88 THE BELLA COOLA INDIANS

tion and those quarrelling follow him as he goes to every house
growling and crying xwa-, xwa-, xwa-. By the time he re-
turns home their anger has cooled. It is then necessary to
quiet X by means of the elaborate beating of sticks. This is
repeated four times, while a kusiut spits violently over him.

Before leaving his own home to attend a kusiut dance, a
little food is always given to X in case he should become hungry
and start biting people. On gotém he always dances after the
donor of the ceremony,** and when the kukusiut eat together
he always receives his portion immediately after that of the
marshals. Fear of all Cannibals is one of the most potent
deterrents to the uninitiated, but the most dreaded are those,
like X, who have just returned from the land above and may
at any moment break forth into an orgy of biting. Several
elderly informants recalled vividly the terror with which they
regarded such a Cannibal when they were young.

The kukusiut take full advantage of the fear which X in-
spires in the uninitiated. On gotfum nights when the time
arrives for the latter to depart, they are often chased forth
by the frenzy of X, or one of his fellow-Cannibals who has
likewise been to the land above. X starts to call out, xwa.,
xwa-, xwa-, and rises to his feet; the singers at once begin to
beat out one of his songs and the uninitiated hurriedly flee,
while the Cannibal’s guardians press close around him as he
dances as if to prevent him running amuck among the fright-
ened people crowding out of the door. As he dances and hears
his song, he becomes more and more excited; he growls and
only the repeated Aoif of his guardians and their pressure
upon the back of his neck appear to restrain him. Non-members
and even those kukusiut who do not understand the full mys-
teries of the Cannibal dance cannot fail to be impressed. The
raising of the arms is supposed to inflame a Cannibal, so if it 1s
desired still more to impress the uninitiated, one of the kuku-
siut lifts his arms, and is bitten by X. The heralds at once go

*If several Cannibals have performed ina single year, the order in which they
dance is subject to arrangement.