628 ARTS AND CRAFTS OF GUIANA INDIANS [ pri. ANN. 38 
the Island Carib, for strangers of their own nation, there is in each 
carbet an Indian (male) whose business it is to receive the travelers 
and who is called niotiakaiti. If these are common folk he gives 
them seats and what there is to eat, but especially a cassava cake 
folded in two, which signifies that they must eat what they can but 
leave the rest. But if the visitors are tiptop people, such as relatives, 
captains, etc., they comb their hair on their coming, and on their 
going away they hang up beds and invite them to rest themselves. 
They also present them with matoutous, which are little tables made 
of rushes or the leaves of palms (sec. 332) . . . on which they set the 
cassava not folded, but as they come off the plank. The women set 
them at their feet, and the men standing about show that which was 
brought, saying, “ Behold thy meat!” Afterwards the women bring in 
gourds full of ouicou and make them drink. Then,having set them on 
the ground before them, the husband, who stands behind the women, 
says, “ Behold thy drink!” And the others make answer to these two 
compliments, “ Very well.” The cassava unfolded signifies, “ Eat 
thy fill and carry away the rest”; which they fail not to do. When 
they have dined well without being interrupted by anyone, they all 
come to salute them one after the other,saying to him,“ Be welcome!” 
But the women are not much concerned in this ceremony (RO, 
516-517; see also PBR, 245). On the mainland the strict etiquette 
is for the visitor to finish the cassava cake that is offered, or, if he 
can not do this, to take it away with him. Then, in certain of the 
tribes there may follow the wrestling matches (secs. 607, 608) and 
the whipping bouts (sec. 840). 
$12. Whatever interest may so far have been displayed by the 
headman, chieftain, etc., toward his visitors would seem to vary 
with the opinion he holds of their relative importance and the 
nature of their business. In the cases above alluded to the interest 
shown has been a more or less active one, but there are many in- 
stances recorded where it is decidedly much to the contrary. “The 
captain [Arawaks at Hittia village, Berbice] receives us,” says 
Dance, “ sitting in his hammock” (Da, 32). The [Wayamara] cap- 
tain received Schomburgk sitting on a low stool surrounded by his 
men, all armed with war clubs (ScF, 219). A Warrau chief greeted 
him after the same style (SR, 1, 184). “The chieftain of the place 
| Makusi settlement, Ossotshuni Mountains], whose name we under- 
stood was Tuma-Tuma, awaited our arrival,” says the last-mentioned 
traveler, “with great indifference, in his hammock ... While our 
guides made him acquainted with the object of our journey, he 
only gave his ahem! without betraying the slightest interest in 
us or those who were with us. The females, however, did not con- 
strain their curiosity in such a determined manner. . . . They 
