The North-West Amazons: Notes of some months spent among cannibal tribes

FOOTNOTES

[1] My arrival in England was postponed to some months later through an attack of beriberi.

[2] It was unknown to me till afterwards that Dr. Koch-GrÜnberg of Berlin had, in 1904, ascended the Uaupes to, I believe, 71° west longitude.

[3] A rifle, where possessed, is never used against an animal but kept for use against the white man.

[4] Turtle eggs are, curiously enough, not considered foetal.

[5] For my share I had the honour to receive, through the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, the thanks of the French Government.

[6] Steamers have been on the Amazon since 1853, and navigation is continuous throughout the year (cf. Brazilian Year-Book).

[7] I never saw the Andes actually from these districts, but the suggestion is always there, they are seen in the mind’s eye; an ultimate, if invisible, limit to what would otherwise seem more than illimitable.

[8] Wallace, p. 246.

[9] Spruce, ii. 379-380.

[10] Robuchon’s estimate of distances is 471 geographical miles from Iquitos to the mouth of the Issa; thence to the Cotuhe, which he places at 2° 53' 12 S. and 69° 41' 10 W., 150 geographical miles. From the Cotuhe to the Igara Parana, 252 miles, a total distance of 873 geographical miles from Iquitos to the Igara Parana.

[11] Robuchon gives latitude 1° 43' 9 S., longitude 71° 53' 36 W.

[12] Spruce, i. 7, ii. 100.

[13] September to January is the hottest portion of the year, the heat being at its worst in December. 90° would be extreme heat, and 70° the lowest the mercury would probably reach; the average being from 75° to 85°. Robuchon is responsible for the statement that the temperature at the mouth of the Cotuhe in September was 43° Cent. in the shade, but that after a brisk shower it fell to 31°. The water of the Amazon has a temperature of 81°; the Japura is a warmer river and reaches 85°. Wallace gives the mean temperature of the Rio Negro water in September—that is, during the hot season—as 86°, and the corresponding temperature of the air as from 76° to 92.5°. The water, he considers, is probably never less than 80° at any time. The temperature of the Uaupes has been noted as invariably 76° at three to six feet below the surface (Geo. Journ., 1910, p. 683).

[14] The Amazon at its mouth is 158 miles across from bank to bank.

[15] This I take to be the Yacitara mentioned by Spruce, i. 30.

[16] Wallace noted a butterfly frequenting “the dung of some carnivorous animal” in Malacca, and remarks that many tropical butterflies suck liquid from muddy places, “and are generally so intent upon their meal that they can be easily approached and captured” (Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, pp. 29, 114).

[17] Spruce, ii. 366.

[18] Bates, ii. 262.

[19] Spruce, i. 49.

[20] One tree is reputed to be so poisonous that no Indian will touch it. See Maw, p. 294.

[21] These tribal houses differ from the communal long-houses of the Fly Delta, British New Guinea, not only in shape, but in that there are no platforms and no divisions for each family; the whole interior is open. For description of Kiwai and Daudai long-houses see Expedition to Torres Straits, iv. 112-117.

[22] Maloka = Indian lodge or tribal house (lingoa-geral).

[23] Manicaria saccifera (cf. Spruce, i. 56).

[24] Eugene AndrÉ noted that two kinds were commonly used on the Causa, the mulato, a kind of Aroideae, and the murcielago, which belongs to the Bignoniaceae family.

[25] Several kinds of palm-leaves are used for this purpose, and whichever was most easily procurable in the district where the house was built would be used by the tribe. Hardenburg mentions the leaves of the Phytelephas macrocarpa, the vegetable ivory-tree, as in use among the Witoto, and the Bactris ciliata or Chonta palm for the posts and rafters (p. 135). The leaves of the Bussu palm, Manicaria saccifera, will make a thatch that lasts for ten or twelve years, by some accounts (cf. Waterton, p. 479).

[26] Wallace, p. 341.

[27] This is architecturally interesting in view of Foucart’s theory of the evolution of the Egyptian grooved stone pillar from wooden originals, bundles of reeds.

[28] Simson mentions such a “door,” p. 237.

[29] Wallace, p. 341.

[30] Among the Jivaro one partitioned half of the house is kept for the women (Orton, p. 171). There is no such distinction among the Issa-Japura tribes.

[31] Cf. Wallace, p. 354.

[32] Crevaux has described the process. He watched an Indian “qui fait du feu en roulant vivement un roseau dans une cavitÉ creusÉe dans une tige de roncon” (Voyage dans l’AmÉrique du sud, p. 214). Wallace mentions this method among the Kuretu, op. cit. 355.

[33] If a jigger is removed at once with a needle it will not hurt, and scarcely makes a puncture.

[34] Vampires in this country are few and far between, but Simson mentions them as a plague at Agnano (Simson, p. 131).

[35] Bates, i. 246. For the taming of a full-grown Coita see p. 247. Another pet mentioned by Bates, a “strange kind of wood-cricket,” is also unknown to me as a pet, and though I have often heard loud-voiced insects of the cricket class they have never been in captivity (cf. Bates, i. 250).

[36] Cf. Martius, P.R.G.S. ii. 192.

[37] See Appendix.

[38] Deniker, p. 552.

[39] Marriage by capture was a Carib custom (Westermarck, p. 383). It is unknown nowadays to the tribes south of the Japura.

[40] Partial couvade is found also among tribes in the north of America, that is to say, certain things are tabu to the father after the child’s birth. Cf. Dorsey, Siouan Cults, p. 511; Venegas, i. 94; Tylor, pp. 294-7.

[41] im Thurn, p. 173. Joyce locates the original Caribs on the upper Xingu, from whence, he considers, they spread over Guiana and the lesser Antilles (South American ArchÆology, p. 256). Rodway, on the authority of Spanish chronicled Arawak information, suggests they were the original inhabitants of the north-west coast, migrant from Mexico (Guiana, pp. 41, 45).

[42] Ibid. pp. 171-2.

[43] Crevaux, Fleuves de l’AmÉrique du Sud, Yapura, F. 5 et 7.

[44] Crevaux, Vocabulaire franÇais-roucouyenne.

[45] Koch-GrÜnberg, Journal de la SociÉtÉ des AmÉricainistes de Paris, tome iii. No. 2 (1906).

[46] Koch-GrÜnberg, Zeitschrift fÜr Ethnologie, xxxviii, 189.

[47] It must be remembered that I came to all these people from the Witoto country.

[48] Crevaux, Voyages dans l’AmÉrique du Sud, p. 368.

[49] Martius, BeitrÄge, ii. 340.

[50] The Inca were called Orejones by the Spaniards on account of the large studs they wore in the lobes of their ears. See Joyce, p. 110; Ratzel, ii. 172.

[51] Simson, p. 210.

[52] Koch-GrÜnberg, Zeitschrift fÜr Ethnologie, xxxviii. 188 (1906).

[53] Cd. 6266, pp. 9, 10, 12, 25, 26.

[54] Rice, p. 690.

[55] Wallace, p. 354.

[56] See Appendix.

[57] Hardenburg, Man, p. 134.

[58] This combination is of so exceptional a character that it is hardly to be recognised as a definite trait of organisation, and it follows that though such exceptional cases may point to a possible past unity of clans as a tribe, these clans are now practically small tribes, being incapable of combining for common action. The expressions language-group, tribe, and tribesman are therefore more correct than tribe, clan, and clansman would be.

