The Middlebury register. [volume] (Middlebury, Vt.) 1850-1882, 1870-04-26

RELIGIOUS BELIEFS or THE INDIANS.
The duality of God was the most ancient
tenet of the Indian faith-a prominent
tenet, it may be observed in all more ad-
vanced Oriental nations of antiquity.
They believed in the existence of two
Great Spirits as forming the perfect God
head. One eminently great was the
Good Spirit, and the inferior was an Evil
Spirit They believed every animal to
have had great original, or father. The
first buffalo, the first bear, the first beav-
er, the first eagle, et eptera, was the man.
itou, or guardian spirit, of the whole race
of these different creatures. They chose
some of these originals as their special
manitou or guardians, and hence arose
the custom of having its representation as
the totem of the tribe Whatever they
held to be superior to themselves they de-
flied, such as the sun, moon, stars, me-
teors, fire, water, thunder, wind; hut
they never exalted their heroes or
prophets above the sphere of humanity.
They adored an invisible great Master of
Life in various forms, which they called
Manitou. and made it sort of tutelar
deity. They had vague notions of vica-
rious atonement, and made propitiatory
sacrifices with great soemnity. They all
had dim traditions of deluge as an ex-
hbition of Divine wrath, and the saliva
ton of family as an act of Divine mercy.
They were very supersttious and under
the direction of prestcraft they did cruel
and horrible things. In their Photographic
records of moral and religious thought, as
well as of their mythology, they employ
ed symbols extensively. These were also
used in writing their songs, and in muSi-
cal notation.
Their funeral and burial ceremonies
indicated their belief in the Immortality
of the soul. These ceremonies were of
similar type every where. They laid
their dead, wrapped in skins, upon sticks
in the bottom of a shallow pit, or placed
them in sitting posture, or occasionally
folded them in skins and laid them upon
high scaffolds out of the reach of wild
beasts, under which the relatives wept
and walled. Their arms, utensils, paints,
and food were buried with them, TO be
used on their long journey to the spirit
land they had an idea that they possessed
a twofold nature of matter and spirit. In
some regions they lighted symbolic fun
eral pyre for several nights upon the
grave. that the soul might perceive and
enjoy the respect paid to the body.
Every where they raised mounds over the
graves, and planted them with wild flow
ers and among the Floridians, the
widows of warriors slain in battle
cut off their hair and strewed it over the
graves of their beloved ones-BENsoN
j. LossING, in HarpNr's Magazine far
May.
CHARLES Dickens. Everybody will be
reading Edwin brood" for year 20
come, and Dickens's name will be on
every ones lips and in all the newspapers.
There is fresh growth of readers for his
novels, and we predict that the famous
novels of Dickens will be read more this
year than ever before In choosing an
edition care should be taken to buy one
that has good clear type, is compact and
cheap. All these qualifications are met
by the Globe Edition, in IA volumes pub
lished by ii. o. Houghton a Co. This
edition also has the advantage that il con-
tains stories and sketches by Dickens
that are not to be found in any other A.
merican edition, aud has besides splen-
did Index of eighty pages, giving the
names of all the wonderful characters in
Dickens's novels, telling in what books
they are to be found.--in fact, regular
street directory. Happy those who
know Dickens's characters, and happy
those yet To- knew them.
a drunken man, who had slipped down,
thought it singular that water always
freezes with the slippery side up.
4 freight train on the Central Railway,
which was thrown from the track near
Rochester, recently, was run into soon af.
ter by another freight train coming from
the opposite direction, and fifty head of
cattle were killed, and an engineer named
Clifford was severely injured,