1770 WAR SONG—TROPHIES OF HEADS 247 
iris; in short, nothing is omitted which could render a 
human shape frightful and deformed, which I suppose they 
think terrible. During this time they brandish their 
spears, hack the air with their patoo-patoos, and shake their 
darts as if they meant every moment to begin the attack, 
singing all the while in a wild but not disagreeable manner, 
ending every strain with a loud and deep-drawn sigh, in 
which they all join in concert. The whole is accompanied 
by strokes struck against the sides of the boats with their 
feet, paddles, and arms; the whole in such excellent time, 
that though the crews of several canoes join in concert, you 
rarely or never heard a single stroke wrongly placed. 
This we called the war-song; for though they seemed 
fond of using it upon all occasions, whether in war or 
peace, they, I believe, never omit it in their attacks. They 
have several other songs which their women sing prettily 
enough in parts. They were all in a slow melancholy style, 
but certainly have more taste in them than could be ex- 
pected from untaught savages. Instrumental music they 
have none, unless a kind of wooden pipe, or the shell called 
Triton’s Trumpet, with which they make a noise not very 
unlike that made by boys with a cows horn, may be 
called such. They have, indeed, also a kind of small pipe 
of wood, crooked and shaped almost like a large tobacco 
pipe, but it has hardly more music in it than a whistle with 
a pea. But on none of these did I ever hear them attempt 
to play a tune or sing to their music. 
That they eat the bodies of such of their enemies as are 
killed in war, is a fact which they universally acknowledged 
from our first landing at every place we came to. It was 
confirmed by an old man, whom we supposed to be the 
chief of an Indian town very near us, bringing at our desire 
six or seven heads of men, preserved with the flesh on. 
These it seems the people keep, after having eaten the 
brains, as trophies of their victories, in the same manner as 
the Indians of North America do scalps ; they had their orna- 
ments in their ears as when alive, and some seemed to have 
false eyes. The old man was very jealous of showing them ; 