[59] Cf. im Thurn, p. 185.

[60] This is exactly the reverse of the matrilocal customs related by Sir Everard im Thurn.

[61] Or their artists and publishers.

[62] “The natives are ashamed, as they say, to be clothed” (Humboldt, Travels, iii. 230; cf. also Wallace, p. 357). Clothes, in fact, are often donned by savages at periods of license only. See Westermarck, History of Human Marriage, chap. ix.

[63] There are several trees in these forests that supply the needed fibrous bark. im Thurn suggests that the bark used is that of the Lecythis ollaria, but Spruce states that tauari is made from the bark of certain species of Tecoma of the Bignoniaceae order, and tururi, a thinner bark-cloth, from various figs and Artocarps. Naturally natives use the tree that is handiest when required (cf. im Thurn, pp. 194, 291; Spruce, i. 27).

[64] Dr. de Lacerda in his journal for July 22, 1798, describes just such a manufacture of bark-cloth carried on by the Muizas, who traded this with their neighbours the Maraves. See Land of Carembe, R.G.S., 1873, p. 71. Loin-cloths made from the bark of the Artocarps are also found among the Semang of Kedah and other wild tribes of the Malay Peninsula. See Skeat and Blagden, i. 143-4, 157, 376, etc.

[65] A similar geographical progression has been noted among the women of British New Guinea. See Williamson, The Mafulu, p. 28.

[66] Sandals known as alparagatas, with soles of plaited aloe-fibre, are usually worn by travellers in the Amazons. These can be cleaned and washed in the same way. See also Simson, p. 83.

[67] Wallace, p. 351.

[68] Feather ruffs are worn by Napo Indians, but not by these tribes.

[69] im Thurn, p. 305.

[70] One feather head-dress in my possession is made with rough cotton yarn, obtained presumably by barter, for none of these tribes make cotton yarn themselves, and it is very rarely to be found among them. The feathers are bound into the hank with very fine fibre.

[71] Oenocarpus distichus.

[72] Wallace, p. 351.

[73] According to Koch-GrÜnberg the Yahabana and other Kuretu-speaking tribes part the hair in the middle and plait it with bast. After bathing, the hair is dried, combed, and arranged with a bandage.

[74] Red was the favourite colour for a djibbeh. White ones were not much liked.

[75] This corresponds with the bead tanga described by Wallace, but the Uaupes’ apron is “only about six inches square,” and these girdles or garlands are two feet long or more (Wallace, p. 343).

[76] Value, I believe, about ninepence exchange or less.

[77] So uncommon is it that I was under the impression that it was entirely unknown until I examined the necklace in question very carefully after my return to England. Certainly I never saw any of these tribes preparing cotton or making use of it in any way except in its natural state to tip their blow-pipe arrows. String or yarn of any sort, except the fibre thread, I always found to be absolutely unobtainable anywhere throughout these districts.

[78] Possibly one of the Histeridae mentioned by Bates, i. 211.

[79] Pace Maw, p. 226.

[80] Belts of apparently similar minute plaiting are worn by the Mafula of British New Guinea. These natives also wear armlets and leglets of the same material, but not tightened to swell the muscles. The thread these are made of is manufactured from vegetable fibre in the identical manner employed by the Issa-Japura Indians (Williams, The Mafula of British New Guinea, pp. 32, 53, 54).

[81] Compare illustration with pictures of ligatures in D. Rannie’s My Adventures among South Sea Cannibals, pp. 80, 170, 179.

[82] The Spaniards called the Inca Orejones on account of the large studs worn by them in the lobes of their ears. See Joyce, p. 110.

[83] Wallace states that all the Indians “have a row of circular punctures along the arm” (Wallace, p. 345). These tribes have nothing of the sort.

[84] Wallace describes the mark as “three vertical blue lines on the chin” (Wallace, p. 345). This is not correct; vide drawing.

[85] Crevaux, p. 264.

[86] The Bixa Orellana (Spix and von Martius, p. 228).

[87] Genifa americana (Spix and von Martius, p. 228).

[88] Hardenburg, p. 138.

[89] “Covering, if not used as a protection from the climate, owes its origin, at least in a great many cases, to the desire of men and women to make themselves mutually attractive” (Westermarck, p. 211). “Clothing was first adopted as a means of decoration rather than from motives of decency. The private parts were first adorned with the appendages that were afterwards used by a dawning sense of modesty to conceal them” (Johnston, The River Congo, p. 418).

[90] The result of this is that a traveller is forced to have women as well as men in his escort, or he would find that half the services required would not be rendered him. For instance, no male Indian will prepare food, neither will he wash clothes, nor clean the cooking vessels. This refers to the untouched districts, and must not be confused with the forced “willingness” of the Rubber Belts.

[91] A. R. Wallace, p. 349.

[92] E. B. Tylor notes that the savage is often skilled in map-making as a form of picture-writing (op. cit. p. 90), and quotes Prescott for the existence of maps in Peru before Europeans reached South America (Prescott, Peru, i. 116). Ancient maps or books like “rolled up palm leaves” (Ratzel, ii. 169).

[93] See Chap. XVIII.

[94] Pudenda maioris statuae muliebris nigra, labia maiora rubra picta sunt; sed et in maiore et in minore statua vagina tam profunde perforata est ut transitum ab vulva ad uterum suggerere videatur. Scrotum statuae virilis nigrum, praeputium rubrum, pictum est; membrum autem ipsum, quamvis quiescens, erectum tamen est et sic ad abdomen parallelum.

[95] See Chap. XVII.

[96] Keane tells of the Mojos valley natives that so uncommon is stone in that district that if a man set out on a journey to the uplands where stone is procurable he would be asked to bring some back as a curiosity (Keane, p. 12). For some use of stone implements of the past still employed among present-day peoples, see Mitchell, Past in the Present, p. 12, etc.; Routledge, With a Neolithic People; Spencer and Gillen, Native Tribes of Central Australia, pp. 592-4, etc.; Skeat and Blagden, Pagan Races of the Malay Peninsula, i. 242, 296.

[97] Spruce mentions a white pitch obtained from Icica trees, I never saw any white pitch. These Indians use only black.

[98] Some tribes near the Napo also use circular shields of tapir hide, p. 116.

[99] The use of the potter’s wheel was even unknown to the Incas (Joyce, p. 193).

[100] Crevaux, p. 193.

[101] The caraipÉ tree is, according to Spruce and Bentham, one of the Licania genus of the Chrysobalaneae order (Spruce, i. 13).

[102] Spruce, i. 14.

[103] The Cerropia peltata, according to Spix and Martius, p. 259.

[104] Tylor mentions the hammock as one of “the inventions which it seems possible to trace to their original districts,” and states that it has spread from South America and the West Indies “far and wide over the world, carrying with it its Haitian name, hamac” (op. cit. p. 175). It is interesting to note in this connection that a hammock is known as a hamaka among the Yakuna; the Tariana call it hamaka or amaka; and the Yavitero Indians call it aimaiha (Koch-GrÜnberg, Aruak-Sprachen Nordwestbrasiliens und der angrenzenden Gebiete, p. 65). The BarÉ Indians call it mi; the Baniwa bidzaha or bisali; the Siusi pieta or piete; the Katapolitani change the t to d and have pieda; the Kurutana call it makaitepa; the Uarekena say soalita (Koch-GrÜnberg, op. cit.); while the Pioje call hammocks jangre (Simson, p. 268). The Witoto word is kinai and the Boro gwapa.

