The Hiflory of 



Book II. 



its direction, than that of a corrupt Nature : They patiently 

 bear with their imperfections, and the frovvardnefs of their 

 old age, are never weary of miniftring unto them, and as much 

 as they can, keep neer them, to divert them, as the French have 

 obferv'd in fome of their Iflands, which demeanour of theirs 

 is the more commendable, in that it is done amongft Barbari- 

 ans: So that if any among them do not honour their Fathers and 

 Mothers;, they have degenerated from the vertue of their An-, 

 ceftors. 



. put when after all their care and pains they chance to lofe 

 any one of their Friends or Relations, they make great cries 

 and lamentations upon his death : Wherein they differ much 

 JjflJlJi a?' from the ancient ihracians^ and the Inhabitants of the Fortu- 

 tkeLifeof 71 nate who buried their dead with rejoicing, dancing, 



Apollonius, an< ^ fi p g m gs as perfons delivered out of the miferies of humane 

 /. 5. c 1. life. After the Caribbians have wept over their dead, they 

 wafti them, paint the bodies with a red colour, rub their 

 heads with Oil, comb their hair, thruft up the legs to the 

 thighs, and the elbows between the legs, and bend down the 

 face upon the hands, fo that the whole body fomewhat refem- 

 bles the pofture of the child in the mothers wombj and then 

 . * I they wrap it up in a new bed, till all things be ready to difpofe 

 it into the ground. 



There have been fome Nations who caft the bodies of the 

 Drakes Voy dead into Rivers, as fome Ethiopians did : Others caft them 

 agtf fart 2. tp fiirds and Dogs, as the Yarthians^ the Hircanians^ and fuch 

 others, who were fomewhat qf the fame humour with Dioge- 

 nes the Cynick ,* Some others covered them with heaps of 

 ftbnes. It is reported of fome Inhabitants of Afric^ that they 

 difpofed their dead in earthen Veffels j and that others put 

 them into glafs : Heraclitus^ who maintained that fire was the 

 principle of all things, would ; have the bodies of the dead 

 burnt, that they might return to their firft origine: And this 

 Guftom, obferved for feveral ages among the Romans , is at 

 Xcnoph.Cy- ^ s praftifed among divers oriental Nations .• But Cyrus 

 ropaed. /.8. at his death amrmed,that there was nothing happier than to be 

 d jfj>pfed into the bofom of the earth, the common Mother of 

 Plin. /. 7. c. a H mankind; The firft Romans were of the fame opinion, for 

 54. ' ' they interr'd their dead : And of the feveral ways of difpofing 

 of thedead ? interring is that which is in ufe among the Carib- 

 bians : They do not make their Graves according to our fa7 

 jh]pp,but like thoie of the Turks* Brapians^ and Canadians ,that 

 is a"fcoutfour or five foot deep, and round like a Tun : and at 

 the bottom of it 5 they fet a little ftool, on which the Relati- 

 ons apd Fxiends of the deceafed place the body fitting, leaving 

 h in the fame pofture as they put it in immediately after the 

 death of the party. 



They commonly make the grave within the houfe of the 



deceafed, 



