30, 31, 32; Revelations xviii.

19, etc.] [Note 85: The women among the American Indians also cut off the hair close to the head as a sign of mourning .-- Vide Catlin, vol.i.] The lamentations for the dead do not terminate with the burial; frequently they are renewed at intervals by the women, during late hours of the night, or some hours before day-break in the morning.

Piercingly as those cries strike upon the traveller in the lonely woods, if raised suddenly, or very near him, yet mellowed by distance they are soothing and pleasing, awakening a train of thoughts and feelings, which, though sad and solemn, are yet such as the mind sometimes delights to indulge in.

The names of the dead are never repeated by the natives among themselves, and it is a very difficult matter for a European to get them to break through this custom, nor will they do it in the presence of other natives.

In cases where the name of a native has been that of some bird or animal of almost daily recurrence, a new name is given to the object, and adopted in the language of the tribe.