[105] Hamilton Rice gives the distances between the meshes as the space of thumb to little finger stretch for the Witoto, palm-length for the Karahone, four fingers for the Cubbeo (p. 700). I knew the spacing differed, but never heard that it was a tribal distinction.

[106] The palm employed is, according to Bates, an Astrocaryum (Bates, ii. 209). Wallace and im Thurn mention the Mauritia flexuosa (A. R. Wallace, p. 342; im Thurn, pp. 283, 290), which, according to Spruce, “seems confined to the submaritime region” (Spruce, i. 15). He gives Bromelia karatas, ii. 520. Spix and Martius give the Tucuma palm (Astrocaryum vulgare) and others of the same genus (Spix and Martius, p. 248).

[107] “A species of Desmoncus” (A. R. Wallace, p. 336).

[108] Women make both cassava-squeezers and graters. This may be a coincidence, as I have seen men making the mats for the doorways, usually women’s work.

[109] Guilielmia speciosa.

[110] Spruce, ii. 447.

[111] Spencer and Gillen, Native Tribes of Central Australia, pp. 668-9, and Across Australia.

[112] Any hard wood may be used, but cedar makes the best canoe. Hamilton Rice says cachicama (Rice, p. 691). Spruce mentions “a heavy laurel, probably Paraturi,” used by the Tussari for making their cascos (Spruce, i. 413). Bates mentions the Itauba amarello, “the yellow variety of the stone-wood” (Bates, ii. 117). But all trees will not do, for some will not open properly when they are fired (AndrÉ, pp. 241-2).

[113] Iriartea ventricosa.

[114] This is said to be the only kind of canoe used by the Auhishiri (cf. Simson, p. 199).

[115] Viz. the Maca, the Guaharibo, and the Guahibo (Spruce, i. 477).

[116] Wallace, p. 358.

[117] For example, the Zaparo (Simson, pp. 169, 295); the Uaupes Indians (Wallace, p. 349).

[118] Among other tribes this is not always the case. Manioc and banana cultivation with the Rucuyens is carried on by the men (Ratzel, ii. 128).

[119] There is a wild species on some of the rivers, but the Indians make no use of it (cf. Bates, i. 194).

[120] Anauana sativa (Wallace, p. 336).

[121] Spruce, i. 180-81.

[122] Among the Issa-Japura tribes it is rather sustaining than stimulating, i.e. it is not fermented.

[123] Theobroma, the food of the gods (Spruce, i. 79).

[124] I would suggest that manioc is the true name for the plant, cassava for the “bread” made therefrom. Mandiocca is only American-Spanish for manioc.

[125] Bates i. 194, n.

[126] Spruce, i. 215.

[127] Capsicum frutescens (Spix and Martius, p. 259). Artanthe eximia and other Artanthe and Peperomia (Spruce, ii. 283-4).

[128] For processes of growing and preparation, see Markham, pp. 148-9.

[129] Erythroxylon coca and E. cataractarum (Spruce, ii. 446-8).

[130] Cf. E. B. Tylor, p. 170.

[131] An illustration in Sir H. Johnston’s Liberia, ii. 406, shows a West African native climbing with only one ring and both arms and ankles free. Bates mentions an Indian climbing with only one ring used for the feet (Bates, ii. 196). The same method is to be found in Ceylon, among the Malays, etc. (cf. Skeat and Blagden, i. 51, 62, 85; Tennant, Ceylon, ii. 523; Partridge, Cross River Natives, p. 150, etc.).

[132] This is no uncommon thing among peoples of lower culture, but that it does not of necessity follow as a corollary to life in the bush is proved by some of the West African tribes who are most indifferent sportsmen. This is the case among sundry of the peoples of the Northern Territories of the Gold Coast, where a British official has before now had to train his shikari, if he hoped for successful sport.

[133] The blow-pipe, the gravitana in lingoa-geral, is known as the zarabatana among the Teffe tribes (Bates, ii. 236); the bodoquera on the Napo. Koch-GrÜnberg gives the following names for it: todike, ImitritÄ Miranya; uataha, Yavitero; uilipona, Uarekena; uapana, Yukuna; Mauipi, Katapolitani; mauipi or moipi, Siusi; mauipi or mauipi, Tariana (Aruak-Sprachen, p. 73).

[134] A species of Arundinaria.

[135] Bactus ciliata.

[136] The wood used is paxiaba-i, the Iriartea setigera (Spruce, ii. 522). This small palm grows from ten to fifteen feet high, with a stem of an inch to two inches in diameter. When dry the soft inner pith is removed, and the bore polished with a bunch of tree-fern roots pulled up and down (Wallace, p. 147).

[137] Jacitara (Bates, ii. 236).

[138] From the arbol-del-lacre (Hardenburg, Man, p. 136); Pao-de-lacre, Vismia guianensis (Spruce, ii. 522).

[139] Bombax (Wallace, p. 147); Eriodendron sp. (Sterculiaceae), (Spruce, ii. 523; Bates, ii. 237).

[140] Oenocarpus Batawa (Spruce, ii. 522).

[141] These blow-pipes appear to be similar to those still in use among the Orang Kuantan Malays, of which a specimen is to be seen in the British Museum. It is made of two grooved halves of a hard wood, bound with cane, and coated with “a gutta-like substance” (Skeat, Man, 1902, No. 108). This is, however, a shorter instrument than the Witoto or Boro use, the measurements given being only 5 feet 2 inches for total length, with an interior diameter of seven-sixteenths of an inch at the mouthpiece and three-eighths of an inch at the muzzle-end. The blow-pipe is found among all Malayan tribes. For distribution in the South Seas, cf. map in Skeat and Blagden’s Pagan Tribes, i. 254.

[142] Deniker states that the Miranha hunt “like the ancient Quechuas by means of nets stretched out between the trees, into which they drive, with cries and gestures, the terrified animals” (Deniker, p. 561). I have never seen or heard of such nets among them.

[143] Orton, pp. 169-70.

[144] Cf. method of poisoning adopted by natives of Torres Straits (Torres Straits, iv. 159).

[145] Jacquinia armillaris. According to Spix and Martius babasco poison is made from the leaves and blossom of the Budleya connata (Spix and von Martius, Reise, 1820, p. 98).

[146] Simson, p. 131.

[147] Paullinia pinnata (Sapindaceae) (Spruce, ii. 523; Bates, ii. 82-3). Spruce also mentions cunambi, poison obtained from the roots of Ichthyothera cunambi (Spruce, ii. 520); and Yuca-raton, the root of Gliricidiae sp. (Spruce, ii. 455).

[148] The frame is made of timbo-titica, Heteropsis sp. (Spruce, ii. 523).

[149] Such very hard wood is procurable, and so abundant is it that even tribes like the Botucudo, who could use shell, stone, or metal, use wood in preference, and many tribes prefer their lithic axes to metal ones. The inference is obvious—these peoples are not, and never have been, metal-using races, and poisoned wood suits sufficiently their purposes for arrow-heads.

[150] Oakenfull, p. 30.

[151] Compare with customs of the Mafulu in British New Guinea (Williamson, p. 179; Fiji, Thompson, p. 35).

[152] Clough, pp. 104-5; Wallace, p. 353.

[153] Partridge, Cross River Natives, p. 59; “Upper Congo Cannibals,” J.R.A.I., xxiv. pp. 298-9.

[154] For example, Maw, p. 160.

[155] Wallace, pp. 346-7.

