66 Timehri. 
it were enclosed with this piece of wood : they lay the child upon his back and 
this board being bound fast to that which is upon the forehead, they make the 
head of the child almost as flat as one’s hand.”” Hence though not recorded for 
the Guianas there is good reason for supposing that it had existence here previous 
to the conquest, but this is now a question that can only be determined by 
a systematic search in the old-time graves. 
Infanticide appears to have been very prevalent in the Western Guianas. 
Father Gumilla tells us how girls when they are born may be killed by their 
mothers, survivors owing their preservation to the entreaties, threats, even 
chastisements of their mothers by the husbands. The so-called crime was effect- 
ed immediately after birth, by breaking the neck, by forcible pressure on the 
breast-bone or wilfully letting it bleed to death by cutting the string too short. 
In some cases the child was even buried alive. If any child were born with any 
defect or monstrosity, minus a hand or foot or with a hare-lip as was commonly 
the case, the child, male or female, was put to death without any objections 
being made by either parent. So also if twins were born, one of them had to be 
immediately buried, either at the direction or at the hands of the mother herself. 
As a matter of fact, twins (as was the case throughout the Western Hemisphere 
and in many portions of the Eastern) were considered uncanny and regarded as a 
sign of dishonour. The husband’s view was that only one of those could be his : 
the presence of the other was a sure sign of his wife’s disloyalty, with the result 
that the poor mother was often made the scapegoat. The women who practised 
infanticide defended it—I am still quoting the Jesuit missionary—: on the score 
of love and affection they recognised the hardship of their own lot, as compared 
‘with the opposite sex, and maintained that they only treated their little babies 
as they wished their own mothers had treated them. The practice it is true was 
not universal amongst all the Guiana nations, but though it dominated in them 
they were many exceptions especially where the husband treated their wives 
decently and kindly. 
It is certain that the system of enslaving each other existed, though in varying 
degrees, among Aborigines of Guiana from the earliest times their discoverers 
found it in full force. The treatment of a slave varied a good deal with the tribe, 
with the object of the raid, and with the sex and youth of the captive. Asa 
marked contrast to those who ate their male prisoners, or emasculated the youths 
for fattening purposes, to those who employed their female captives as boat- 
women and paddlers on their predatory expeditions, it is indeed pleasant to record 
the following account of the Aquas or Buaguas in the Southern Guianas :— 
“They make slaves of all the prisoners they take in war, and use them for all 
kinds of service. However, they treat them with so much love and kindness 
that they make them eat with themselves, and there’s nothing in the world 
displeases them more than to desire them to sell them, as we found by experi- 
ence on several occasions. In a word, they gave us signs enough to convince us 
that they had a greater esteem for their slaves than for all the rest of their goods, 
and they had rather part with all they possessed besides than part with them. 
In silence and in shame, I pass over the story of the slavery of the Indians 
and of its encouragement by the English, Dutch, Spanish, and Portuguese, and 
