CHAPTER XIV.

OF THE FORM AND MATERIALS OF CLOTHING, AND OF THE FABRIC OF OTHER UTENSILS.

Those persons are egregiously mistaken, who imagine that all the Americans, without distinction, wear no other clothes than those in which they were born. This error seems to have arisen from the misrepresentations of pictures or engravings, in which every American Indian is pourtrayed like a hairy Satyr, or like one of the Cyclops, Brontes, or Steropes, or naked Pyracmon. I do not deny that there do exist in America nations entirely destitute of clothing; but that this nakedness is common to them all, is very far from being true. The Payaguas are abominated by the other Indians, because they are unacquainted with dress and with modesty. They think themselves elegantly attired when they are painted with various colours from head to foot, and loaded with glass beads. We found that the Mbayas had plenty of clothes, but made a bad use of them: for they cover those parts of the body which may safely be exposed to the eyes of all, and bare those which modesty commands to be concealed. The Abipones, when I asked them their opinion of the Mbayas, said they thought them like dogs, because they were as impudent. My companions too, who dwelt amongst them, complained much to me of their shamelessness and public indecencies. The women, however, of both nations wear that degree of clothing which modesty requires. In the woods called Mbaeverà, or Mborebiretâ, the country of the antas, I found the men clothed up to the middle with a thin veil, and naked every where else; but the female Indians are decently clothed from the shoulders to the heels, with a white cloth which they weave themselves. I observed the same amongst the wood-Indians who wander on the shores of the Tapiraguaỹ and the Yeyuy, crowds of whom were brought by the Jesuits to the new colony of St. Stanislaus. An old Indian woman and her daughter fifteen years of age, whom I found in the woods betwixt the rivers Mondaỹ and Empalado, wore nothing but a net woven of the hemp caraquatà, in which they slept at night, so that the same dress, which was certainly too transparent, served them both for bed and clothing.

I can truly say of the Abipones, that whilst they were in a state of barbarism, and roamed up and down like brutes, they were all decently, and, in their fashion, elegantly clothed. They will not suffer a female infant, a few months old even, to remain naked. We have often vainly desired to see this decency imitated by the Spaniards in Paraguay, especially those of the cities Asumpcion and Corrientes. How often do grown women allege the excessive heat of the sun as an excuse for throwing off their clothes, without the least regard to modesty, in the public street! For this they are frequently reprehended by preachers, both in public and private. Do you wish to be made acquainted with the kind of clothing which the Abipones wear? They use a square piece of linen, without any alteration, or addition of sleeves, thrown over their shoulders, tying one end of it to the left arm, and leaving the right disengaged. They confine this woollen garment, which displays various colours, and flows from the shoulders to the heels, with a woollen girth. In leaping on to a horse they keep back their dress with their knees, that they may not be quite bare: for they know of no such things as shoes, stockings, or drawers, and are for that reason better prepared to swim rivers, and ride on horseback. Besides this vest which I have described, they throw another square piece of linen over their shoulders, by way of a cloak, which, tied in a knot under the neck, both defends them against the cold, and gives them a respectable appearance. When they are hewing down a tree, and are afraid of being fatigued, they will sometimes throw off their clothes, if they be out of sight. Some strip themselves quite naked when they are going to join battle with the savages, partly that, being lighter, they may be so much the more expeditious in avoiding their adversaries' weapons, partly, that they may appear to despise wounds. In long JOURNEYS, they generally go bareheaded amidst rain, heat, and wind. Some, however, tie a piece of red woollen cloth round their forehead, which is a great defence against the heat of the sun and pains in the head. They greatly prize a European hat, especially the young men, who likewise are much delighted with Spanish saddles, with spurs, and iron bridles. The women wear the same dress as the men, adjusted in rather a different manner.