[156] Ratzel, ii. 138-9; Orton, pp. 171-2.

[157] See British Museum, Cambridge Museum, Munich Museum.

[158] Bates, ii. 132.

[159] I was never present at a cannibal feast. This information is based on Robuchon’s account, checked by cross-questioning the Indians with whom I came in contact.

[160] Johnson, Liberia, ii. 898.

[161] On the other hand earth-eating is prevalent among the Torres Straits people, where salt is not rare. The pregnant woman eats it to make her infant light in colour and strong and brave (Torres Straits Exped., iv. 139).

[162] Crevaux, p. 287.

[163] Bates, ii. 195.

[164] Ibid.

[165] Some tribes, for example the Jivaro (Simson, pp. 93-4), are said to be more provident in this respect, but the Boro and Witoto groups are not among them. Occasionally a store of pines may be made in October, when pines are most plentiful, but this is all.

[166] It may be noted here that all the denizens of the forest, including even the larger carnivora, are by popular report fruit-eaters, and are specially fond of the wild alligator pear (cf. Spruce, ii. 362-3).

[167] Tapirus americanus.

[168] All animals when wounded appear to take to water.

[169] Coelogenys paca.

[170] Hydrochaerus capybara.

[171] Dasyprocta agouti.

[172] I captured some and brought them away as pets.

[173] Spruce, i. p. 182.

[174] Dicotypes tajacu is the only one I observed in these parts, but D. labiatus is common in the bush. The peccary is called kairooni by the Arawak; mero and emo by the Witoto according to the species; mene by the Boro; and whinga by the Macusi.

[175] See Wood’s Natural History, “Mammals.”

[176] Oakenfull, p. 30.

[177] Turning turtles is prohibited by law in Brazil, but no law reaches these wilds.

[178] The Indians of British Guiana who eat the turtles’ and iguana eggs, also “will not touch the egg of a fowl” (im Thurn, p. 18).

[179] They do not, however, object to their food being decidedly “high” (cf. Simson, p 115).

[180] In this they share the tastes of the Liberian women (cf. Johnston, Liberia, ii. 954).

[181] Spruce, ii. 381.

[182] Manihot aypi.

[183] The description given by Fr. Pinto in Dr. de Lacerda’s eighteenth-century journal of the preparation of manioc flour by the Murunda Kaffirs differs only from the Indian method in that the root is not squeezed, merely soaked till “almost rotten,” then dried and pounded (R.G.S., The Lands of Cazembe, 1873, p. 129).

[184] It would seem that the Boro use what is known in Brazil as Farinha de aqua, and the Witoto make Farinha secca (cf. Spruce, i. 11-12). Brazilian arrowroot and tapioca are products of the manioc prepared in different ways. Only the Boro and Menimehe make Farinha de aqua.

[185] “A mandiocca oven (called budari in BarrÉ)” (Spruce, ii. 477-8).

[186] Bates noted that he saw Indians on the Tapajos season this sauce with ants in place of fish (Bates, i. 318-19).

[187] Wallace, p. 340.

[188] Simson mentions salt-licks in the neighbourhood of the Rio Salado Grande (Simson, p. 238).

[189] The ashes of the drum tree (Cecropia peltata) “are saline and antiseptic” (Spruce, ii. 447). “A kind of flour which has a saline taste” is extracted from the fruits of the Inaja palm (Maximiliana regia), and the Jara palm (Leopoldinia major), and the Caruru, a species of Lacis (Wallace, p. 340). Cuaruru is given by Spruce as a native name for Pogostemon sp.; when this is burnt the ashes give salt (Spruce, ii. 520).

[190] Cf. Torres Straits, “The chief meal of the day is taken at night, soon after sundown; the remains are eaten in the morning,” iv. 131.

[191] This is probably the puruma (Puruma Cecropiaefolia Martius) mentioned by Bates (Bates, ii. 217).

[192] Yerba Luisa (Simson, p. 61).

[193] This may be Mimusops sp. (Sapotacae) or Callophora sp. (Aponcynaccae) (Spruce, i. 50, 224; ii. 520). Bates, i. 69; Spruce, i. 51; Orton, pp. 288, 500, 581.

[194] Caapi is known as aya-huasca, the drink of Huasca, the greatest king of the Inca, to the Zaparo and other tribes farther west (Spruce, ii. 424).

[195] Spruce, ii. 419-21.

[196] Banisteria Caapi (Spruce, ii. 414).

[197] Haemadictyon amazonicum (ibid. p. 415). This is only added by the Uaupes tribes.

[198] Both Manihot utilissima and Manihot Aypi (Spruce, ii. 414).

[199] Cf. Tylor, pp. 179-80.

[200] Paullinia cupana (Spruce, i. 180).

[201] Guarana, “pro panacea peregrinantum habetur” (von Martius), is made from the roasted seeds. It is “almost identical in its elements with theine and caffeine” (Spruce, i. 181). It is cultivated on the Negro as an article of trade. According to Bates it is made from the seeds of a climbing plant (Paullinia sorbilis) (Bates, ii. 134).

[202] Coca Erythroxylon.

[203] Spix and von Martius, p. 153.

[204] Joyce, p. 97.

[205] Markham, Peruvian Bark, p. 151.

[206] According to Bates the leaves of the candelabrum tree (Cecropia palmata) are used (Bates, ii. 211-12). Spruce has the imbauba or drum tree (Cecropia peltata) (Spruce, ii. 447). Markham gives the quinoa plant (Markham, op. cit. p. 151).

[207] Re effects. Spruce notes that it had little effect on him (Spruce, ii. 448). One of my companions though “at first affected … with slight nausea … soon became accustomed to it, and found it very useful on many occasions” (Hardenburg, p. 137-8). This is interesting in relation to my own continued intolerance. “In Peru its excessive use is said to seriously injure the coats of the stomach” (Spruce, ii. 448). At Ega it was regarded as a vice only to be indulged in secretly (Bates, ii. 211). Markham, on the other hand, considers it “the least injurious, and the most soothing and invigorating” narcotic (Markham, op. cit. p. 152). He even recommends it as a preventative of loss of breath to Alpine climbers (ibid. p. 153). With this I cannot concur.

[208] See Appendix for this and other notes.

[209] Spruce relates that a Guahibo told him, “With a chew of caapi and a pinch of niopo … one feels so good! No hunger—no thirst—no tired!” (Spruce, ii. 428).

[210] Mimosa acaciodes (Bentham). “A species of Inga” (Bates, i. 331). The seeds of Acacia Niopo (Humbolt). Piptadenia peregrina (L.) (Bentham and Spruce, ii. 427).

[211] The Guahibo use no quicklime (Spruce, ii. 426).

[212] This is curious, but I can advance no reason.

[213] Or “a bit of the leg-bone of the jaguar, closed at one end with pitch” (Spruce, ii. 427).

[214] And by the natives on the upper Orinoco (Spruce, ii. 423).

[215] “Two feet long and as thick as the wrist” (Spruce, ii. 420). It “is smoked in the ordinary way”. A long cigar is also smoked on the Equatorial Pacific coast, but “held in the mouth at the lighted end” (ibid. p. 436). This is common amongst negroes.

[216] Like the eyes of a cocoanut—to allow passage to the budding rootlets.

[217] Spruce, ii. 413-55.

[218] Bates, ii. 288.

