height of the sun, and those of the night by the position of the stars: but, as they make use of no instrument for this purpose, it follows that this division, which must necessarily be unequal according to the different seasons of the year, will be much more so from the imperfect manner of regulating it. They begin to number their hours as is general in Europe, from midnight, and give to each a particular name.* In civil transactions, they calculate indifferently, either by days, nights, or mornings, so that three days, three nights, or three mornings, signify the same thing.

To the stars in general they give the name of huaglen, and divide them into several constellations, which they call pal, or ritha. These constellations usually receive their particular appellations from the number of remarkable stars that compose them. Thus the Pleiades are called Cajupal, the constellation of six, and the Antarctic Cross, Meleritho, the constellation of four, as the first has six stars that are very apparent, and the last four. The Milky Way is called Rupuepeu, the fabulous road, from a story which, like other nations, they relate of it, and which is considered as fabulous by the astronomers of the country.

*These names, commencing at midnight, are, Puliuen, Ueun, Thipanantu, Maleu, Vutamaleu, Ragiantu, Culunantu, Gullantu, Conantu, Guvquenantu, Puni, Ragipun.

They are well acquainted with the planets, which they call Gau, a word derived from the verb gaun, to wash, from whence it may be in ferred, that they have respecting these bodies the same opinion as the Romans, that at their setting they submerge themselves in the sea. Nor are there wanting Fontenelles among them, who believe that many of those globes are so many other earths, inhabited in the same manner as ours; for this reason they call the sky Guenumapu, the country of heaven; and the moon Cuyen-mapu, the country of the moon. They agree likewise with the Aristotelians, in maintaining that the comets, called by them Cheruvoe, proceed from terrestrial exhalations, inflamed in the upper regions of the air; but they are not considered as the precursors of evil and disaster, as they have been esteemed by almost all the nations of the earth. An eclipse of the sun is called by them Layantu, and that of the moon Laycujen, that is, the death of the sun or of the moon. But these expressions are merely metaphorical, as are the correspondent ones in Latin, of defectus solis, aut luna. I know not their opinions of the cause of these phenomena; but I have been informed that they evince no greater alarm upon these occasions than at the most common operations of nature. Their language contains several words wholly applicable to astronomical subjects, such as Thoren, the late rising

2.

of the stars, and others similar, which prove that their knowledge in this respect, is much greater than what is generally supposed. But my researches into their customs, owing to the reasons which I have already assigned, were by no means so complete as I could have wished before I left the country.

Their long measures are the palm, nela, the span, duche, the foot, namun, the pace, thecan, the ell, nevcu, and the league, tupu, which answers to the marine league, or the parasang of the Persians. Their greater distances are computed by mornings, corresponding to the day's journey of Europe. Their liquid and dry measures are less numerous: the guampar, a quart, the can, a pint, and the mencu, a measure of a less quantity, serve for the first. The dry measures are the chi aigue, which contains about six pints, and the gliepu, which is double that quantity.

With regard to the speculative sciences they have very little information. Their geometrical notions are, as might be expected from an uncultivated people, very rude and confined. They have not even proper words to denote the principal figures, as the point, the line, the angle, the triangle, the square, the circle, the sphere, the cube, the cone, &c. Their language, however, as we shall show hereafter, is flexible and

adapted to every species of composition, whence it would be easy to form a vocabulary of technical words to facilitate the acquisition of the sciences to the Araucanians.

CHAP. VII.

Rhetoric; Poetry; Medical Skill; Commerce of the Araucanians.

NOTWITHSTANDING their general ignorance, they cultivate successfully the sciences of rhetoric, poetry, and medicine, as far as these are attainable by practice or observation; for they have no books among them, nor any who know how to write or read. Nor can they be induced to learn these arts; either from their aversion to every thing that is practised by the Europeans, or from their being urged by a savage spirit to despise whatever does not belong to their country.

Oratory is particularly held in high estimation by them, and, as among the ancient Romans, is the high road to honour, and the management of public affairs. The eldest son of an Ulmen who is deficient in this talent, is for that sole reason excluded from the right of succession, and one of his younger brothers, or the nearest relation that he has, who is an able speaker, substituted in his place. Their parents, therefore, accustom them from their childhood to speak in public, and carry them to their national assem