CHAPTER XV.

OF THE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE ABIPONES.

The Abipones, in their whole deportment, preserve a decorum scarce credible to Europeans. Their countenance and gait display a modest cheerfulness, and manly gravity tempered with gentleness and kindness. Nothing licentious, indecent, or uncourteous, is discoverable in their actions. In their daily meetings, all is quiet and orderly. Confused vociferations, quarrels, or sharp words, have no place there. They love jokes in conversation, but are averse to indecency and ill-nature. If any dispute arises, each declares his opinion with a calm countenance and unruffled speech: they never break out into clamours, threats, and reproaches, as is usual to certain people of Europe. These praises are justly due to the Abipones as long as they remain sober: but when intoxicated, they shake off the bridle of reason, become distracted, and quite unlike themselves. In their assemblies, they maintain the utmost politeness. One scarcely dares to interrupt another, when he is speaking. Whilst one man relates some event of war, perhaps for half an hour together, all the rest not only listen attentively, but assent at every sentence, making a loud snort, as a sign of affirmation, which they every now and then express with these words: _quevorken_, certainly, _cleerà_, very true, and _chik akalagritan_, I don't in the least doubt it. _Ta yeegàm_, or _kem ekemat!_ are exclamations of wonder. With these words, uttered with great eagerness, they interrupt the preacher in the midst of his discourse, thinking it a mark of respect. They account it extremely ill-mannered to contradict any one, however much he may be mistaken. They salute one another, and return the salute in these words: _La nauichi?_ Now are you come? _La ñauè_, Now I am come. But in general, for the sake of brevity, both parties only use the word _Là_, pronounced with much emphasis. The same manner of saluting is usual to the Guaranies, who say _Ereyupà_? Are you come? _Ayù angâ_, I am come. When tired of a conversation, they never depart without taking leave of the master of the house. The one who sits nearest to him, says: _Ma chik kla leyà?_ Have we not talked enough? the second accosts the third, and the third the fourth, in the same words, till at length the last of the circle, seated on the ground, declares that they have talked enough: _Kla leyà_, upon which they all rise up together at one moment. Each then courteously takes leave of the master of the house in these words, _Lahikyegarik_: now I am going from you; to which he replies, _La micheroà_: now you are going from me. The plebeian Indians say _Lahik_, now I am going. When at the door of the house, that is, at the place where they go out, for they have no doors, they turn to the master, and say, _Tamtařa_, I shall see you again, an expression commonly made use of in our country. They would think it quite contrary to the laws of good-breeding, were they to meet any one, and not ask him where he was going: so that the word _Miekauè_ or _Miekauchitè_? where are you going? resounds in the streets.

The men think polygamy and divorce allowable, from the example of their ancestors, and of other American nations; but very few of the Abipones indulge in this liberty. Repudiation is much more common than a plurality of wives. But very many are content with one wife during the whole of their lives. They think it both wicked and disgraceful to have any illicit connection with other women; so that adultery is almost unheard-of amongst them. Both boys and girls display a native hilarity in their countenances, yet you never see them in company, or talking together. Some time after my arrival, I played on the flute in the open street. The crowd of women were delighted with the sweetness of a musical instrument they had never before seen; and the youths flocked in numbers to hear it; but as soon as they approached, the women every one disappeared. The custom of bathing in a neighbouring stream is agreeable to them, and practised every day, except when the air is too cold. But do not imagine that, as syrens and dolphins are seen sporting on the same waves in the ocean, males and females swim and wash in the same part of the lake, or river. According to the Abiponian custom, the different sexes have different places assigned them. Where the women bathe, you cannot find the shadow of a man. Above a hundred women often go out to distant plains together to collect various fruits, roots, colours, and other useful things, and remain four or eight days in the country, without having any male to accompany them on their journey, assist them in their labours, take care of the horses, or guard them amidst the perils of wild beasts, or of enemies. Those Amazons are sufficient to themselves, and think they are safer alone. I never heard of a single woman being torn to pieces by a tiger, or bitten by a serpent: but I knew many men who were killed in both ways.