[219] Also called curari, ourali, worara, woorari, urari, ervadura. “A powerful South American arrow-poison occurring in commerce as a blackish extract, somewhat resinoid in appearance,” used for tetanus, hydrophobia, epilepsy (Dict. Mat. Med.).

[220] Strychnos castelmoeana and Cocculus toxicoferus (Hardenburg, p. 136).

[221] “Many ingredients are used, such as several kinds of barks, roots, peppers (Capsicum), ants, and the poison-fangs of snakes” (im Thurn, p. 311).

[222] Crevaux gives a long description of the preparation of this poison (Crevaux, pp. 268-337).

[223] According to Bates, salt is considered to be an antidote for this poison (Bates, i. 247).

[224] Bates, ii. 200. This agrees with Darwin, Descent of Man, i. 128.

[225] Dr. Galt considered “that there is no more fertile race than the pure-blooded Indian of the MaraÑon” (Orton, p. 465).

[226] Menstruation has been known to commence in England at the age of eleven, generally in cases of well-nourished blondes, and in exceptional cases even earlier. It has been known to occur at nine years, but this was induced by a severe accident. This is unknown among the forest people. I made out the age of puberty to be not less than fifteen for girls, and eighteen for boys, among the tribes I was with.

[227] Cf. Thomson, The Fijians, pp. 179-80; Codrington, The Melanesians, p. 228, etc.

[228] Tapir flesh is undoubtedly rich, and over-indulgence would have evil effects upon any woman independent of other conditions, for equally it would upset a man.

[229] A tribe in British Guiana, the Macusi, carry this idea even further, and impose such restriction on a man before his actual marriage (im Thurn, p. 222). I have never met with this.

[230] Wallace in his account of the Uaupes Indians states that “the women are generally delivered in the house, and do no work for four or five days” (Wallace, p. 345). This does not tally with the customs among the Issa and Japura tribes, at least I never found it to be the case.

[231] These Indians adopt a sitting, i.e. continental (not English left lateral) position for parturition.

[232] For similar treatment elsewhere see Schomberg, Reisen in Britisch Guiana, ii. 66.

[233] Hardenburg, p. 135.

[234] I cannot help thinking that some infanticides may be due to the fear by the wife that the husband would refrain from the fulfilment of his debitum conjugale did he find that it resulted in his having to support an unduly increasing family.

[235] Infanticide is a subject open to unlimited misapprehension and misrepresentation. Compare with the above, for instance, the statements of a missionary among some of the Indian tribes farther south. Mr. Grubb speaks of “a shrill cry of pain when a child perhaps has been cruelly murdered” (An Unknown People in an Unknown Land, p. 17). A reviewer with much knowledge and experience of Paraguay, remarks, “I never remember hearing the women’s shrill cry of lamentation. The children are killed almost immediately after birth, as secretly as possible, and no one pays much attention to the fact” (Seymour H. C. Hawtrey, for R.A.I.). This is certainly the case with the Issa and Japura groups.

[236] Among the Ucayali deformed children are killed because they “belong to the devil” (Orton, p. 321).

[237] A similar practice is reported among the Kuni of British New Guinea (Williamson, The Mafulu, p. 178).

[238] Among Zaparo tribes also this is the case (Simson, pp. 175, 183).

[239] Early History of Mankind, p. 247.

[240] This is one of the many supposed indications of a possible Asiatic origin of these peoples, “remnants of a race driven into the mountains by the present dwellers in the plains,” as Tylor says of the Miau-tsze, who also practice the couvade (op. cit. p. 295). The practice is as widespread as the performance of the medicine-man or shaman, though not invariably an accompaniment of so-called shamanism or kindred performances: for example the Arunta have medicine-men but do not practise the couvade, the Basque people have couvade but no medicine-man.

[241] In support of this theory note that in Melanesia proper couvade has only been observed “where the child follows the father’s kindred” (Codrington, p. 228).

[242] According to one writer some Indians go so far as to remove all weapons and furniture from the house (Clough, p. 104).

[243] With the Issa-Japura tribes the father is subjected to no such torturing processes at the hands of his friends as are recorded of other tribes and peoples, “in such sort that from being sick by pure imagination they often make a real patient of him” (Tylor, loc. cit. p. 288 et seq.; J.A.I. xviii. 248; cf. also Crevaux, Spix, and Martius, p. 381; Schomburg, Reisen in Britisch Guiana, ii.).

[244] Bird names, as is commonly the case in South America, are attempts to repeat the cry of the birds themselves. Kweko, for instance, is a most suggestive name for a parrot. Birds, it may here be noted, very seldom sing in Amazonia.

[245] See Brinton on this subject, Religions of Primitive Peoples, p. 196. Cf. Howitt, p. 739.

[246] Witoto.

[247] Boro.

[248] Cf. Tylor, Early History of Mankind; im Thurn, p. 220; Hodson, Naga Tribes, p. 176; Spencer and Gillen, op. cit. p. 139; Brinton, p. 195, etc.; Seligmann, p. 140; AndrÉ, p. 16; Lang, Origin of Religion, etc.

[249] See Folklore Journal; Mitchell, Past in the Present.

[250] Every Indian man has two names, his own name and his secret name (name of genitalia). The latter is generally a significant name, and is used in ribald jesting round the fire, e.g. “the Okaina (a rodent) went to the stream to bathe,” etc. etc., ad nauseam.

[251] The converse of this holds good elsewhere, for the names of the dead are often tabu. See Rivers, Todas, pp. 625-6; Tylor, p. 142; Brinton, pp. 94-5.

[252] Brinton, p. 197.

[253] Pace Ratzel, ii. 128.

[254] Simson, p. 92; Ratzel, ii. 128.

[255] Markham, Clough, p. 104.

[256] Wallace, p. 360.

[257] According to Waitz the Carib medicine-man was accorded the jus primae noctis (Anthropologie der NaturvÖlker, iii. 382); Westermarck, p. 76. Von Martius also attributes this custom to certain Brazilian tribes, the chief, not the medicine-man, claiming the right (i. 113, 428, 485).

[258] Letourneau, The Evolution of Marriage, p. 52.

[259] Wallace, p. 355.

[260] This is quite usual of course. See Westermarck, pp. 445-7.

[261] Cf. custom among the Muskoks (Ratzel, ii. 125. See also im Thurn, p. 221; Westermarck, p. 18).

[262] Wallace, p. 346.

[263] Westermarck puts the disparity of years at from five to six among natives of Brazil (op. cit. p. 137; Spix and Martius, ii. 248).

[264] This invariably takes place in the forest, for no intimacy, even between husband and wife, is ever permitted in the publicity of the house. According to Westermarck a similar custom prevailed in Fiji (op. cit. pp. 151-2), but this is denied by Thomson, The Fijians, p. 202.

[265] im Thurn, pp. 186, 221.

[266] As De Morgan remarked of a somewhat similar practice among the Sakai of Perak, this is a form of marriage by purchase “modified by the smallness of the price paid … a purely formal substitute” (Bulletin de la SociÉtÉ Normande de GÉographie, vii. 422; Skeat and Blagden, ii. 60-61).

[267] Or potacea, a nut of bitter taste the size of an acorn.

[268] See von Martius, i. 113. For similar instances cf. Westermarck, p. 151.

[269] This confirms the account given by Wallace, p. 346; von Martius, i. 600.

[270] See for similar etiquette, Alcedo-Thompson, Dictionary of America and the West Indies, i. 416; E.R. Smith, The Aurocanians, p. 215; Westermarck, pp. 383-4.

