2 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 79 



such a degree one with their whole life and essence that only pow- 

 erful pressure from outside or a radical change of their whole 

 character and moral views could make them abstain from them. 

 This one may judge even from the fact that from a victory over 

 his enemies the Jibaro warrior not only expects honor and fame 

 in the ordinary sense of the word but also certain material benefits. 

 The head trophy which he takes from his slain enemy is not merely 

 a token of victory, but becomes a fetish charged with supernatural 

 power, and the great victory feast itself with its many mysterious 

 ceremonies, in fact, forms a part of the practical religion or cult 

 of the Jibaros. 



The education of the boys among the Jibaros first of all aims 

 at making them brave and skillful warriors. When a Jibaro has 

 enemies on whom he wants to take revenge for offences and out- 

 rages, perhaps committed long ago, but despairs of being able to do 

 it himself, he systematically tries to awaken and maintain hatred 

 against them in his young sons by discourses directed to them every 

 day. " The Shucira So-and-so killed my father, my grandfather, my 

 brothers, while I was a child, carried off my mother, my sisters, 

 and burnt our house. This blood guilt is not yet washed off. It Ls 

 the duty of you, my sons, to avenge this crime and to kill the enemy 

 or his sons, who are still threatening our family. If you 'do this, 

 blessing and good luck will follow you in all your undertakings; 

 you will have a long life and be able to kill many other enemies; 

 your plantations will be richly fruit-bearing ; your domestic animals, 

 the swine and the chicken, will prosper and grow numerous; there 

 will never be lack of food in your house," etc. This discourse is, 

 at times, repeated every morning when the house father gets up, and 

 with about the same words ; and, of course, can not fail to make an 

 impression upon the minds of the young ones. 



When a Jibaro chief goes on a war expedition he often takes his 

 young sons with him in order that they may early learn the art of 

 war and get accustomed to the bloody scenes which take place. 



When a boy reaches the age of puberty and is to be received among 

 the full-grown men, a feast is made in his honor which is called 

 kusupani and which chiefly consists in ceremonies with tobacco. 

 After the feast, which lasts three or four days, he is obliged to take 

 a narcotic drink, called maikoa, prepared from the rind of the bush 

 Datura arborea. This bush seems to have much the same poisonous 

 properties as belladonna or opium, and the drink prepared from its 

 rind has the power of completely narcotizing the Indian as well as 

 awakening within him peculiar visions and hallucinations which are 

 ascribed to certain spirits. The most important of these spirits are 

 the so-called arutama (" the old ones ") which are in their nature the 



