230 TlMEHRI. 
ACHINAON, a Carib, at present a star, causes light 
rain and strong winds. 
Couroumon (a Carib), also a star, causes the heavy- 
sea waves, and upsets canoes ; he is also the cause of 
flood and ebb. Chirities, the Pleiades, they reckon 
by, and observe the years by this constellation, but, 
they know not how many it is since the first of them 
came from the mainland to inhabit the islands, neither 
know their age. They know not where we come from, 
but they call us Balanacle, i.e., Men of the Sea,* and 
believe that we were born out of the sea, and had no 
other dwellings but ships. They believe now that we are 
from a different world, and that our God, who made the 
sky and earth, but not their lands, is not theirs. 
As they knew not that there were other countries besides 
theirs, the first time that they saw ships and heard 
guns, they believed that these were devils, and that the 
men and ships had come from out of the sea to convey 
them away and occupy their land. They ran away 
and hid in the bush. They found out that they 
were mistaken in one of these points, but right in 
the other ; and they wished that we had never put foot 
on their land ; and, whatever they may pretend, they 
hold us in great aversion, though they are no longer 
to be feared, for many have been killed. I think 
there still are about 4000. Of the twenty or thirty 
islands which they once possessed, they now only 
occupy two or three. They are now mostly subject to 
the French, Spanish, English, or Flemish. The first 
time they saw a man on horse-back, they thought that 
* To this day the men of the Carib tribes in Guiana call us " Para, 
nikeri." — Ed. 
