it is 
more than likely that this hypothesis is entirely fanciful. It is said by 
others they believed that so long as the body was preserved from cor- 
ruption the soul remained in it, Herodotus states that it was to pre- 
vent bodies from becoming a prey to animal voracity. ‘They did not 
inter them,” says he, ‘for fear of their being eaten by worms; nor did 
they burn, considering fire as a ferocious beast, devouring everything 
which it touched.” According to Diodorus of Sicily, embalmment origi- 
nated in filial piety and respect. De Maillet, however, in his tenth letter 
on Egypt, attributes it entirely to a religious belief, insisted upon by 
the wise men and priests, who taught their disciples that after a certain 
number of cycles, of perhaps thirty or forty thousand years, the entire 
universe became as it was at birth, and the souls of the dead returned 
into the same bodies in which they had lived, provided that the body 
remained free from corruption, and that sacrifices were freely offered 
as oblations to the manes of the deceased. Considering the great care 
taken to preserve the dead, and the ponderously solid nature of the 
Kgyptian tombs, it is not surprising that this theory has obtained many 
believers. M. Gannal believes embalmment to have been suggested by 
the affectionate sentiments of our nature—a desire to preserve as long as 
possible the mortal remains of loved ones; but MM. Volney and Pariset 
think it was intended to obviate, in hot climates especially, danger from 
pestilence, being primarily a cheap and simple process, elegance and 
luxury coming later; and the Count de Caylus states the idea of em- 
balmment was derived from the finding of desiccated bodies which the 
burning sands of Egypt had hardened and preserved. Many other sup- 
positions have arisen, but it is thought the few given above are suffi- 
cient to serve as an introduction to embalmment in North America. 
