1865.} Religion dec. among the Karens. 205 



" It is related that formerly two men travelling were overtaken by 

 night in a mountain gorge, where they built up a little booth in 

 which to sleep. After dark, the wood-pecker screamed, and the men 

 heard the ghosts saying to each other : ' The dog barks.' 



" Thinking it was other men speaking, the travellers hallooed in 

 reply, when the ghosts said : ' The monkeys are leaping, let us shoot,' 

 and immediately the snap of a bow was heard. Instantly one of the 

 men was seized with a severe fit of shivering ; and he went home in 

 the morning and died." 



Hence the wood-pecker is a bird of omen, and when a Karen hears 

 it stream, he cries out : " Wood-pecker, shun me afar off. Shun my 

 house, shun my road, shun my way, shun my field, shun my garden, 

 shun the roof of my house, shun my place, shun my stream, shun my 

 brook, shun the place where I draw water. Shun me, keep afar off^ 

 go thine own way, thine own road." 



Spirits of Ancestors. 



The Karens suppose that their parents who have performed merito- 

 rious acts go to a place of happiness above, which seems to correspond 

 to the Deva heavens of the Buddhists. The existence of Grod the 

 original Creator of all things is quite ignored, and he appears to have 

 no place in it. It has its rulers and its subjects ; and one of the names 

 applied to them is the Burmese designation of Indra, the king of the 

 Deva heavens. 



These beings are supposed to preside over births and marriages, and 

 to exercise a general watch care over their children on earth ; and the 

 Karens make offerings to them, as their deified ancestors. 



There are different classes of worshippers or sects, as they may be 

 denominated, who make different kinds of offerings. One set of wor- 

 shippers offers only rice and vegetables ; another offers fowls, another 

 hogs, and another oxen or buffaloes. Those who sacrifice animals,, 

 sometimes offer all three as different rites, but those who. offer rice 

 and vegetables never offer sacrifices. 



These different rites are hereditary in different families of the same 

 or of different tribes. Those whose ancestors offered bloodless offerings, 

 offer bloodless offerings ; and those whose progenitors sacrificed ani- 

 mals, sacrifice animals. 



