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SWANTON] CHOCTAW SOCIAL AND CEREMONIAL. LIFE 185
aud from mouth to mouth till all have been bountifully supplied. While supper
is being served two of the oldest men of the company quietly withdraw, and go
to the grave and fill it up, taking down the flags. All then join in a dance,
which not unfrequently is continued till morning; the widow does not fail to
unite in the dance, and to contribute her part to the festivities of the occasion.
This is the " last cry," the days of mourning are ended, and the widow is now
ready to form another matrimonial alliance. The ceremonies are precisely the
same when a man has lost his wife, and they are only slightly varied when any
other member of the family has died. But at the time of our residence with
them those heathenish ceremonies were not generally observed, yet they were
occasionally practiced by the most ignorant and degraded of the tribe."*
Among the Bayou Lacomb Choctaw the ancient burial customs
seem almost to have disappeared even as memories, as appears from
the information furnished by Mr. Bushnell.
There appears to have been very little lamenting or mourning on the oc-
casion of a death or a burial. The body was borne to the grave and the
interment took place without a ceremony of any sort. In the event of the
death of a man of great importance, however, the body was allowed to remain
in state for a day before burial. During that time it was decorated
with various ornaments and garments, but these were removed before interment.
Such objects are said to have been preserved and handed down from
one generation to the next, and used whenever required.
Usually a hunter's gun was placed in the grave with the body.
The period of mourning varied with the age of the deceased. For a child
or young person it was about three months, but for an older person, as one's
mother or father, from six months to one year.
The women cut their hair and " cried " at certain times near the grave.
When a person desired to cease mourning, he stuck into the ground so as to
form a triangle three pieces of wood, each several feet in length, about 1 foot
apart. The tops of these sticks were drawn together and tied with a piece
of bright-colored cloth or ribbon. This object was placed near the door or
entrance of the lodge and indicated to all that the occupant desired to cease
mourning.
During the next three days the mourners cried or wailed three times each
day—at sunrise, at noon, and at sunset. While v.ailing they wrapped blankets
around their heads and sat or knelt upon the ground. During these three
days the friends of the mourners gathered and began dancing aud feasting.
At the expiration of the time they ceased weeping and joined in the festivities,
which continued another day.""
The few notes which I have myself collected agree with the above,
but amplify it in certain particulars. Thus Jackson Lewis, one of
my oldest and best Creek informants, who had been much with the
Choctaw, told me that in his early years the people of that tribe
used to lay the bodies of the deceased out on the ground in the yard
of the dwelling and erect a little house over them, and as the body
decomposed they would sharpen canes and punch them into the body
6s rienry C. Benson, Life Among tbe Choctaw Indians and Sketches of the Southwest.
Cincinnati, 1860, pp. 294-295.
=" Bushnoll, Bull. 48, Bur. Amer. Ethn., p. 27.
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