I do not deny that the Abipones have been savage, inhuman, and ferocious, but only against those whom they believed to be their enemies. Before peace was established, they afflicted all Paraguay, for many years, with fire, slaughter, and rapine; but this they looked upon as the privilege of war, and indeed a thing to be gloried in, because they always found or suspected the Spaniards their enemies. They thought they were only repelling force by force, and returning injuries for injuries, slaughters for slaughters; which they deny to be wrong or dishonourable; seeing the same so frequently done, in time of war, by the Spaniards to the Portugueze, and by the Portugueze to the Spaniards. Led by their example, they insisted upon it that they should not be called assassins, and thieves, but soldiers, whose duty it is to offend their adversaries, and defend themselves and their possessions to the utmost of their power. The heads of the Spaniards severed from their shoulders, they called their trophies, and preserved as testimonials of their valour. The innumerable herds of cattle, the thousands of horses, in short whatever they took from the Spaniards, they called booty justly obtained in war. They always disown the name of robbers, in the plea that all the cattle of the Spaniards, by right, belongs to them; because, born on lands which the Spaniards forcibly wrested from their ancestors, and which, in their opinion, they at this day unjustly usurp. To eradicate these errors, we all ardently strove to instil into their ferocious minds an affection and friendship for the Spaniards; but our efforts were not crowned with success. Although they burnt with hereditary hatred to the Spaniards, yet, in their very manner of killing them, they displayed a sort of humanity. They inflicted death, but thought it unworthy of them, after the mortal blow, to torture, excruciate, tear, and mangle them, like other savages; though they were wonderfully solicitous about cutting off their heads, by displaying which they thought to testify their valour to their countrymen at home. They generally spared the unwarlike, and carried away innocent boys and girls unhurt. They used to feed infants, torn from their mothers' breasts, with the juice of fruits and herbs, during a long journey, and carried them home uninjured. If ever mothers, or their children, were slain, it was done by youths thirsting for the blood of the Spaniards, or by grown men enraged at the deaths of their countrymen whom the Spaniards had slain.

The Spaniards, Indians, Negroes, or Mulattoes, taken by them in war, they do not ill-use like captives, but treat with kindness, and indulgence; I had almost said like children. If a master wants his captive to do any thing, he signifies it in an asking, not a commanding tone. _If you please_, he gently says, or _take compassion on me_, and _bring me my horse, Amamàt gröhöchem_, or _Grcáuagiikàm, yañerla ahöpegak tak nahörechi ena_. I never saw a captive, however dilatory or hesitating in performing his master's orders, punished either with a word or a blow. Many display the tenderest compassion, kindness, and confidence towards their captives. To clothe them, they will strip their own bodies, and though very hungry, will deprive themselves of food to offer it them, if they stand in need of it. An old woman, wife of the chief Cacique Alaykin, has frequently got the horse ready and saddled it, in my presence, for a Negro captive of her's. Another old woman, mother of the Cacique Revachigi, gave up her bed for many nights to a sick boy, one of her captives, and, lying miserably on the floor herself, watched day and night in attendance upon him. By this kindness and wish to gratify, they bind their captives so firmly to them, that they never think of taking advantage of the daily opportunities afforded them of flight, being perfectly well satisfied with their situation. I knew many, who, after being ransomed, and brought back to their own country, voluntarily returned to their Abiponian masters, whom they follow both to the chase and to the combat; little scrupulous about shedding the blood of Spaniards, though Spaniards themselves. What a subject for lamentation have we here! How many Spaniards by birth, brought up from childhood amongst the Abipones, and instructed in their ceremonies, customs, and a hundred arts of injury, became the destroyers of Paraguay, their native soil! Whenever these men were present at the bloody expeditions of the savages, they were not only companions of the journey, but guides and partakers in all the slaughter, burning, and plundering committed at such times; in a word, instruments of public calamities, in the same manner as the Portugueze, Spanish, and Italian renegadoes, who did so much service to the pirates of Algiers and Morocco, by intercepting the vessels of their countrymen.

