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The Spanish conquistador, reckless of native life in his eager quest of gold, and the Spanish preaching friar, often yielding himself to death for the spread of the Gospel, are the two types of men most impressively delineated in the pages of the first decades of Spain's history in America, illustrating the complex and conflicting motives which urged the great adventure. As early as the writings of Columbus these two motives stand out, and the promise of wealth and the promise of souls to save are alike eloquent in his thought. In order to convert, one must first understand; and Columbus himself is our earliest authority on the religion of the men of the Indies, showing how his mind was moved to this problem. In the History of the Life of Columbus, by his son Fernando, the Admiral is quoted in description of the Indian religion.

"I could discover," he says, "neither idolatry nor any other sect among them, though every one of their kings ... has a house apart from the town, in which there is nothing at all but some wooden images carved by them, called cemis; nor is there anything done in those houses but what is for the service of those cemis, they repairing to perform certain ceremonies, and pray there, as we do to our churches. In these houses they have a handsome round table, made like a dish, on which is some powder which they lay on the head of the cemis with a certain ceremony; then through a cane that has two branches, clapped to their nose, they snuff up this powder: the words they say none of our people understand. This powder puts them beside themselves, as if they were drunk. They also give the image a name, and I believe it is their father's or grandfather's, or both; for they have more than one, and some above ten, all in memory of their forefathers.... The people and caciques boast among themselves of having the best cemis. When they go to these, their cemis, they shun the Christians, and will not let them go into those houses; and if they suspect they will come, they take away their cemis and hide them in the woods for fear they should be taken from them; and what is most ridiculous, they used to steal one another's cemis. It happened once that the Christians on a sudden rushed into the house with them, and presently the cemi cried out, speaking in their language, by which it appeared to be artificially made; for it being hollow they had applied a trunk to it, which answered to a dark corner of the house covered with boughs and leaves, where a man was concealed who spoke what the cacique ordered him. The Spaniards, therefore, reflecting on what it might be, kicked down the cemi, and found as has been said; and the cacique, seeing they had discovered his practice, earnestly begged of them not to speak of it to his subjects, or the other Indians, because he kept them in obedience by that policy."

This, the great Admiral quaintly concedes, "has some resemblance to idolatry." In fact, his description points clearly to well-developed cults: there are temples, with altars, idols, oracles, and priests, and there is even a shrewd adaptation of religion to politics—the certain mark of sophistication in matters of cult. Benzoni, who visited the Indies some fifty years after their discovery, says of the islanders: "They worshipped, and still worship, various deities, many painted, others sculptured, some formed of clay, others of wood, or gold, or silver.... And although our priests still daily endeavour to destroy these idols, yet the ministers of their faith keep a great many of them hidden in caves and underground, sacrificing to them occultly, and asking in what manner they can possibly expel the Christians from their country." Idols of gold and silver have not been preserved to modern times, but examples in stone and wood and baked clay are in present-day collections, and one, at least, of the wooden images has a hollow head, open at the back for the reception of the speaking-tube by which the priest conveyed the wisdom of his cacique. A peculiar type of Antillean cultus-image, mentioned by Peter Martyr, among others, was made of "plaited cotton, tightly stuffed inside," though its use seems to have been rather in connexion with funeral rites (perhaps as apotropaic fetishes) than in worship of nature-powers.

The work of archaeologists, especially in the Greater Antilles, has brought to light many curious objects certainly connected with the old Antillean cults. There are idols and images, ranging in height from near three feet to an inch or so; and the latter, often perforated, were used, perhaps, as Peter Martyr describes: "When they are about to go into battle, they tie small images representing little demons upon their foreheads." There are, again, masks and grotesque faces, sometimes cunningly carved, sometimes crude pictographs. Most characteristic are the triangular stones with a human or an animal face on one side; the stone collars or yokes, some slender and some massive in construction, but all representing laborious toil; and the "elbow stones" with carved panels—objects of which the true use and meaning is forgotten, though their connexion with cult is not to be doubted.¹⁴ Possibly a hint of their meaning is to be found in the narrative of Columbus, which, after describing the zemis, goes on to say: "Most of the caciques have three great stones also, to which they and their people show a great devotion. The one they say helps corn and all sorts of grain; the second makes women be delivered without pain; and the third procures rain and fair weather, according as they stand in need of either."

PLATE II.

Antillean triangular carved stones, lateral and top views. In addition to the grotesque masks, limbs are clearly indicated. For reference to their probable significance, see pages 23-24 and note 14. After 25 ARBE, Plates XLVI and XLIX.

From the name zemi (variously spelt by the older writers), applied to the Antillean cult-images, the aboriginal faith of this region has come to be called zemiism; and it is not difficult, from the descriptions left us, to reconstruct its general character. "They believe," says Peter Martyr, "that the zemes send rain or sunshine in response to their prayers, according to their needs. They believe the zemes to be intermediaries between them and God, whom they represent as one, eternal, omnipotent, and invisible. Each cacique has his zemes, which he honours with particular care. Their ancestors gave to the supreme and eternal Being two names, Iocauna and Guamaonocon. But this supreme Being was himself brought forth by a mother, who has five names, Attabeira, Mamona, Guacarapita, Iella, and Guimazoa." Here we have the typical American Indian conception of Mother Earth and Father Sky and a host of intermediary powers, deriving their potency in some dim way from the two great life-givers. In the name zemi itself is perhaps an indication of the animistic foundation of the religion, for by some authorities it is held to mean "animal" or "animal-being," while others see in it a corruption of guami, "ruler"—a source which would ally it with one of the terms for the Supreme Being as given by Peter Martyr; for Guamaonocon is interpreted as meaning "Ruler of the Earth."

