﻿ig'2 ACCOUNT OF THE 



cream of common cow milk, and its flesh consti- 

 tutes the first luxury at a Kookie feast, and, except 

 on vGvy extraordinary occasions, is never given. 

 The goats are larger, and more hairy than those of 

 the )3lains. In the other animals there is nothing 

 peculiar. Notwithstanding that the Kookies have 

 such a number of different articles of food, yet a 

 scarcity of provisions frequently prevails among the 

 tribes, when those upon a friendly footing always 

 assist each other ; and whatever may have been thus 

 amicably given is rigidly repaid, in more favour- 

 able times, by the tribe which received it. A 

 scarcity may be occasioned either by "the irregu- 

 larity of the season in a failure or excess of the 

 periodical rains ; or else by the incursions of ene- 

 mies, who never fail to lay waste and destroy, if 

 they can, every thing to be found without the Parah. 

 And the Parah itself, in a fatally unguarded hour, 

 is often destroyed also, when the helpless survivors, 

 if any, of such a calamity, ai;e tlnown upon the 

 humanity of their neighbouring friends. 



In the Parahs they cook their victuals in earthen 

 pots of their own manufacture, resembling those of 

 the Bengalees, but much stronger and thicker in 

 substance. The hunter, however, in his excursions 

 through the forests, boils his food in a particular 

 kind of hollow bamboo. From the ashes of a difter- 

 ent species of the same plant, he extracts a substi- 

 tute for salt, to eat with his victuals; and with 

 equal simplicity and readiness he kindles his fire, by 

 tlie friction of one piece of dried bamboo upon ano- 

 ther. The 7\^ookies have but one wife ; they may 

 however keep as many concubines as the}'^ please. 

 Adultery may be punished with instant death by 

 cither ot'the injured parties, if the guilty are caught 

 by them in the fact; it may otlierwise be compromised 

 by a fine o{' Oi/ais, as the chief may determine. 

 The frailty of a concubine is always compromised in 

 this vvay, without disgrace to the parties. Fornica- 

 :1 tion 



