RoTH] GAMES, SPORTS, AND AMUSEMENTS 483 
tribe (Cr, 571). On the other hand, Schomburgk thus expresses 
himself: “The art of improvising seems to be met with all over 
America. With trifling modulation of the voice, they sing about 
their deeds in war and in the chase, and have an inexhaustible flow 
of humor and satire” (SR, nu, 193). On several occasions the dis- 
tinguished traveler and his party would appear to have constituted 
the subject matter of their improvised songs (SR, m1, 192). 
598. The Indians are a very sociable people among themselves and 
frequently meet together in a large wigwam or carbet that is in 
every hamlet for the purpose, where, if they do not play or dance, 
they amuse each other with fiction, stories generally concerning 
ghosts, witches, or dreams, during which they frequently burst out 
into immoderate fits of laughter (St, 1, 393). At other times, says 
Bancroft, they visit each other, and are mutually entertained, not 
only with the simple occurrences of their lives, but with a variety of 
fables which are merry, significant, and replete with such simple mo- 
rality as their confined observations and uncultivated minds have sug- 
gested (BA,328). So also, says Dance, one method of spending the 
hours before bedtime agreeably is to challenge explanations of some 
peculiarity of animals, or the solution of certain practices among In- 
dians. . . . The person asked will then answer his question by relat- 
ing a story, more or less elaborate, according to his ability (Da, 262). 
Brett distinguishes certain groups into which these fables or stories 
fall; e. g.,the destructive deeds of animals of which kanaima, or a 
human soul acting under its influence, has taken possession, the doings 
of bush hogs and other animals temporarily possessed by other spirits, 
the explanation of the various natural phenomena surrounding them 
(Br, 374). In almost all the tribes that we got to know, says Schom- 
burgk, it was the old women who take the place of the old bards, 
and plant these traditions from one generation to the other (SR, n, 
320). A very common topic of conversation while lying in their 
hammocks at night will be a relation of the day’s doings, not, how- 
ever, in more or less general terms, as would be the case in ordinary 
European discourse, but with details of almost scientific precision, 
yet embellished with tiresome monotony and repetitions. The nar- 
rator will give particulars, step by step, of the route taken, the 
creeks crossed, the trees seen, the bird and anmial life noted, the 
persons met, what he and they said and did, and everything else that 
was noticed, however ordinary or matter-of-fact it might be. 
Comparatively speaking, he will thus take hours to express what 
could, for all practical purposes, be just as well explained in as many 
minutes. Every now and again the listener will chime in with an 
exclamative note of agreement, doubt, or surprise. The reference 
of De Goeje from Surinam that the Trio have the peculiar habit 