Now at this moment I have before my eyes the countenances and wicked actions of many of these captives, whom I knew amongst the Abipones, and who, in desire of injuring the Spaniards, and indeed in savageness, exceeded the savages themselves. The soldiers of St. Iago, whilst resting at noon in an excursion to Chaco, happened to cast their eyes upon a scull, and after much debate about whom it could belong to, clearly discovered that a short time previous, four Spaniards had been slain in that place, and that the perpetrator of the murder was a Spaniard, a captive, and leader of the Abipones, and more formidable to the Spanish nation than any Abipon. Many things worthy of relation will occur respecting this base crew, respecting Almaràz, Casco, Juanico, a Negro of Corrientes, Juan Joseph, an Ytatingua Indian, and above all, respecting Juan Diaz Caëperlahachin. This last, an Abipon by origin, had been taken in war by the Spaniards, when a boy, and afterwards converted to their religion. During twenty years which he spent in the town of St. Iago, in the service of the Spaniard Juan Diaz Caëperlahachin, he evinced much probity, and even piety. Every year, in the last week of Lent, did he publicly mangle his back with a bloody scourge; but after having effected his escape, and got back to his countrymen, he became the scourge of the Spaniards, and shedding torrents of their blood, obtained a high renown amongst his own people, to whom his knowledge of roads and places rendered him eminently useful; for, in expeditions having the slaughter of the Spaniards for their object, no man discharged the offices of scout and leader more gloriously or more willingly than he. Peace being subsequently established with the Spaniards, and the colony of Concepcion founded for the Abipones, this man, who was acquainted with many languages, performed the part of interpreter there; abusing which office to his own purposes, he left no stone unturned to render the friendship of the Spaniards suspicious, the religion of Christ, and us, the teachers of that religion, odious to the Abiponian catechumens. Feigning, however, piety and friendship, this crafty knave succeeded in gaining an excellent character amongst the credulous Spaniards and Abipones, though dangerous to both, and perfectly intolerable to us who governed the colony. But lo! the pestilent son had a still more pestilent mother. This woman, the chief of all the female jugglers, a hundred years old, venerable to the people on account of her wrinkles, and formidable by reason of the magic arts she was thought to be acquainted with, never ceased exhorting her countrymen to shun and detest the church, our instruction, and baptism, even when administered to dying infants. Behold! a mother worthy of her son—a bad egg of a bad crow! But the vengeance of God overtook this accursed old woman. Flying from the town, with a band of her hordesmen, she was killed by the Mocobios, along with many others. Of what death, or in what place Caëperlahachin died, I am still ignorant.

The liberty of wandering at will, the abundant supply of food and clothing, the multitude of horses, the power of being as idle and profligate as they chose, and the completest impunity, where neither law nor censure is to be apprehended, bind the Spanish captives to the Abipones with so sweet a chain, that they prefer their captivity to freedom, forgetful of their relations and their country, where they know that they must live in obedience to the laws, and labour daily, unless they choose to endure stripes and hunger. I have known captives of so bad a disposition that their masters were glad to get rid of them without ransom. In many of the captives you would look in vain for the least trace of a Christian, or even of a man. Very few of the Abipones have many wives at a time, though they account polygamy lawful; the captives, seldom content with one, marry as many Spanish or Indian captives as they can. For the Abiponian women scorn to marry either Spaniards, or Indians of any other nation, unless, by the splendour of their achievements, namely, slaughters and rapine, they be reputed Abipones in nobility. The men too, accounting themselves more noble than any other nation, never deign to marry the Spanish captives, much less to have any clandestine intercourse with them: so that their virtue would be safer in captivity amongst the savages, than in freedom amongst their own countrymen, could they escape the seductive arts of their fellow captives. In confession, I found most of the female Spaniards, after a very long captivity amongst the Abipones, guilty of no trespass upon the laws of chastity. They all agreed in confessing that no woman need go astray amongst these savages, unless she herself chose it. I can say as much for the continence of the young men, who had been long captives amongst them.

