When a tribal group among the Ami is in serious distress or danger, or faced by the necessity of a decision of importance, the elders of the group[64]--or village, if only one village is affected--usually repair to a cave, or to a place near a high cliff--wherever an echo may be heard--accompanied by several priestesses. The latter dance and chant themselves into a state of frenzy, until they fall exhausted in a swoon, real or simulated. When they return to consciousness, which is sometimes not until next day, they say that the spirits which “sang back” at them from cliff or cave during the chanting have told them what measures the people must take in order to meet the emergency in question. This can be communicated only to the elders; and only the elders are allowed to watch this especially sacred dance. For any of the younger people to do so would be considered a heinous sin. The red stones, or beads, used by the priestesses in their incantations are also sometimes used by the older warriors and huntsmen. An old hunter, just before starting into the mountains in search of game, will put a red pebble into a freshly opened betel-nut, lay this in the palm of his hand and wave it before his face, palm upward, toward the sky. This is supposed to bring him good luck in the chase. The same ceremony is said to have been performed in the olden days, just before starting on a head-hunting expedition. The ideas of the Ami regarding heaven and hell also suggest that these may be the vestiges of missionary teachings once given by the Dutch (the present-day missionaries in Formosa confine their attention to the Chinese-Formosans as before explained). Good men and women, the Ami believe, go to “heaven,” and bad ones to “hell.” Heaven they believe to be situated “somewhere in the north”; hell “somewhere in the south.” One wonders if this belief as regards direction represents a tribal recollection of their former home--perhaps of a massacre, which caused the emigration of those remaining; perhaps of hunger, thirst, and terror on the voyage between the “land to the south” and Formosa. At any rate, their tradition is that their ancestors drifted to the coast, which is now their home, in a “long boat.” The very spot of their debarkation is pointed out--a place near Pinan.[65] Once a year a commemoration festival is held at this spot, when food and drink are offered to the spirits of their ancestors. Their own ancestors of course have gone to heaven, where they themselves will go after death; equally of course the people of the other tribes, especially those with whom they happen to be at enmity, will go to hell (savage and civilized psychology being on some points strangely alike). The Ami say, however, that hell cannot be any worse than the earth; otherwise spirits would not remain there.