CHAPTER XXV. OF THE RITES WHICH ACCOMPANY AND SUCCEED THE DEATH OF AN ABIPONE. Death is dreadful to most mortals, but particularly so to the Abipones. They cannot even bear the sight of a dying person. Hence, whenever any one's life is despaired of, his fellow inmates immediately forsake the house, or are driven away by the old women who remain to take care of the sick, lest they should be so affected by the mournful spectacle, that fear of death should make them shrink from endangering their lives in battle. They are, therefore, obliged to pass many nights in another person's tent, or in the open air. As they have very little experience of persons dying a natural death, they do not know the signs of it when it draws near. A short abstinence from food, unusual silence, or sleeplessness, makes them presage approaching dissolution. As soon as a report is spread that a man is dying, the old women, who are either related to the person, or famed for medical skill, flock to his house. They stand in a row round the sick man's bed, with dishevelled hair and bare shoulders, striking a gourd, the mournful sound of which they accompany with violent motion of the feet and arms, and loud vociferations. She who excels the rest in age, or fame for medical skill, stands nearest to the dying man's head, and strikes an immense military drum, which returns a horrible bellowing. Another, who is appointed to watch the sick man, removes every now and then the bull's hide with which he is covered, examines his face, and if he seems yet to breathe, sprinkles him plentifully with cold water, a jug of which is placed under the bed. When I first witnessed these things, I pitied the fate of the sick man, who, I feared, would be killed, if not by the disease, at any rate by the howling of the women and the noise of the drum, or else smothered by the weight of the hide, with which the whole body is covered, and which is as hard and as heavy as a board. Under the pretext of compassion, they use all this cruelty to the departing soul, that the women may be spared the sight of his last agonies, and the hearing of his groans.