XCViil A GENERAL HISTORY

They are, at the fame time fubjeé& to every kind of domeltic drudgery:
they drefs the leather, make the clothes and fhoes, weave the nets, colleé&t
wood, ereét the tents, fetch water, and perform every culinary fervice; fo
that when the duties of maternal care are added, it will appear that
the life of thefe women is an uninterrupted fucceffion of toil and pain.
This, indeed, is the fenfe. they entertain of their own fituation; and,
under the influence of that fentiment, they are fometimes known to
deftroy their female children, to fave them from the miferies which they
themfelves have fuffered. They alfo have a ready way, by the ufe of
certain fimples, of procuring abortions, which they fometimes practile,
from their hatred of the father, or to fave themfelves the trouble which
children occafion; and, as Ihave been credibly informed, this unna-
tural a& is repeated without any injury to the health of the women

who perpetrate it.

The funeral rites begin, like all other folemn ceremonials, with {mok-
ing, and are concluded by a feaft. The body is dreffed in the beft habili-
ments poflefled by the deceafed, or his relations, and is then depofited
in a grave, lined with branches: fome domeftic utenfils are placed on
it, and a kind of canopy erefted over it. During this ceremony, great
lamentations are made, and if the departed perfon is very much regretted
the near relations cut off their hair, pierce the flefhy part of their thighs
and arms with arrows, knives, &c. and blacken their faces with charcoal.
If they have diflinguifhed themfelves in war, they are fometimes laid ona
kind of f{caffolding; and I have been informed that women, as in the
Eaft, have been known to facrifice themfelves to the manes of their
liufbands. ‘The whole of the property belonging to the departed perfon

is