Year: 1859

AAN OAxAAS <AOOA9 ON - SAsAAAASs


The following description is given BY the
Tehama Gazettes


"When one of the tribe dies he Is general.
ly placed in a sitting posture, and his legs
drawn up close to his body. The head is
then pressed down on the knees so as to re-
semble ball as much as it is possible to
make the human form. When this is done,
hole is dug in the earth from three to four
feet in depth, and the deceased is put in, to-
gether with hatchet, his weapons, imple-
ments of the chase, and sufficient food for a
long journey. The hole is then filled with
earth and small cone, shaped by their Pc
culiar baskets, raised above the grave. DUR
ing the process of burial most Internal
howling is INDUCED in by the squaws, but
so soon as all is completed their mourning
is turned to the most extravagant joy, and
they retire from the spot, thinking, no doubt,
that their departed brother is on his way to
the happy hunting grounds of the brave,
where the acorn crop is perennial, and where
grasshoppers never fail"


In addition to the above we recollect q
strange ceremony connected with the burial
of digger Indian, near Colusa about eight
years ago. A small community called the
Shoonoose, a mere remnant of what had
once been large tribe, lost one of its mem
bers and proceeded to inter him after the
fashion described by the Gazette, with this
curious difference. They first disinterred a
corpse that had been buried for months, and
amid circle of gesticulating and yelling SUR
vivors, whose bare bodies were whitened by
the ashes which they threw over themselves
profusely, the head of the exhumed digger
was divested of its bandages and covered
with fanciful cap ornamented with beads,
while string of beads was also put around
the half-rotten neck. The newly defunct
was then brought forth amid renewed howl
ings, placed in a round hole adjoining the
old grave, a conical basket being set in the
hole over his bundled up remains, and the
earth rapidly scrapedin by hand and trampled
down while the same things were done for
the corpse that had been exhumed. This
completed the whole ceremony, but the
mourning continued, at intervals, for two or
three days. The exhumation was performed
out of respect for the deceased, who had been
a person of note, and was relative of the
Indian who had just died. We have never
heard of an instance similar to this, and are
not aware whether it was ever custom or
not. 1t certainly exhibited disgusting lack
of sensibility. The tribe alluded to buried
their dead amongst the earthen huts of the
living, and we have seen them build fires and
cook right over the graves which they had
closed up with so much grief.


The dcfunct Indian, accompanied by his
nets, beads &C., was supposed by the Shoo-
moose to be received into sort of heaven,
which they called Hall, where the great chief
Lama resides. This divinity is a good being,
and is at enmity with Carno, bad spirit,
who receives the wicked Indians in a region
Of complete darkness where they roam about
forever This belief is merely crude from
of that Manicheism which is the basis of our
civilized theoogies, and which, like the dead
hand of Calvin, to quote the language of
famous divine, holds New England orthodoxy
by the throat to this day. We do not know
that this belief in hereafter and in the two
principles, is a common one; but the belief
in superior being of some kind certainly
prevails amongst all the aborigines of Cali
fornia.