44 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [buu,. 73 
to his breast, to the top of his palace, whore he exhibits them to the people. He and 
they are saluted with respect and fear by the people, who fall upon their knees or 
throw themselves on the ground with loud shouts. The king then descends and 
hangs the idols, draped in artistically worked cotton stuffs, upon the breasts of two 
venerable men of authority. They are, moreover, adorned with feather mantles of 
various colors, and are thus carried escorted with hymns and songs into the country, 
while the girls and young men dance and leap. Anyone who stopped in his house 
or absented himself during the procession would be suspected of heresy; and not only 
the absent, but likewise any who took part in the ceremony carelessly and without 
observing the ritual. The men escort the idols during the day, while during the 
night the women watch over them, lavishing upon them demonstrations of joy and 
respect. The next day they were carried back to the palace with the same ceremonies 
with which they were taken out. If the sacrifice is accomplished with devotion and 
in conformity with the ritual, the Indians believe they will obtain rich crops, bodily 
health, peace, or if they are about to fight, victory, from these idols. Thick cakes, 
similar to those the ancients made from flour, are offered to them. The natives are 
convinced that their prayers for harvests will be heard, especially if the cakes are 
mixed with tears. 1 
Another feast is celebrated every year when a roughly carved wooden statue is car- 
ried into the country and fixed upon a high pole planted in the ground. This first 
pole is surrounded by similar ones, upon which people hang gifts for the gods, each 
one according to his means. At nightfall the principal citizens divide these offerings 
among themselves, just as the priests do with the cakes and other offerings given them 
by the women. Whoever offers the divinity the most valuable presents is the most 
honored. Witnesses are present when the gifts are offered, who announce after the 
ceremony what every one has given, just as notaries might do in Europe. Each one is 
thus stimulated by a spirit of rivalry to outdo his neighbor. Prom sunrise till evening 
the people dance round this statue, clapping their hands, and when nightfall has 
barely set in, the image and the pole on which it was fixed are carried away and 
thrown into the sea, if the country is on the coast, or into the river, if it is along a river's 
bank. Nothing more is seen of it, and each year a new statue is made. 
The natives celebrate a third festival, during which, after exhuming a long-buried 
skeleton, they erect a black tent out in the country, leaving one end open so that the 
sky is visible; upon a blanket placed in the center of the tent they then spread out 
the bones. Only women surround the tent, all of them weeping, and each of them 
offers such gifts as she can afford . The following day the bones are carried to the tomb 
and are henceforth considered sacred. As soon as they are buried, or everything is 
ready for their burial, the chief priest addresses the surrounding people from the 
summit of a mound, upon which he fulfills the functions of orator. Ordinarily he 
pronounces a eulogy on the deceased, or on the immortality of the soul, or the future 
life. He says that souls originally came from the icy regions of the north, where per- 
petual snow prevails. They therefore expiate their sins under the master of that 
region who is called Mateczungua, but they return to the southern regions, where 
another great sovereign, Quexuga, governs. Quexuga is lame and is of a sweet and 
generous disposition. He surrounds the newly arrived souls with numberless atten- 
tions, and with him they enjoy a thousand delights; young girls sing and dance, 
parents are reunited to children, and everything one formerly loved is enjoyed. The 
old grow young and everybody is of the same age, occupied only in giving himself up 
to joy and pleasure. 2 
1 This ceremony seems to correspond in intention to the Creek busk, hut the form of it is quite different- 
» Compare with this the Chickasaw belief in a western quarter peopled by malevolent beings through 
which the soul passes to the world of the sky deity above. 
