BELIEF IN WITCHCRAFT. 471 



one occasion freed himself from some importunate Indians, 

 by threatening to draw them if they did not go away. I 

 have already mentioned (p. 425) the danger in which Catlin 

 found himself from sketching a chief in profile, and thereby 

 as it was supposed depriving him of half his face. So again 

 a mysterious connexion is supposed to exist between a cut 

 lock of hair and the person to whom it belonged. In various 

 parts of the world the sorcerer gets clippings of the hair of 

 his enemy, parings of his nails or leavings of his food, con- 

 vinced that whatever evil is done to these, will react on their 

 former owner. Even a piece of clothing, or the ground on 

 which a person has trodden, will answer the purpose, and 

 among some tribes the mere knowledge of a person's name 

 is supposed to give a mysterious power. The Indians of 

 British Columbia have a great horror of telling their names. 

 Among the Algonquins a person's real name is communicated 

 only to his nearest relations and dearest friends: the outer 

 world address him by a kind of nickname. Thus, the true 

 name of La Belle Sauvage was not Pocahontas, but Matokes, 

 which they were afraid to communicate to the English. In 

 some tribes these name-fancies take a different form. Ac- 

 cording to Ward, it is an unpardonable sin for a Hindoo 

 woman to mention the name of her husband. The Kaffirs 

 have a similar custom, and so have some East African tribes. 

 In many parts of the world the names of the dead are 

 avoided with superstitious horror. This is the case in great 

 parts of North and South America, in Siberia, among the 

 Papuans and Australians, and even in Shetland, where it is 

 said that widows are very reluctant to mention their departed 

 husbands. 



Throughout Australia, among some of the Brazilian tribes, 

 in parts of Africa, and in various other countries, natural 

 death is regarded as an impossibility. In the New Hebrides 

 " when a man fell ill, he knew that some sorcerer was burn- 