[271] This seems to be the same as the Hottentot custom (Kolben, Present State of the Cape of Good Hope, i. 157).

[272] These are, I believe, the same ants that are used in the manufacture of the curare poison. They are fairly common. In lingoa-geral they are called tucaudera.

[273] “The Carayas maintain quasi-husbands for widows at the public cost, lest they should be a source of disturbance to the general peace” (Ratzel, ii. 126). Widows are repi, prostitutes among some Melanesians (Codrington, p. 235).

[274] See, for similar belief among the Zaparo, Simson, p. 174.

[275] For example, among the Bororo when the medicine-man has announced that the patient will die in a given time, “if at the end of this time he still lives, the executioner, sent of course by the priest, will suddenly appear in the hut, sit astride his stomach, and strangle him to death” (Cook, p. 55).

[276] See Joyce, p. 249.

[277] See supra, p. 151.

[278] The idea of blood crying for vengeance is familiar enough, and the most universally-known example is that of the fratricide Cain informed that his brother’s blood cried for vengeance from the ground (Gen. iv. 10).

[279] See supra, p. 31.

[280] “A microscopic scarlet Acarus” (Orton, p. 485).

[281] “To an Indian smallpox is certain death—the most dreaded enemy, who has over and over again swept off entire tribes, and the name or passing suspicion of which from youth up has always been trembled at and fled from as from death itself” (Simson, p. 142).

[282] There are many varieties of this complaint. In one kind the patient wastes away. With another it assumes the characteristics of elephantiasis, the legs swell, the flesh becomes soft and podgy, the skin unhealthy and white. It is said by the rubber-gatherers that a cure can only be effected when the patient sees the sea, in other words through complete change of air.

[283] Simson speaks of a “skin-disease common amongst all Indians of the higher MaraÑon, called ‘carata.’ The skin is ‘scaly and blotched all over with black’” (Simson, p. 178). This seems to be similar to the “cutaneous disease” mentioned by Bates, except that he explicitly mentions “the black spots were hard and rough but not scaly” (Bates, ii. 382). The Purupura Indians have also a skin complaint that causes them to be “spotted and blotched with white, brown, or nearly black patches” (Wallace, p. 357).

[284] I did myself, and so did my boy Brown and others of the party.

[285] AndrÉ, pp. 16-110.

[286] Spix and Martius, p. 31.

[287] Simson, pp. 148, 194. A very common practice among Indians.

[288] Koch-GrÜnberg, pp. 134, 165.

[289] I do not mean the body of an infant killed at birth, which, as I have said, is done as quietly and secretly as possible.

[290] “Primary urn-burial is characteristic in the main of the Tupi-Guarani family” (Joyce, p. 270).

[291] For the same reason that prompted similar proceeding among the Norsemen, an influence still alive in many parts of our own country. Cf. Mitchell, Past in the Present. An instance is reported from Hampshire within the last few years of a child’s toys being broken on its grave. (Read, Folklore Journal, vol. xxii. p. 322.)

[292] Ratzel, ii. 155.

[293] Shaman is in more general use among Americans. It should be remembered that the Zaparo, with whom Simson mentions the shimano (Simson, pp. 174-5, 177), have had considerably more intercourse with western civilisation than the tribes away from the Napo line of communication.

[294] Vol. xxiv.

[295] “The chief ‘medicine’ of the Payes on the affluents of the Amazon, both northern and southern, and on the Orinoco” (Spruce, ii. 436).

[296] Crevaux, p. 300.

[297] im Thurn, p. 312; Wallace, p. 347; Crevaux, p. 299.

[298] im Thurn, p. 368.

[299] Spruce mentions BarrÉ Indians “sucking out the rheumatism” from each other’s shoulders (Spruce, ii. 435).

[300] I am unable to say whether the medicine-man believes that an actual stick has been literally in the patient’s flesh, or whether he believes that the stick concealed in his mouth becomes a habitation for the supernatural power causing the sickness, or if he merely does the whole thing to impress his audience, and confirm their belief in his magical powers. Quite possibly all these reasons combined in varying degrees are present in any case. See Marett, Anthropology, p. 247.

[301] A boy “with epileptic tendency being preferred,” as im Thurn noted was the case in British Guiana (im Thurn, p. 334).

[302] Waterton, p. 449.

[303] Cf. im Thurn, p. 349.

[304] Cf. Westermarck, p. 152.

[305] Spruce, ii. 430-31.

[306] I have never seen the medicine-man’s palm-leaf boxes mentioned by Spruce, ii. 431.

[307] Among the Mungaberra the medicine-men “can and often do assume the form of eagle-hawks,” and thus attack other tribes (Spencer and Gillen, p. 533). It may be that the medicine-men of Indian tribes nearer the mountains, where these birds have their habitat, assume the form of a condor, as the medicine-man of the forest districts does that of the jaguar, for the condor is “sacred throughout practically the whole of the Andean region.” See Joyce, p. 175.

[308] The jaguar and the anaconda are both magical beasts. See Chap. XIX.

[309] Note: Among the Arunta the medicine-man has “a particular kind of lizard distributed through his body, which endows him with great suctional powers” (Spencer and Gillen, p. 531).

[310] See im Thurn, pp. 329-31.

[311] Spruce, ii. 432. Cf. Rochfort, Histoire naturelle et morale des Isles Antilles, p. 472.

[312] Spruce, ii 431.

[313] That the words are now incomprehensible may have arisen from the fact that the songs were originally intended only to recall things to those already instructed, in the same way that Mexican picture records “do not tell their stories in full, but only recall them to the minds of those who are already acquainted with them” (E. B. Tylor, p. 96). As instruction and memory lapsed the words would become mere gibberish. Certainly all these tribes appear to have songs they can no longer interpret. La danse est accompagnÉe des chantes; je regrette de n’avoir pu saisir le sens de leurs paroles (Crevaux, p. 104). There are old dances with words no longer understood among the Tukano (Koch-GrÜnberg, p. 254). This is, of course, by no means peculiar to the Amazonian Indians. Some of the singing games played by children in British New Guinea have words whose meanings are either obscure or lost (Barton, J.R.A.I., p. 269). Among the Naga tribes the language of the songs “is known in many cases to be now unintelligible to those who sing them” (Hodson, Naga Tribes, p. 68). Corrobborees are passed from one tribe to the other among the Australian natives, “the result is that the words are, as a general rule, quite unintelligible to the performers” (Spencer and Gillen, Central Australia, p. 281). Zulu charm songs are said to be incomprehensible to the singers (Callaway, Religious System of the Amazulu, p. 413). These instances might be multiplied, but they suffice to show that this survival of words with lost meanings is world-wide.

As a curious contrast to this we find that the Spanish missionaries in South America complained that they had great difficulty in getting their converts to remember the Ave Maria and the Paternoster “seeing that the words were mere nonsense to them” (Tylor, p. 96). It should not be forgotten though, in this connection, that the potency of a word is in inverse ratio to its incomprehensibility. Cf. Brinton, Religions of Primitive Peoples, p. 92.

[314] Possibly there may be a second pine harvest and dance, but the great feast takes place in October.

[315] Koch-GrÜnberg mentions the same among the Opaina.

[316] Koch-GrÜnberg.

[317] Maw describes quite a different arrangement in a dance at Tabitinga. “The dancers were usually linked three together, one principal character supported by two others, one on each side; and there were generally two sets dancing at the same time, each set being followed by women and children dancing or jumping in the similar manner” (Maw, p. 220).

