V 
263 
SICKNESS. 
I have already said that the Jakuns were not much subject to 
sickness; notwithstanding 1 , on account of want of proper care, few 
of them reach to an advanced age. The sickness of which they 
have the greatest dread, and from which they suffer most, is the 
small pox. Is any one attacked by it, immediately he is entirely aban¬ 
doned ; parents, relations, friends and neighbours fly away, and the 
poor sick man, thus left without any assistance, of course dies mis¬ 
erably. In their other sicknesses, they are not so entirely uncared 
for ; some physic, consisting ordinarily of an infusion or decoction of 
wild plants, is given according to the rede prescription of a Pawang, 
but ordinarily without any success. They mostly die of fever caused 
by the dampness and insalubrity of the places they inhabit; like the 
people of India they are generally very subject to ulcers. Many of 
them have also disgusting skin diseases, but ordinarily not danger¬ 
ous. I think that, if the Missionaries succeed in gathering the Ja¬ 
kuns into villages as they intend to do, and to make their habita¬ 
tions more salubrious, ulcers amongst them will be certainly much 
more scarce ; and I hope the cure of their skin diseases would not 
present great difficulty. A small provision of quinine or some other 
remedies for fever would also doubtless preserve the life of many. 
FUNERALS. 
The preparations they make for their funerals are few and simple. 
If the decease took place before noon, the body is buried the same 
day ; if after noon, the funeral is deffered until next day. The corpse 
is washed, wrapped in some cloth, and interred by relations and 
neighbours, in a grave about four or five cubits deep. The sum- 
pitan, quiver of arrows, knife, &c., of the deceased are buried with 
him; along with some rice, water, and tobacco. I questioned them 
respecting the reason of burying such things with the deceased, but 
I could not obtain any answer except that this was the custom prac¬ 
tised by their ancestors, and followed by them. This practice is not 
peculiar to the Jakuns; we know from history, that many of the 
