for example during several memorable sieges. It has even, in a season of unparalleled suffering from want of food, been exposed for sale in the shambles; * but it has only been under circumstances like these, that it has been so eaten. The thing is only done on certain special occasions-at the coronation of a sovereign, after a victory over enemies, at some solemn religious celebration, or at the funerals of friends and relatives. Prescott ("Conquest of Mexico," I. pp. 59 ff.) has drawn a graphic and terrible picture of these abominable rites among the Mexicans. Nor is the account given of cannibal feasts among other nations, by the travellers who have witnessed them, different from his except only as regards the superior refinement of the Mexicans when contrasted with the savages of Fiji, or New Zealand.

One does not like to think it, but there can be little doubt that a corrupt and debased religion is the root of these abominations. Human sacrifices originated in the perversion of a true principle that of giving to God what is best; and this perversion finds its hideous consummation at the cannibal feast. Captives taken in war are offered as a thanksgiving sacrifice to the gods, who have granted the victory; and the feast which forms a main feature in every religious festivity—from which, indeed, the festivity takes its name-is regarded as incomplete without the dish containing the human victim, the most precious of all offerings, to the Deity in whose honour the feast is held. It is thought again that the dead cannot be disposed of in any manner so respectful to them, as by being eaten by their friends and relatives, and so, as it were, absorbed into them. "The Massagetæ," writes St. Jerome, "think those persons especially

* At Tournus in France, in the year 1000 A.D. It should be added that the butcher who so offered it was burnt alive for the offence.

unfortunate who die of sickness, and they kill and devour their parent, relatives and kinsfolk, thinking it more proper for them to be eaten by them, than by worms." (Hieron. ad Jov. ii.) Strabo says "that little was known (in his day) of Ireland, except that its inhabitants were cannibals, and regarded it as meritorious to eat their deceased parents." ("Geogr." Iv.) Similar to this was the answer of the Indians to King Darius as related by Herodotus (Thalia, 38). He records how the Persian king asked some Greeks, "what sum of money would induce them to eat the bodies of their fathers after their deaths?" They replied that "no sum of money would tempt them to such an act." He then sent for some Calabar Indians, whose practice it was to eat the remains of their parents, and inquired "what sum of money would induce them to burn the bodies of their fathers?" They replied with equal horror, imploring him not to speak of such things. Seventeen centuries afterwards Friar Odoric says of the people of Dondin (probably Sumatra), "I rebuked them sharply for this (their custom of eating the bodies of their dead relatives) saying to them, Why do ye act thus against all reason? were a dog slain and put before another dog, he would by no means eat thereof, and why should ye do this, who seem to be men, endowed with reason?' And their answer was, 'We do this lest the flesh of the dead should be eaten of worms! for if the worms should cat his flesh, his soul would suffer grievous pain.'" Further, it is not the relatives only but the victims themselves, in many instances, who share the same views. Dr. Leyden relates that "in the island of Sumatra when a man becomes infirm and weary of the world, he invites his own children to eat him. He ascends a lime tree round which his offspring and friends assemble, and shakes the tree. Then all join in a dirge to the

effect that the season has come, the fruit is ripe, and it must fall. Thereupon he descends from the tree; his nearest relatives put him to death and devour his remains."

Corruptio optimi fit pessima. As a true religion is the greatest blessing mankind can possess, the spring of every earthly joy and comfort-so is a false religion the deadliest of all curses, the cause of crimes and miseries, which could arise from no other source than that polluted fountain.

CHAPTER XIV.

STRANGE CUSTOMS: MARRIAGE-FUNERAL.

BIRTHS, marriages, and deaths, are the sum of human life. Almost all nations have their special customs connected with all three and seeing that—as regards two of them at all events, men of every age and race differ in no way from one another; for that all bring nothing into this world and none can carry anything out we might expect these customs to be everywhere very nearly the same. Such, however, is very far from being the case. In some countries for example, the birth of a child, especially of the eldest of the family, is an occasion of the greatest rejoicing. The relatives and friends repair to the house of the parents, to offer congratulations and gifts. A feast is held, which is repeated on the anniversary of the birth. Among the Jews, in particular, where barrenness is regarded as a great misfortune and reproach, a woman's safe delivery of her firstborn, called forth the deepest joy and thankfulness. In other lands, exactly the reverse is the case. Among the Thracians, we are told, the kinsfolk and acquaintance did indeed meet together in the chamber of the new-born infant, but under the influence of very different feelings. "When a child is born among the Thracians," says Herodotus (Terpsich. 4), "all its kindred sit round about it in a circle, and weep for the woes it will have to undergo, now that it has come into the world, making mention of every ill that falls to the lot of

human kind." The same mournful view of man's birth into the world is echoed by more than one writer of renown.

Again, in some ancient communities, the birth of children was accounted as a mark of the special favour of Heaven. The father of a numerous progeny was held in general honour, and special privileges were accorded to him. The children were accounted the property of the State, and their lives were guarded with the most jealous care. In other lands they were viewed as a clog and a burden, of which their parents might rid themselves, if they chose it, by putting them to death, without incurring any punishment, indeed without injury. In some instances, where infants were born weakly or deformed, the law even required their destruction.

But it is chiefly in respect of their marriage and funeral rites, that the great differences are noticeable between different nations. And these may indeed move our wonder.

In the first place, while all civilised nations regard the marriage tie as strictly binding, and the greater part of them guard it with the most jealous severity, there have been and still are communities, among whom it has no existence. Many nations of antiquity had no marriage rites whatsoever. Herodotus relates this of the Indians and Scythians, and later writers of the Tyrrhenians, Californians, and others. Odoric, Marco Polo and Maundeville affirm the same of the inhabitants of Lamori (by which some locality in Sumatra is probably denoted), and the same statements have been repeated by modern travellers, of tribes with which they have come into contact. This of course could not have been the normal condition of any people, and must be the result of many generations of progressive degradation.

There are, again, some countries in which a man may take