The gentle reader will pardon this digression concerning captives, if indeed it be a digression, because it does much towards establishing a good opinion of the chastity and benevolence of the Abipones, which form the subject of the present chapter, and will be further confirmed by additional arguments. They hospitably entertain Spaniards of the lower order, Negroes or Christian Indians, who have run away from their masters, lost their way, or, by some other means, chanced to enter the hordes of the Abipones, and, in the most friendly manner, offer them food or any thing else they may stand in need of; this they do the more cordially the more liberally these strangers abuse the Spanish nation; but if they neglect this they are taken for spies, and undergo considerable danger. They diligently watched over the safety of us Jesuits, to whom was committed the management of the colonies. If they were aware of any danger impending over us from foreign foes, they acquainted us with it immediately, and were all intent upon warding it from us. In JOURNEYS, when rivers were to be crossed, the horses got ready, sudden and secret attacks of the enemy to be avoided or repelled, it is incredible how anxiously they offered us their assistance. See! what mild, benevolent souls these savages possess! Though they used to rob and murder the Spaniards whilst they thought them their enemies, yet they never take anything from their own countrymen. Hence, as long as they are sober, and in possession of their senses, homicide and theft are almost unheard of amongst them. They are often and long absent from their homes, during which time they leave their little property without a guard, or even a door, exposed to the eyes and hands of all, with no apprehension of the loss of it, and on their return from a long journey, find every thing untouched. The doors, locks, bars, chests, and guards with which Europeans defend their possessions from thieves, are things unknown to the Abipones, and quite unnecessary to them. Boys and girls not unfrequently pilfered melons grown in our gardens, and chickens reared in our houses, but in them the theft was excusable; for they falsely imagined that these things were free to all, or might be taken not much against the will of the owner. Though I have enlarged on the native virtues of the Abipones more than it was my intention to do, I shall think nothing has been said till I have made a few observations relative to their endurance of labour. Who can describe the constant fatigues of war and hunting which they undergo? When they make an excursion against the enemy, they often spend two or three months in an arduous journey of above three hundred leagues through desert wilds. They swim across vast rivers, and long lakes more dangerous than rivers. They traverse plains of great extent, destitute both of wood and water. They sit for whole days on saddles scarce softer than wood, without having their feet supported by a stirrup. Their hands always bear the weight of a very long spear. They generally ride trotting horses, which miserably shake the rider's bones by their jerking pace. They go bareheaded amidst burning sun, profuse rain, clouds of dust, and hurricanes of wind. They generally cover their bodies with woollen garments, which fit close to the skin; but if the extreme heat obliges them to throw these off as far as the middle, their breasts, shoulders, and arms are cruelly bitten and covered with blood by swarms of flies, gad-flies, gnats, and wasps. As they always set out upon their journeys unfurnished with provisions, they are obliged to be constantly on the look out for wild animals, which they may pursue, kill, and convert into a remedy for their hunger. As they have no cups they pass the night by the side of rivers or lakes, out of which they drink like dogs. But this opportunity of getting water is dearly purchased; for moist places are not only seminaries of gnats and serpents, but likewise the haunts of dangerous wild beasts, which threaten them with sleepless nights and peril of their lives. They sleep upon the hard ground, either starved with cold, or parched with heat, and if overtaken by a storm, often lie awake, soaking in water the whole night. When they perform the office of scouts, they frequently have to creep on their hands and feet over trackless woods, and through forests, to avoid discovery; passing days and nights without sleep or food. This also was the case when they were long pursued by the enemy, and forced to hasten their flight. All these things the Abipones do, and suffer without ever complaining, or uttering an expression of impatience, unlike Europeans, who, at the smallest inconvenience, get out of humour, grow angry, and since they cannot bend heaven to their will, call upon hell. What we denominate patience is nature with them. Their minds are habituated to inconvenience, and their bodies almost rendered insensible by long custom, even from childhood. While yet children they imitate their fathers in piercing their breasts and arms with sharp thorns, without any manifestation of pain. Hence it is, that when arrived at manhood, they bear their wounds without a groan, and would think the compassion of others derogatory to their fortitude. The most acute pain will deprive them of life before it will extort a sigh. The love of glory, acquired by the reputation of fortitude, renders them invincible, and commands them to be silent.

