108 THE BELLA COOLA INDIANS

in banning the rite if they do not think the dancer will be able
to carry it out properly. When the call comes, the uninitiated
are at once expelled from the Cannibal’s house; later he rushes
to the graveyard and exhumes one of the meat-filled frames
previously buried. Non-members watch with horror as he
sinks his teeth in the “flesh.”’ Closely guarded, he is then
taken to every house where, if they are bold, the uninitiated
peer forth from their bedrooms and watch his performance.
He carries part of the corpse in his arms and periodically sinks
his teeth in the repulsive mass. As usual, apparent attempts
are made to tie him to this earth, but in spite of them he escapes
to the upper regions where he remains for an unusually long
period. Great efforts are made to reduce him to a state of
emaciation, for which purpose he drinks large amounts of
water in which cedar-wood has been boiled. When the Can-
nibal ultimately returns to earth, the cannibalistic incubus is
expelled and he at length becomes normal. When dancing, a
corpse-eater constantly bends both hands towards the floor in
front of him and upwards, as though raising some heavy
object towards his face. Then his head sinks towards this,
only to be thrown quickly upwards and to one side, with a wild
expression in his eyes. The uninitiated are told that this re-
presents the manner in which he lifts a corpse towards his
mouth and bites, only to be revolted by its putrescence. He
has, they hear, no actual liking for human flesh, but his in-
cubus fills him with an irresistible craving for it. Frequently
he wears on his blanket wooden representations of skulls (see
Plate 7), symbolic of the corpses devoured.

Rarely, a corpse-eating Cannibal kills a slave and pretends
to devour his body as a means of impressing the uninitiated,”
but usually this is done only under the driving force of revenge
or jealousy. If a man hears that a near relative, slave of a
foreign tribe, has been killed, he often determines to wipe out
blood with blood. He consults a corpse-eating Cannibal, and

Eating of corpses has long ceased among the Bella Coola; the present tense is
used merely for consistency.