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them. No one dared to fall asleep during the wake, for sleep meant that 
the dead man’s soul was calling for company and the sleeper would die 
within the next few months. 
There are slight differences, however, in the interpretation of these 
rites. Some Indians argued that the soul departed immediately for its 
destination, taking with it only the souls of the tobacco and food that 
were deposited in the grave. In their conception the food and tobacco 
thrown into the fire during the wake served the dead man’s shadow, inducing 
it to remain in the vicinity contented and harmless. For that reason the 
wake around the funeral fire was often prolonged over four nights instead 
of only one. Even today some of the Parry Islanders set a place at the 
table and leave a little food on the stove for four nights after a kinsman’s 
death. 
“ When my sister died my parents hung a pail outside the wigwam, and for four 
successive evenings in it the remnants of the food we had eaten during the day. 
The pail had a tight lid that prevented raids by birds and animals; but my sister’s 
shadow moved the lid aside and fed on the soul of the food, leaving its outward 
substance unchanged” (James Walker). 
With the primitive tools at the command of the Indians the digging 
of a grave in frozen ground was well-nigh impossible. Hence during the 
winter months they merely laid the corpse on the surface of the ground, 
wrapped it in birch bark, and covered it with logs or stones. Sometimes 
they left the wigwam standing over it, or, if they wished to keep the 
wigwam for further use, built a miniature wigwam in its place. In the 
cemeteries of post-European times they substituted grave houses for wig- 
wams, fitted them with openings like windows, and gave them broad ledges 
to receive the offerings of food and tobacco. Even commoner than surface 
burial was the deposition of corpses in trees. Nevertheless, both surface 
and tree burial were no more than substitutes for burial in the ground. 
Indeed, relatives often returned after the snow had melted to inter the 
remains they had left exposed to the elements. 
On many graves the Indians planted wooden stakes carved or painted 
with the inverted crests of the deceased’s clans. To make a site more 
readily discoverable, they sometimes set up a boulder or pole a few yards 
away, and lined up the boulder and the grave to point towards some 
prominent feature in the landscape. Passing travellers, especially if they 
belonged to the same clan, would then deposit a little food or tobacco 
for the use of the dead man’s shadow. 
Whether or not death occurred naturally made no difference in the 
manner of burial. Only for a still-born babe were there special rites, 
because its failure to live was attributed either to sorcery, or to some 
wrongdoing on the part of the mother, and the latter, being always susoect, 
had to seek forgiveness from the Great Spirit and from her kinsfolk. 
The corpse was, therefore, deposited in the hollow of a stump for nine 
days, and each day at the hour of birth the mother walked nine times 
round its resting place- At the end of nine days the grave was opened. 
If the corpse had disappeared, as sometimes happened, the Indians believed 
that it had perished completely, body, soul, and shadow; but if it had not 
disappeared they interred it without ceremony in the woods. 
