Not unlike this has been a common practice among the American Indians, in the treatment of prisoners of war. “If the victim had shown courage,” again says Parkman, concerning the Hurons, “the heart was first roasted, cut into small pieces, and given to the young men and boys, who devoured it, to increase their own courage.”[259] So, similarly, with the Iroquois.[260] And Burton says of the Dakotas:[261] “They are not cannibals, except when a warrior, after slaying a foe, eats, porcupine-like, the heart or liver, with the idea of increasing his own courage.” Schomburgk, writing concerning the natives of British Guiana, says: “In order to increase their courage, and [so their] contempt of death, the Caribs were wont to cut out the heart of a slain enemy, dry it on the fire, powder it, and mix the powder in their drink.”[262]
The native Australians find, it is said, an inducement to bloodshed, in their belief--like that of the ancient Scythians--that the life, or the spirit, of the first man whom one slays, enters into the life of the slayer, and remains as his helpful possession thereafter.[263] The Ashantee fetishmen, of West Africa, apparently acting on a kindred thought, make a mixture of the hearts of enemies, mingled with blood and consecrated herbs, for the vivifying of the conquerors. “All who have never before killed an enemy eat of the preparation; it being believed that if they did not, their energy would be secretly wasted by the haunting spirits of their deceased foes.”[264] The underlying motive of the bloody “head-hunting” in Borneo, is the Dayak belief, that the spirits of those whose heads are taken are to be subject to him, who does the decapitating. The heads are primarily simply the proof--like the Indian’s scalps--that their owner has so many lives absorbed in his own.[265]
A keen observer of Fellâheen life in Palestine has reported:[266] “There is an ugly expression used among the fellâheen of South Palestine, in speaking of an enemy slain in war--‘_Dhabbahhtho bisnâny_’ (‘I slew him with my teeth’)[267]; and it is said that there have been instances of killing in battle in this fashion by biting at the throat. In the Nablous district (Samaria), where the people are much more ferocious, the expression is, ‘I have drunk his blood’; but that is understood figuratively.”