Dead bodies were usually burned, and the ashes thrown into the sacred stream. Sometimes this could not be done, as, for instance, when one died upon an expedition, and there was no time or means to make a funeral pyre. In such cases the body would be hastily buried, or, as once occurred, thrust into a porcupine's hole, and some of the fingers cut off and carried home to the sorrowing relatives. The part was then burned for the whole, and the gang presented a widow with money to distribute in alms, and enabled her to make a handsome offering to the family priest. Each colony had two or three especial deities, who were the spirits of ancestors distinguished in the "imperial business," as they proudly designated their vocation. When they desired to know who of their forefathers was the most sympathetic, the most interested in their welfare, they carefully noted the incoherent ravings of a delirious man, or one suffering from epilepsy. His rambling talk was attributed to the temporary possession of his tongue by some departed spirit. If there were any doubt as to whose it was, the family priest, or a relative of the sick man, would throw on the ground a few grains of wheat, or coloured glass beads, mentioning the name of some ancestor, and at the same time crying odd or even. If they cried correctly two or three times consecutively, they had discovered the demigod. They then sacrificed a goat, or some other animal, that the pleasant odour of the culinary operations might gratify the nostrils of the "daimon," while the assembled friends loudly sang his praises. If the patient began to amend during the sacrifice, it was deemed a full confirmation of their belief, and a new "Lar familiaris," or household god was added to the polytheism of the colony.