472 ARTS AND CRAFTS OF GUIANA INDIANS [HTH, ANN. 338 
of the new cassava. These cakes, for this occasion only, are made 
small, but very thick, up to as much as 14 inches, and are known as 
no-arra, the ordinary kind for everyday use being called aru. Upon 
the men’s return the women boil the crabs and place the food in 
readiness for them and their friends. This food is arranged on any 
large leaves—a cake and two crabs for each person—extending in a 
circle around the house. When the meal is over the leaves are all 
collected and cleared away and then the dancing and drinking 
commence. The people now all form themselves into a ring, and into 
the ground in their center is stuck an arrow with the tip pointing 
upward upon which is stuck a wooden baby-doll. A young man 
and woman are next placed within the center of the circle vis-a-vis, 
but separated by the arrow. The woman has her hands folded over 
her little piece of apron with toes apart and heels together. Her 
dancing consists in alternately shuffling one foot forward and out- 
ward, but keeping in one place all the time. The man must have a 
new hammock folded behind the buttocks, with the ends, passing in 
front under the armpits, emerging from behind and over the op- 
posite shoulders, and then tied below the neck. He locks his fingers 
together across the lower part of his chest. The dance which he 
has to perform is to slightly raise each foot alternately, at the same 
time shifting his position a step or two backward, and then forward 
again simultaneously, with a very suggestive fore and aft move- 
ment at the hips. More than this, both of them have to look at 
one another, or rather stare each other out, without any movement 
of eye or mouth whatsoever. The slightest sign of a laugh will dis- 
qualify either participant, who is thereupon bundled out of the 
ring. The ordeal is not an easy one, because the people around are 
all the time making naughty remarks and exerting their very utmost 
to raise a titter. And whenever one or other fails, the crowd shouts 
out something to this effect: “Hi-e! (/¢., Hoorah!) that man 
(woman) is no good. He (she) will never get a wife (husband).” 
The place of the person thus ignominiously turned out of the ring 
is immediately taken by another man or woman as the case may be. 
The one that can keep stolid enough sufficiently long, without show- 
ing even a suspicion of a smile, is thereupon greeted as a good per- 
son, and as deserving of a helpmate. During the performance, music 
is supplied by two masters of ceremony, stationed within the ring, 
but at opposite sides of it, playing on the serore reed (sec. 570). 
These two are the only people who don a special feather he» ddress ; 
all the others, male and female, wear but the ordinary cotton fore- 
head band. They subsequently move gradually round and round the 
circle, with a two-step, the others, male and female, following in 
Indian file, each holding a staff or stick, which, struck on the ground, 
