[Works] . valleys, covered with a delicate fruitcalled the mamey, about the size of an imagined that the souls of the deceasedremained concealed among the airy and inac-cessible cliffs of the mountains during theday, but descended at night into these happyvalleys, to regale on this consecrated living were sparing, therefore, in eatingit, lest the souls of their friends should sufferfrom want of their favorite nourishment.* The dances to which the natives seemed soimmoderately addicted, and which had beenat first considered by the Spaniards mere idlepastimes, were found t
[Works] . valleys, covered with a delicate fruitcalled the mamey, about the size of an imagined that the souls of the deceasedremained concealed among the airy and inac-cessible cliffs of the mountains during theday, but descended at night into these happyvalleys, to regale on this consecrated living were sparing, therefore, in eatingit, lest the souls of their friends should sufferfrom want of their favorite nourishment.* The dances to which the natives seemed soimmoderately addicted, and which had beenat first considered by the Spaniards mere idlepastimes, were found to be often ceremonialsof a serious and mystic character. They formindeed a singular and important featurethroughout the customs of the aboriginalsof the New World. In these are typified, bysigns well understood by the initiated, and as * Hist, del Almirante, cap. 6i. Peter Martyr,decad. i., lib. ix. Charlevoix, Hist. St. Domingo,lib. i. Natives Dancing. Redrawn from an old print from Gottfriedfs Newe Cbrlstopber Columbus. 143 it were by hieroglyphic action, their historicalevents, their projected enterprises, their hunt-ing, their ambuscades, and their battles, resem-bling in some respects the Pyrrhic dances ofthe ancients. Speaking of the prevalence ofthese dances among the natives of Hayti,Peter Martyr observes that they performedthem to the chant of certain metres and bal-lads, handed down from generation to genera-tion, in which were rehearsed the deeds oftheir ancestors. These rhymes or ballads, he adds, they callareytos ; and as our minstrels are accustomed to singto the harp and lute, so do they in like manner singthese songs, and dance to the same, playing on tim-brels tnade of shells of certain fishes. These timbrelsthey call maguey. They have also songs and balladsof love, and others of lamentation or mourning ;some also to encourage them to the wars, all sung totunes agreeable to the matter. It was for these dances, as has been alreadyobserved, that they were
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