The clothing of the Abipones is the chief employment of the women, who are commendable for their assiduity, and almost avidity in labour: for not to mention the daily business of the house, they shear sheep, spin the wool very neatly, dye it beautifully, by the aid of alum, with any colours they may have at hand, and afterwards weave it into cloth, adorned with a great number of lines and figures, and with a variety of colours. You would take it for a Turkey carpet, worthy of noblemen's houses in Europe. The loom and the instruments of which it consists are confined to a few reeds and sticks. The American women seem to have a natural talent for making various useful articles. They can mould pots and jugs of various forms of clay, not with the assistance of a turning machine, like potters, but with their hands alone. These clay vessels they bake, not in an oven, but out of doors, placing sticks round them. They cannot glaze them with lead, but they first dye them of a red colour, and then rub them with a kind of glue to make them shine. There is never any snow, and very little frost, in the region inhabited by the Abipones: but when the South wind blows hard, the air becomes very piercing, and sometimes intolerably so to persons thinly clad. The Abipones shield themselves from the cold with a cloak made of otters' skins. This garment, which is likewise square, is laboriously and elegantly made by the women: whose business it is to strip off the skins of the otters, after they have been caught by dogs, and then fix them to the ground with very slender pegs, that they may not wrinkle. After being dried, they are painted red, in square lines like a dice box. The Indian women cannot dress hides like curriers, but after having well rubbed and softened them with their hands, they sew them with a very thin thread, with so much skill, that the seams escape the quickest eye, and the whole cloak looks like one skin. For needles they use very small thorns, with which they pierce the otters' skins, as shoemakers do leather with an awl, so that the slender thread of the caraquatà can be passed through it. This cloak is commonly used both by men and women, when the air is cold; but the old people of both sexes will not part with a hair of these otters' skins, even in the hottest weather. Some of the poorer sort appear clothed in the skins of stags, does, and tigers. All the Americans, who are not entirely devoid of modesty, cover themselves with skins to keep out the cold. Others substitute, or wear in addition, the many coloured feathers of birds, sewed together with singular art; but this is more for the sake of adorning than of covering the body. The savages who inhabit the mountains, generally make threads of the caraquatá, or of the bark of the tree pinô, with which they weave a kind of cloth to serve in part for a covering. The Abiponian widows, whilst they mourn for their husbands, cover their shorn heads and their shoulders with this same kind of cloth. When the Abipones are bathed in sweat, the otters' skins, from not being dressed, exhale, I confess, a by no means balsamic odour. On coldish nights they are used for counterpanes. These skins and cloaks, when worn by use, generally serve to wrap and cover infants, and, when they have no linen in the house, to bind up wounds.

In former ages the Americans preferred nakedness to clothing so greatly, that they refused or threw away the garments offered them by the Europeans. Now, however, the ardour with which the Paraguayrian Indians seek fine dresses exceeds belief. Give them a handsome hat, some pieces of red linen or cloth, or a string of glass-beads, and they will pay you the profoundest homage and obedience. Day and night did the Abipones pester us with the following petition: Give me a dress, father! _Paỳ! Tachcauê hihilalk_, or _aapar̂aik_. There is no surer method of gaining the hearts of the Indians than giving them clothes. No American colony will abound in Christian inhabitants, unless it also abound in sheep and oxen; the wool of the former being necessary to clothe, and the flesh of the latter to feed the bodies of the Indians. If both or either of these articles be wanting, they will return to their retreats, and think themselves richer in being foes than friends to the Spaniards. For, as I have often heard them complain, they found war with the Christians more to their advantage than peace. In times of declared enmity, they acquired by arms what, when peace was established, they failed of obtaining by prayers. The most eloquent teacher of God's word will do but little good in Paraguay, unless he be liberal in clothing and feeding his disciples. Should an angel descend from Heaven to make the Abipones acquainted with God and his commandments, if he should come empty handed, unprovided with clothes, food, and other gifts, it would be all in vain, he would scarce obtain a hearing. Were the blackest demon to come up from hell, and offer them chests full of clothes, food, knives, scissors, rings, and glass-beads, he would be called captain, and find all the Abipones tractable and obedient. If you ask me why the Americans have not all been induced to embrace Christianity, I will tell you the reason. It is chiefly owing to the pernicious examples of the old Christians, and to their want of liberality to the Indians; the former deter them from embracing our religion, while the latter renders them apostates to it. Another cause is to be found in the extreme, and almost incredible scarcity of priests to instruct them, and indeed of all things. After perusing the latter part of my history, you will perhaps be better inclined to credit what I say.