Page:Life and Adventures of William Buckley.djvu/76

Rh excited—so that wounds, not only of the heart, but of the head, and frightful murders ensue; some of them never to be forgiven, until a fearful revenge has followed.

Previous to breaking up from our present ground there was another battle, so that when the other tribe left, one of ours stole after them in the night and speared a man dead, who was sleeping in his hut beside his wife; he sent his spear right through him into the ground, for no other cause than that the murdered man had promised him his daughter years before, and had then given her to another. Having had his revenge he returned, and boasted of what he had done, upon which his relations and particular friends left the place, apparently apprehending an attack. The next morning, those who remained went to the tribe to which the murdered man belonged, and found him rolled up in his rug, ready to be tied up in a tree—a mode of disposing of the dead, who were not enemies, unknown to me before. They selected a strong, if not a lofty tree, and in the branches, about twelve feet up, they placed some logs and branches across, and sheets of bark; on these they laid the body with the face upwards, inclining toward the setting sun, and over it was placed some more bark and boughs, and then logs as heavy as the branches would bear; all this being done to protect the body from the birds of prey. Whilst this was going on, the women sat round the tree joining with the widow in the most bitter lamentations, pitiable to hear. A fire was, as usual, made all round this extraordinary