She might not cook food or fetch water for her children, nor let them lie down on her bed, nor should she lie or sit where they slept. Sometimes a widow would wear a breech-cloth made of dry bunch-grass for several days to prevent her husband’s ghost from having intercourse with her.(511) Among the Tinneh or Déné Indians of North-West America all who have handled a corpse are subject to many restrictions and taboos. They are debarred for a certain period from eating any fresh meat: they may never use a knife to cut their food but must tear it with their teeth: they may not drink out of a vessel in common use, but must employ a gourd which they carry about for the purpose; and they wear peeled willow wands about their arms and necks or carry them in their hands as disinfectants to annul the evil consequences which are supposed to follow from handling the dead.(512) Among the Indian tribes of Queen Charlotte Sound a widow or widower goes into special mourning for a month; among the Koskimos the period of mourning is four months. During this time he or she lives apart in a very small hut behind the house, eating and drinking alone, and using for that purpose dishes which are not employed by other members of the tribe.(513) (M91) Among the Agutainos, who inhabit Palawan, one of the Philippine Islands, a widow may not leave her hut for seven or eight days after the death; and even then she may only go out at an hour when she is not likely to meet anybody, for whoever looks upon her dies a sudden death. To prevent this fatal catastrophe, the widow knocks with a wooden peg on the trees as she goes along, thus warning people of her dangerous proximity; and the very trees on which she knocks soon die.(514) So poisonous is the atmosphere of death that surrounds those to whom the ghost of the departed may be thought to cleave. In the Mekeo district of British New Guinea a widower loses all his civil rights and becomes a social outcast, an object of fear and horror, shunned by all. He may not cultivate a garden, nor shew himself in public, nor traverse the village, nor walk on the roads and paths. Like a wild beast he must skulk in the long grass and the bushes; and if he sees or hears any one coming, especially a woman, he must hide behind a tree or a thicket. If he wishes to fish or hunt, he must do it alone and at night. If he would consult any one, even the missionary, he does so by stealth and at night; he seems to have lost his voice and speaks only in whispers. Were he to join a party of fishers or hunters, his presence would bring misfortune on them; the ghost of his dead wife would frighten away the fish or the game. He goes about everywhere and at all times armed with a tomahawk to defend himself, not only against wild boars in the jungle, but against the dreaded spirit of his departed spouse, who would do him an ill turn if she could; for all the souls of the dead are malignant and their only delight is to harm the living.(515)