Other appellations of the Sky Father, who "lives in the sun," are Jocakuvague, Yocahu, Vague, and Maorocon or Maorocoti; while Fray Ramon Pane gives names for the Earth Mother closely paralleling Peter Martyr's list: Atabei ("First-in-Being"), Iermaoguacar, Apito, and Zuimaco. Guabancex was a goddess of wind and water, and had two subordinates, Guatauva, her messenger, and Coatrischie, the tempest-raiser. Yobanua-Borna was a rain-deity whose shrine was in a cavern, and who likewise had two subordinates, or ministers. The Haitians are said to have made pilgrimages to a cave in which were kept two statues of wood, gods again of rain, or of sun and rain; and it is likely that the double-figure images preserved from this region are representations of these or of some other pair of Antillean twin deities. Baidrama, or Vaybrama, was also seemingly a twinned divinity, and clearly was the strength-giver: "They say," Fray Ramon tells us, "in time of wars he was burnt, and afterwards being washed with the juice of yucca, his arms grew out again, his body spread, and he recovered his eyes"; and the worshippers of the god bathed themselves in the sap of the yucca when they desired strength or healing. Other zemis mentioned by Pane are Opigielguoviran, a dog-like being which plunged into a morass when the Spaniards came, never to be seen again; and Faraguvaol, a beam or tree-trunk with the power of wandering at will. Here there seems to be indication of a vegetation-cult, which is borne out by Pane's description of the way in which wooden zemis were made—strikingly analogous to West African fetish-construction: "Those of wood are made thus: when any one is travelling he says he sees some tree that shakes its root; the man, in great fright, stops and asks who he is; it answers, 'My name is Buhuitihu [a name for priest, or medicine-man],¹⁵ and he will inform you who I am.' The man repairing to the said physician, tells him what he has seen. The wizard, or conjurer, runs immediately to see the tree the other has told him of, sits down by it and makes it cogioba [an offering of tobacco].... He stands up, gives it all its titles, as if it were some great lord, and asks of it, 'Tell me who you are, what you do here, what you will have with me, and why you send for me? Tell me whether you will have me cut you, whether you will go along with me, and how you will have me carry you; and I will build you a house and endow it.' Immediately that tree, or cemi, becomes an idol, or devil, answers, telling how he will have him do it. He cuts it into such a shape as he is directed, builds his house, and endows it; and makes cogioba for it several times in the year, which cogioba is to pray to it, to please it, to ask and know of the said cemi what good or evil is to happen, and to beg wealth of it."

In such descriptions we get our picture of zemiism, a religion rising above the animism which was its obvious source, becoming predominantly anthropomorphic in its representations of superhuman beings, yet showing no signs of passing from crude fetish-worship to that symbolic use of images which marks the higher forms of idolatry. The ritual was apparently not bloody—offerings of tobacco, the use of purges and narcotics inducing vision and frenzy, and the dramatic dances, or areitos, which marked all solemn occasions and the great seasons of life, such as birth and marriage and death—these were the important features. Oblatio sacrificiorum pertinet ad jus naturale, says Las Casas (quoting St. Thomas Aquinas) in his description of Haitian rites; and to the law of man's nature may surely be ascribed that impulse which caused the Antillean to make his offerings to Heaven and Earth and to the powers that dwell therein.

Nor was he forgetful of the potencies within himself. With his nature-worship was a closely associated ancestor-worship. When they can no longer see the reflection of a person in the pupil of the eye, the soul is fled, say the Arawak—fled to become a zemi. The early writers all dwell upon this belief in the potency and propinquity of the souls of the departed. They are shut up by day, but walk abroad by night, says Fray Ramon; and sometimes they return to their kinsmen in the form of Incubi: "thus it is they know them: they feel their belly, and if they cannot find their navel, they say they are dead; for they say the dead have no navel." The navel is the symbol of birth and of the attachment of the body to its life; hence the dead, though they may possess all other bodily members, lack this; and the Indians have, says Pane, one name for the soul in the living body and another for the soul of the departed.

The bones of the dead, especially of caciques and great men, enclosed sometimes in baskets, sometimes in plaited cotton images, were regarded as powerful fetishes; and from what is told us of the funeral ceremonies certain beliefs may be inferred. The statement by Columbus, already quoted, closes with an account of some such rites: "When these Indians die, they have several ways of performing their obsequies, but the manner of burying their caciques is thus: they open and dry him at the fire, that he may keep whole. Of others they take only the head, others they bury in a grot or den, and lay a calabash of water and bread on his head; others they burn in the house where they die, and when they are at the last gasp, they suffer them not to die but strangle them; and this is done to caciques. Others are turned out of the house, and others put them into a hammock, which is their bed, laying bread and water by their head, never returning to see them any more. Some that are dangerously ill are carried to the cacique, who tells them whether they are to be strangled or not, and what he says is done. I have taken pains to find out what it is they believe, and whether they know what becomes of them after they are dead," and the answer was that "they go to a certain vale, which every great cacique supposes to be in his country, where they affirm they find their parents and all their predecessors, and that they eat, have women, and give themselves up to pleasures and pastimes." This is very much the belief of all the primitive world, but it has one interesting feature. The strangling of caciques and of those named by caciques clearly indicates that there was a belief in a different fate for men who die by nature and men who die with the breath of life not yet exhausted; quite likely it was some Valhalla reserved for the brave, such as the Norseman found who escaped the "straw death," or the Aztec warrior whom Tonatiuh snatched up into the mansions of the Sun.