little images of dough, into the temple, dedicated to Vishnu, and there cutting off the head in honor of that god. This ceremony, which is annually performed with great solemnity, was instituted in commemoration of a famous event which happened in that village. "Two virtuous persons lived there, Sirutenden and his wife Vanagata-ananga, whose faith and piety Vishnu was desirous to prove. He appeared to them, and demanded no other service of them but that of sacrificing, with their own hands, their only and much beloved son Siralen, and serving up his flesh for a repast. The parents with heroic courage, surmounting the sentiments and chidings of nature, obeyed without hesitation, and submitted to the pleasure of the god. So illustrious an act of devotion is held worthy of this annual commemoration, at which the sacrifice is emblematically renewed. The same barbarous custom is preserved in many parts of India; and the ardor with which the people engage in it leaves room to suspect that they still regret the times when they would have been at liberty to offer up to their sanguinary gods, the reality, instead of the symbol." Such a legend as this, taken in conjunction with the custom which perpetuates it, and with all the known history of human sacrifices, in India and elsewhere, furnishes evidence that cannibalism as a religious rite FEEJEE AND MOHAWK CANNIBALISM. 187 was known to the ancestors of the present dwellers in India. And as it is in the far East, so it is in the far West; and so, also, in mid-ocean. Thus, for example, in the latter field, among the degraded Feejee Islanders, where one would be least likely to look for the sway of a religious sentiment in the more barbarous customs of that barbarous people, this truth has been recognized by Christian missionaries, who would view the relics of heathenism with no undue favor. The Rev. Messrs. Williams and Calvert,—the one after thirteen years, and the other after seventeen years of missionary service there, said on this subject: "Cannibalism is a part of the Fijian religion, and the gods are described as delighting in human flesh." And again: "Human flesh is still the most valued offering [to the gods], and their 'drink offerings of blood' are still the most acceptable [offerings to the gods] in some parts of Fiji.”1 It was the same among the several tribes of the North American Indians, according to the most trustworthy testimony. A Dutch clergyman, Dominie Megapolensis, writing two centuries ago from near the present site of Albany, "bears the strongest testimony to the ferocity with which his friends, the Mohawks treated their prisoners, and is very explicit as to 1 See William and Calvert's Fiji and the Fijians, pp. 35 f., 161166, 181 f. little images of dough, into the temple, dedicated to Vishnu, and there cutting off the head in honor of that god. This ceremony, which is annually performed with great solemnity, was instituted in commemoration of a famous event which happened in that village. "Two virtuous persons lived there, Sirutenden and his wife Vanagata-ananga, whose faith and piety Vishnu was desirous to prove. He appeared to them, and demanded no other service of them but that of sacrificing, with their own hands, their only and much beloved son Siralen, and serving up his flesh for a repast. The parents with heroic courage, surmounting the sentiments and chidings of nature, obeyed without hesitation, and submitted to the pleasure of the god. So illustrious an act of devotion is held worthy of this annual commemoration, at which the sacrifice is emblematically renewed. The same barbarous custom is preserved in many parts of India; and the ardor with which the people engage in it leaves room to suspect that they still regret the times when they would have been at liberty to offer up to their sanguinary gods, the reality, instead of the symbol." Such a legend as this, taken in conjunction with the custom which perpetuates it, and with all the known history of human sacrifices, in India and elsewhere, furnishes evidence that cannibalism as a religious rite FEEJEE AND MOHAWK CANNIBALISM. 187 was known to the ancestors of the present dwellers in India. And as it is in the far East, so it is in the far West; and so, also, in mid-ocean. Thus, for example, in the latter field, among the degraded Feejee Islanders, where one would be least. likely to look for the sway of a religious sentiment in the more barbarous customs of that barbarous people, this truth has been recognized by Christian missionaries, who would view the relics of heathenism with no undue favor. The Rev. Messrs. Williams and Calvert,—the one after thirteen years, and the other after seventeen years of missionary service there,―said on this subject: "Cannibalism is a part of the Fijian religion, and the gods are described as delighting in human flesh." And again: "Human flesh is still the most valued offering [to the gods], and their 'drink offerings of blood' are still the most acceptable [offerings to the gods] in some parts of Fiji.”1 It was the same among the several tribes of the North American Indians, according to the most trustworthy testimony. A Dutch clergyman, Dominie Megapolensis, writing two centuries ago from near the present site of Albany, "bears the strongest testimony to the ferocity with which his friends, the Mohawks treated their prisoners, and is very explicit as to 1 See William and Calvert's Fiji and the Fijians, pp. 35 f., 161166, 181 f. cannibalism. The common people,' he says 'eat the arms, buttocks, and trunk; but the chiefs eat the head and the heart.' This feast was of a religious charac "1 ter." Parkman says, of the "hideous scene of feasting [which] followed the torture of a prisoner,” “it was, among the Hurons, partly an act of vengeance, and partly a religious rite." He cites evidence, also, that there was cannibalism among the Miamis, where "the act had somewhat of a religious character [and], was attended with ceremonial observances." Of the religious basis of cannibalism among the primitive peoples of Central and South America, students seem agreed. Dorman who has carefully collated important facts on this subject from varied sources, and has considered them in their scientific bearings, is explicit in his conclusions at this point. Reviewing all the American field, he says: "I have dwelt longer upon the painful subject of cannibalism than might seem desirable, in order to show its religious character and prevalence everywhere. Instead of being confined to savage peoples, as is generally supposed, it prevailed to a greater extent and with more horrible rites among the most civilized. Its religious inception was the cause of this."4 Again, he says, of the peoples of 1 Cited in Parkman's Jesuits in No. Am., p. 228, note. 2 Ibid., p. xxxix. 3 Ibid., p. xl., note. Origin of Prim. Supers., p. 151 f. |