Most of the observations I have just been making apply both to men and women, although the latter possess virtues and vices peculiar to themselves. All the Americans have a natural propensity to sloth, but I gladly pronounce the Abiponian women entirely free from this foible. Every one must be astonished at their unwearied industry. They despatch the household business with which they are daily overwhelmed, with alacrity and cheerfulness. It is their task to make clothes for their husbands and children; to fetch eatable roots, and various fruits from the woods; to gather the alfaroba, grind it, and convert it into drink, and to get water and wood for the daily consumption of the family. A ridiculous custom is in use amongst the Abipones, of making the most aged woman in the horde provide water for all domestic purposes. Though the river may be close at hand, the water is always fetched in large pitchers on horseback, and the same method is observed in getting wood for fuel. You will never hear one of these women complain of fatigue, however many cares she may have to employ her mind. A noble Spaniard had a captive Abiponian woman in his service many years, and he assured me that she was more useful and valuable to him than three other servants, because she anticipated his orders, and did her business seasonably, accurately, and quickly. They justly claim the epithet of the _devout female sex_. No sooner do they hear the sound of the bell than they all fly to hear the Christian religion explained, and listen to the preacher with attentive ears. They highly approve the law of Christ, because by it no husband is allowed to put away his wife, or to marry more than one. For this reason they are extremely anxious to have themselves and their husbands baptized, that they may be rendered more certain of the perpetuity of their marriage. This must be understood only of the younger women; for the old ones, who are obstinate adherers to their ancient superstitions, and priestesses of the savage rites, strongly oppose the Christian religion, foreseeing that if it were embraced by the whole Abiponian nation, they should lose their authority, and become the scorn and the derision of all. The young men amongst the Abipones, as well as the old women, greatly withstood the progress of religion; for, burning with the desire of military glory and of booty, they are excessively fond of cutting off the heads of the Spaniards, and plundering their waggons and estates, which they know to be forbidden by the law of God. Hence, they had rather adhere to the institutes of their ancestors, and traverse the country on swift horses, than listen to the words of a priest within the walls of a church. If it depended upon the old men and the young women alone, the whole nation would long since have embraced our religion.

Honourable mention has been frequently made by me of the chastity of the Abiponian women: it would be wrong to be silent upon their sobriety and temperance. It costs them much labour to prepare a sweet drink for their husbands of honey and the alfaroba: but they never even taste it themselves, being condemned to pure water the whole of their lives. Would that they as carefully abstained from strife and contentions, as they do from all strong drink! Quarrels certainly do arise amongst them, and often end in blood, upon the most trivial occasions. They generally dispute about things of no consequence, about goats' wool, as Horace expresses it, or the shadow of an ass. One word uttered by a scolding woman is often the cause and means of exciting a mighty war. The Abipones, in anger, use the following terms of reproach: _Acami Lanar̂aik_, you are an Indian, that is, plebeian, ignoble; _Acami Lichiegar̂aik_, you are poor, wretched; _Acami Ahamr̂aik_, you are dead. They sometimes dreadfully misapply these epithets. Who would not laugh to hear a horse, flying as quick as lightning, but which his rider wishes to incite to greater speed, called _Ahamr̂aik_, dead? When two women quarrel, one calls the other poor, or low-born, or perhaps lifeless. Presently a loud vociferation is heard, and from words they proceed to blows. The whole company of women crowd to the market-place, not merely to look on, but to give assistance as they shall think proper. Some defend the one, some the other. The duel soon becomes a battle-royal. They fly at each other's breasts with their teeth like tigers, and often give them bloody bites. They lacerate one another's cheeks with their nails, rend their hair with their hands, and tear the hole of the flap of the ear, into which the roll of palm-leaves is inserted. Though a husband sees his wife, and a father his daughter, bathed in blood and covered with wounds, yet they look on at a distance, with motionless feet, silent tongues, and calm eyes; they applaud their Amazons, laugh, and wonder to see such anger in the souls of women, but would think it beneath a man to take any part in these female battles. If there appears no hope of the restoration of peace, they go to the Father: "See!" say they, "our women are out of their senses again to-day. Go, and frighten them away with a musket." Alarmed at the noise, and even at the sight of this, they hasten back to their tents, but even from thence, with a Stentorian voice, repeat the word which had been the occasion of the combat, and, neither liking to seem conquered, return again and again to the market-place, and renew the fight. It seems to have been a regulation of divine Providence, that the Abiponian women should abstain from all strong liquors, for, if so furious when sober, what would they have been in a state of intoxication? The whole race of the Abipones would have been utterly destroyed.