According to some, there is but little trace, if any, of a clear conception of a system of rewards and punish- ments, as there certainly do not seem to have been very clear distinctions between vice and virtue, as in anywise related to a future world. The difference between the soul's comfort and discomfort in a future life, in so far as it is made a matter of degree at all, was made to de- pend, as in the IMexican mythology, on the mode of death. Vromen dj-ing in childbirth were associated in the category of worth and merited happiness ivith war- riors dying in battle. In Guatemala a violent death in any shape was sufficient to banish, in after-life, from the felicitous regions. The Brazilian natives divided the dead into classes, making those drowned, or killed by violence, or jdelding to disease, to go into separate regions; but there seems to be no reason founded in morals connected with this. It is but just to say that others take a different view of this part of the subject from that here set forth. The abbe Em. Domenech, who spent seven years among these tribes, gives traditions which favor the doctrine of future re^vards and pun- ishments for the good or bad deeds of this life (p. 283). Other tribes, however, seem to know notliing of pimisli- menfs. The IMaster of Life, or Merciful Spirit, -will be alike merciful to all, irrespective of the acts of tliis life, or of any degree of moral turpitude. They see nowhere clear conceptions of virtue and vice even in this world. Sin, they say, is only represented at -worst as a metaphorical going astray, as of one -(vho loses his path in the woods, though this may suggest much more than this class of persons admit. That there is a moral sentiment is ad- mitted in connection with their civil and social life, but not as connected with their future state. Their pray- ers are almost wholly for temporal, and not for moral blessings; but there may be found an assumption of moral qualities or ethical character in connection with their gods, as in the case of Quetzalcoatl above alluded to, who is the founder of their civil code, and who insti- tuted the household, instilled patriotism, etc. The Mex- icans had another place for the souls of those dying by lightning-stroke, dropsies, leprosies, etc., who could not go to the home of the sun, but who must go to the realm of the god of the rains and waters,- called Tlalocan.
There are indications of the doctrine of metemjjsycho- sis, and also of the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead. The vast tumuli, though they were not all con-
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nected with fmieral rites, are summoned in testimony of this doctrine. The custom of collecting and cleans- ing the bones— usualh- once in eight or ten years— of those who had died in" the tribe, and then burying them in a common sepidchre "lined with choice furs, and marked with a mound of wood, stone, or earth," was common east of the Mississippi. This has been sup- posed to be connected with the theory that a part of the soul, or one of the souls, dwelt in the bones, and that these seed-souls, so to speak, would one day germinate into living human beings. Parts of their mythology aflfbrd support to such a supposition. An Aztec legend is to the effect that when the human species had been destroyed from off the face of the world, it was restored by one of the gods descending to the realm of the dead, and bringing thence a bone of the perished race, which they sprinkled with blood, and on the fourth day it be- came a youth, the father of the present race.
6. Funeral Rites. — The mounds used for funeral ser- vices are found, for the most part, within walls of in- trenched camps and fortified towns. On the top of these tumuli are altars of baked clay or stone, varying in length from a few inches to many yards. The mounds are found in verj' large numbers, and have an average height of eight or ten yards, being usually in the form of a simple cone, or of a pear or egg. The dead were frequently biunied before they were buried, funeral ums having often been discovered, as also beds of charcoal. With the dead were generally interred the ornaments, arms, and other objects belonging to them during life. The mounds sometimes contain silver, brass, stone, or bone, beads, shells, pieces of silex, quartz, garnet, points of arrows, fossil teeth of sharks, sculptures of human heads, potterj', etc. The customs observed in the burial of their dead differ in the different tribes. They all, however, paint the corpse black. The feet of the corpses are turned to the rising sun. The Omahas swathe the bodies with bandages raatle of skins, and yilace them on the branches of a tree, with a wooden vase filled with dried meat by their side, which is renewed from time to time. The Sioux bury their dead on the summit of a hill or mountain, and plant on the tomb a cedar-tree, which maj' be seen from a distance. The Chinooks MTap the bodies of their dead in skins, bind their eyes, put little shells in their nostrils, and dress them in most l)eautiful clothes, and then place them in a canoe, which is allowed to drift on a lake, or river, or the Pacific Ocean. The Shoshones burn their dead, with every- thing belonging to them. Among other tribes of the West the warriors are buried on horseback, with bow, and buckler, and quiver, and pipe, and medicine-bag, tobacco, and dried meats. The Assiniboins suspend their dead by thongs of leather between the branches of great trees, or place them on high scaffoldings, to keep them from wild animals. The Ottawas sacrifice a horse on the tomb of the dead, strangling the animal by a noose. When a tribe emigrate, they carry with them, if possible, the bones of their dead which have been pre- ser\'ed, or bury them in a cave, or hill, or wood.