Many a
broken-down debauchee, many a feeble frame wasted with disease, may
have been pointed out by these simple moralists to their awe-struck
disciples as a fearful example of the fate that must sooner or later
overtake the profligate who indulges immoderately in the seductive
habit of mentioning his own name.
However we may explain it, the fact is certain that many a savage
evinces the strongest reluctance to pronounce his own name, while at
the same time he makes no objection at all to other people
pronouncing it, and will even invite them to do so for him in order
to satisfy the curiosity of an inquisitive stranger. Thus in some
parts of Madagascar it is taboo for a person to tell his own name,
but a slave or attendant will answer for him. The same curious
inconsistency, as it may seem to us, is recorded of some tribes of
American Indians. Thus we are told that "the name of an American
Indian is a sacred thing, not to be divulged by the owner himself
without due consideration. One may ask a warrior of any tribe to
give his name, and the question will be met with either a
point-blank refusal or the more diplomatic evasion that he cannot
understand what is wanted of him.
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