12. HOUSES AND HOUSE-LIFE OF THE AMERICAN ABORIGINES. 
try puts forward its best players, usually from six to ten on a side, and the 
members of each phratry assemble together, but upon opposite sides of the 
field in which the game is played. Before it commences, articles of per- 
sonal property are hazarded upon the result by members of the opposite 
phratries. These are deposited with keepers to abide the event. The 
game is played with spirit and enthusiasm, and is an exciting spectacle. 
The members of each phratry, from their opposite stations, watch the game 
with eagerness, and cheer their respective players at every successful turn 
of the game.* 
Again, when a murder had been committed it was usual for the gens 
of the murdered person to meet in council, and, after ascertaining the facts, 
to take measures for avenging the deed. The gens of the criminal also held 
a council, and endeavored to effect an adjustment or condonation of the 
crime with the gens of the murdered person; but it often happened that the 
gens of the criminal called upon the other gentes of their phratry, when the 
slayer and the slain belonged to opposite phratries, to unite with them to 
obtain a condonation of the crime. In such a case the phratry held a coun- 
cil, and then addressed itself to the other phratry, to which it sent a delega- 
tion with a belt of white wampum asking for a council of the phratry and 
for an adjustment of the crime. They offered reparation to the family and 
gens of the murdered person in expressions of regret and in presents of 
value. Negotiations were continued between the two councils until an 
affirmative or a negative conclusion was reached. The influence of a phratry 
composed of several gentes would be greater than that of a single gens; 
and by calling into action the opposite phratry the probability of a con- 
donation would he increased, especially if there were extenuating circum- 
stances. We may thus see how naturally the Grecian phratry, prior to 
civilization, assumed the principal though not exclusive management of cases 
of murder, and also of the purification of the murderer if he escaped pun- 
ishment, and after the institution of political society with what propriety 
the phratry assumed the duty of prosecuting the murderer in the courts of 
justice. 
At the funerals of persons of recognized importance in the tribe the 
* League of the Iroquois, p. 294. 
