Primitive Games. 299 



Macoosi and Ackawoi ; possibly by all the other Carib 

 tribes too. There are but few Ackawois on my own 

 river, the Pomeroon, and those few are comparatively 

 recent arrivals ; but one of the Pomeroon Indians who 

 was with me assured me that he had seen the dance 

 among the Ackawois on that river many years ago. The 

 other Pomeroon Indians all assert that neither the Caribs 

 nor any of the other Indians there know it. 



Parasheera seems to be the name not only of the dance 

 but also of each of the performers who, fantastically 

 clothed, arrive at the appointed settlement and institute 

 the dance. Even when we reached Araiwaparoo in the 

 morning, the wooded heights round us from time to time 

 re-echoed to frequent shouts ; these, however, for some 

 hours died away each time they were raised, without 

 anything apparently happening or any one appearing. 

 There seemed a good deal of hesitation and unwilling- 

 ness in answering my questions about these shouts, and 

 an air of mystery seemed to pervade the whole village. 

 I, however, induced one of my Macoosi travelling com- 

 panions to throw some light on the matter. He told me 

 that it was the parasheera gathering. Each party of 

 two or three of them, being the male inhabitants of one 

 household from some part of the neighbouring savannah, 

 as they come, shouting and yelling, to some spot 

 in the forest, appointed as a gathering place, near 

 the village where the feast is to be held, hush their cries 

 and wait till the other parasheeras, each party of whom 

 seems to come from a separate, more or less distant set- 

 tlement, come up. Only when the representatives from 

 all the invited settlements have thus gathered together 

 at the appointed place in the forest near, but not in 



PP2 