[318] Koch-GrÜnberg mentions a dance among tribes north of the Japura where the men and women dance together in pairs. The women do not wear aprons, and at the end of the figure they disappear.

[319] Spruce, i. 313.

[320] One is irresistibly reminded of the clown, especially of the comic man who usually puts in an appearance at military sports. It is possible that this custom of dressing-up to secure attention when airing a grievance is what has been mistaken by some writers for a part of the dance. Sir Roger Casement, quoting Maw in the Contemporary Review, September 1912, talks of “the masked men” as “a necessary part of each performance.” It is certainly quite unknown to me, for I never saw or heard of anything of the kind, though in the first edition of Bates’s Naturalist on the River Amazon the frontispiece of the second volume gives a masked dance of the Tukuna, so I do not suggest that masked dancers do not exist, only that they are not known among the tribes of the Issa-Japura valleys.

[321] It must be remembered that Indians are extraordinarily generous, or improvident, in the matter of food. I should never hesitate to join a family party when feeding, without waiting for an invitation. The complaint in question probably refers to a whole basket of manioc bartered in the plantation, which transaction would belong to quite another category.

[322] Crevaux gives an account of an initiation dance where the torture applied is by means of the application of stinging ants to the naked bodies of the neophytes (Crevaux, pp. 245-50).

[323] Koch-GrÜnberg, p. 188. The German doctor also gives an account of a dance where boys and girls perform in couples. When the figures are ended the couples withdraw into the forest, and night covers subsequent proceedings. This takes place among the Yahuna of the Kuretu group. The men of these tribes when summoned by drum to a dance leave their women behind them.

[324] Bates, ii. 207.

[325] Manioc.

[326] Plantation.

[327] Manioc root.

[328] Cassava.

[329] What is it? what is it?

[330] It is good.

[331] As proof that this dance is borrowed, and not common to all the tribes that dance it, is the fact that all tribes, whatever their language-group, use the Muenane words for the answer.

[332] See Appendix.

[333] The individual in question was labouring under the most extraordinary sexual excitement. This may have been due to coca influence, to the lubricity of the song words, or to the intoxication due to rhythmic movement. The first two possible causes are eliminated by the fact that Indians are almost continually under the influence of the drug, and that no song could be more lewd than the ordinary conversation of these people.

[334] These Muenane riddle dances somewhat resemble the Pirapurasseya, or fish dance, seen by Bates at Ega. The performers joined hands in a ring and questioned the leader in the centre, who finally might try to rush the ring, and when successful was succeeded by whoever might be responsible for his escape (Bates, ii. 276). im Thurn’s description of a Guiana animal dance also tallies more or less with these dances. See im Thurn, p. 324.

[335] R. L. Stevenson, In the South Seas (Pocket Edition, 1908), p. 100.

[336] “Dancing to the accompaniment of the human voice only. The word ballad is derived from this.” Ital. ballare = to dance. See Games, Sports, and Pastimes, by D. H. Moutray Read, in the new Folklore Handbook.

[337] North of the Japura the tribes use what are known as Yapurutu pan-pipes, which are usually played in pairs. The Tukana call them bupupo or yapurato (Koch-GrÜnberg, p. 300).

[338] Cf. Howitt, Native Tribes of South-East Australia, p. 345, chap. xi., etc. Bull-roarer too sacred for women to see in Muralug Island, Torres Straits (Expedition Torres Straits, iv. 276; v. 217).

[339] Cf. Spencer and Gillen, Native Tribes of Central Australia. Sound supposed by women and children to be the voice of the great spirit assisting at the boy’s initiation.

Also Howitt, pp. 594-5; Andrew Lang on “the Bull-roarer” in Custom and Myth; Haddon, Study of Man, p. 309.

[340] See Koch-GrÜnberg; Humbolt, ii. 363; Nery, p. 261; Spruce, ii. 416; Wallace, pp. 348-9.

[341] There are two in the British Museum on the top shelf in the South American room.

[342] Mauritia flexuosa.

[343] Cf. Spencer and Gillen, op. cit. p. 517.

[344] The one exception being where parturition is imminent, and no helpmate is available.

[345] See Appendix.

[346] Compare with identity of the white culture-hero of the higher South American cultures, Quetzalcoatl of the Nahua, Uiracocha of Peru, Tsuma of Venezuela. Note this being came from the East. See Joyce, p. 12. He is in fact the Atahocan of the Algonquin “remote from the world, to whom no worship was paid”(Ratzel, ii. 144).

[347] According to the Malays’ anthropomorphic ideas concerning the tiger, “the tiger-folk … have a town of their own, where they live in houses, and act in every respect like human beings” (Skeat, Malay Magic, p. 157). In Perak tigers with human souls live in similar villages (Sir W. E. Maxwell, J.R.A.S., No. vii. p. 22). The natives of Korinchi in Sumatra are credited with the power to assume tiger form at will (Sir H. Clifford, In Court of Kampong, pp. 65-6).

[348] When Markham says of the Ticuna that “they fear the evil spirit, and believe of the good one that, after death, he appears to eat fruit with the departed and takes them to his home, this would seem to be a distinct survival of missionary teaching, for these Indians were preached to between 1683 and 1728.” Christian influence is also shown in their naming ceremonies (Markham, p. 200).

[349] These holes in the heavy mould of the forest are caused by subsidences. The Indians do not understand how they came to be, and explain the fact by asserting they are the work of devils.

[350] Among the Kuretu the soul is believed to hover near the body for one day after death, and then to flit away, and finally to retire to a beautiful house at the source of a mysterious river.

[351] Skeat, Malay Magic, p. 52.

[352] im Thurn, p. 343. Cf. also Skeat, Pagan Malay, p. 47.

[353] See Simson, p. 175; Orton, p. 170.

[354] Cf. Spencer and Gillen, p. 498.

[355] This is so frequently the case among primitive peoples as hardly to need amplifying. It is very general among the Indian races. See AndrÉ, p. 16; im Thurn, pp. 158, 220.

The Algonquin hold that the mention of a man’s name offends his personal deity (H. R. Schoolcraft, Oneota, pp. 331, 456; Indian Tribes of the U.S. ii. 65). Australian natives only mention secret names in a whisper (Spencer and Gillen, p. 139). See also note on names in Chap. XI.

[356] This belief is also held by the Dyaks. “Their theory is that during sleep the soul can hear, see, and understand, so what is dreamt is really what the soul sees. When any one dreams of a distant land, they believe that his soul has paid a flying visit to that land” (E. H. Gomes, Seventeen Years among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo, p. 161). Howitt writes of the South Australian native: “While his body lies motionless, his spirit goes out of him on its wanderings” (Howitt, pp. 410-11). See also Seligmann, p. 191.

[357] im Thurn, pp. 329, 343.

[358] See im Thurn, p. 349. In Australia “one black fellow will often tell you that he can and does do something magical, whilst all the time he is perfectly well aware that he cannot, and yet firmly believes that some other man can really do it” (Spencer and Gillen, p. 130).

[359] Spruce relates a custom unknown to me practised by some tribes when astray in the bush. The Indian when lost “names the Curupira, and … twists a liana into a ring … throws it behind him … follows the direction in which it has fallen” (Spruce, ii. 437-8). The Bororo use a bull-roarer to drive the bad spirits off (W. A. Cook, The Bororo Indians of Matto Grosso, p. 55).

[360] The Caribs of the Pomeroon river actually attempt to counter the attack of epidemic sickness by blocking the forest tracks “to stop the passage of the spirits” (im Thurn, p. 356). In Guiana disease is regarded as an evil spirit that prowls around (Brett, Indian Tribes of Guiana, p. 225).

[361] Bates, ii. 115.

[362] Jurupari is unknown south of the Japura. I can therefore give no particulars or description from personal investigation and knowledge of aught concerning this all powerful demoniac deity of the northern tribes.

[363] J. D. Pfleiderer, Die Genesis des Mythus der indogermanischen VÖlker, p. 48.

[364] Elsewhere this appears not to be the case. See Bates, ii. 114.

[365] Yacu = water, mama = mother, Mai d’agoa (Tupi). Pachamama, the earth, was worshipped in Peru, and the Inca also reverenced Mamaccocha, the sea mother (Joyce, pp. 154, 225).

[366] Bates mentions a boy at Ega being devoured by one of these huge creatures (Bates, ii. 113-15).

[367] Clough, p. 60.

[368] For description see Wallace, pp. 127-8.

[369] Bates, ii. 264.

[370] For dance at tiger’s “wake” see Skeat, Malay Magic, p. 169.

[371] Cf. Darwin, p. 64.

[372] “They consider the sun as the fountain-head of majesty and power and even of beneficence, and as the abode of the Great Priests who have passed to the spirit world and fear him” (W. A. Cook, op. cit. p. 55).

[373] Occidente is on the left bank of the Igara Parana, a tributary of the Issa.

[374] Folklore Journal, 1912, p. 314.

[375] Casement, Contemporary Review, September 1912, p. 325.

[376] Indians on the main river, however, according to Dr. Silva Coutinho, “not only give names to a great number of celestial bodies [stars], but they have legends about them” (Nery, p. 252).

[377] Markham, pp. 93-4.

[378] Poison.

[379] Narcotic.

[380] Spruce, i. 314. In South America manihot is propagated by means of slips or cuttings; but in the Torres Straits the manihot sp. introduced by the white man is grown from pieces of the old roots (Exped. Torres Straits, iv. 149).

[381] Clough, p. 212; Humboldt, ii. 182; Oakenfull, pp. 34-5; im Thurn, p. 375; Joyce, p. 167.

[382] im Thurn, p. 375.

[383] Humboldt, ii. 400-1; Chanoine Bernadino de Souza, Para e Amazon; see Nery, pp. 8-9.

[384] Humboldt, pp. 88, 400.

[385] Spruce, ii. 561.

[386] Spruce wisely remarks on this point, “that the Spaniards had been for two whole years among Indians who wore their hair long,” and therefore were not likely to mistake men for women (Spruce, ii. 459).

[387] Nery, p. 6.

[388] The French traveller rejects the ?-, a??? theory in favour of the ?a ????—bound with a belt (Nery, p. 2).

[389] Wallace, p. 343.

[390] “I have myself seen that Indian women can fight.… The women pile up heaps of stones, to serve as missiles for the men” (Spruce, ii. 457-8). This, vide “stones,” is not possible in the Issa-Japura district.

[391] Where tribal differentiation of colour is so marked as among these people it is only natural that tales should be told of some mythical “white” folk.

[392] Crevaux, Voyages dans l’AmÉrique du Sud, p. 284.

[393] Komuine = monkey (Boro).

[394] “So high”—demonstrated with the hand.

[395] These would be her natural protectors.

[396] Rubber latex. See Depilation.

[397] To hide the unsightliness.

[398] Of the chief’s daughter.

[399] This may be a folk-tale of the monkey-people stealing Indian women for their mates. Cf. Skeat, Malay Magic, p. 185; Clifford, Studies in Brown Humanity, p. 243.

But it should not be overlooked that the Boro depile most carefully, while the Andoke medicine-man does not depile at all, and the Andoke are mortal foes of the Boro. The Karahone also are said not to depile, and on this score would be regarded by the Boro as no better than brute beasts. So this story may be a traditional account of the actual rape of a chief’s daughter by a hostile tribe, the Amazonian version of Helen and Troy.

[400] Simson, p. 168.

[401] Spruce, i. 332. im Thurn relates of the Arawak Indians that “each family is descended—their fathers knew how, but they themselves have forgotten—from its eponymous animal, bird, or plant” (im Thurn, pp. 184, 376).

[402] The general principle is well known, and is now used both by the authorities of the United States and of Great Britain. It consists in giving to the vowels in native words their Italian significance, and to the consonants that which they have in the English language.

[403] Notes and Queries on Anthropology (1912), pp. 187-96.

[404] Simson, p. 94.

[405] Tylor, p. 25.

[406] Koch-GrÜnberg transliterates it as ingeta, or ingÉta; and gives mara for good, maringeta, marinyeta, bad; farÉti, fat; farÉ ingeta, thin (Die UitÓto Indianer, pp. 10-11).

[407] Orton stated that the Zaparo “have no words for numbers above three, but show their fingers” (Orton, p. 170). Simson gives words for four and five as in use among those tribes, and after that manunu, meaning “many-many” (Simson, p. 179).

[408] The reference to monkey or beast is due to the fact that the Karahone do not depilate all body and face hair.

[409] Spencer and Gillen, Across Australia, ii.

[410] Cf. Ratzel, ii. 125.

[411] For example the Maca, the Guaharibo, and the Guahibo (Spruce, i. 477).

[412] Vide Chap. VI. p. 101, where it is stated that the dug-out is not the autochthonic boat of this country.

[413] These canoes, it must be remembered, are not affairs of everyday manufacture. They are tribal possessions, not many in number, and needing time, skill, and, above all, experience, to make successfully.

[414] For instance the wrong wood might have been chosen; some trees will not open when heated (cf. AndrÉ, pp. 241-2).

[415] The Decadence of Useful Arts.

[416] There are no stones in this region it should be remembered.

[417] Wallace gives 5 feet 9 inches or 5 feet 10 inches as not uncommon for the height of a Uaupes man (Wallace, pp. 335, 353), and the Isanna as very similar. The Bugre are shorter, 5 feet 4 inches, and misshapen in the leg (Oakenfull, p. 33). The Tukana, 160 to 170 centimetres (Koch-GrÜnberg).

[418] I had no calipers, and the breadth in all cases is approximate only, taken from point to point where it was individually greatest, not where, as I subsequently discovered, scientific measurement decrees.

[419] Tukuya, two types dolichocephalic. Koch-GrÜnberg. Napo, brachycephalic (Orton, p. 166). According to Orton the “long-headed hordes” came from the south (Orton, p. 316).

[420] Bates noted that the Tapuyo have “small hands and feet” (i. 78), and Orton mentions it as a characteristic of races of Tupi origin (Orton, p. 316).

[421] The women are muscular in the neck, and will carry considerable weights in baskets slung on a band passed round the forehead. They will carry through the thickest bush as much as sixty pounds and more in the same manner, their strength in lilting and carrying weights being confined to the neck.

[422] Robuchon states that the women’s mammae are pyriform, and the photographs show distinctly pyriform breasts with digitiform nipples. I found them resembling rather the segment of a sphere, the areola not prominent, and the nipples hemispherical.

[423] Orton and Galt, however, note that “one will sometimes find the skin of the Indian rough, hard, and insensible, like the skin of the larger lower animals” (Orton, p. 591). Skin—Colour and Texture.—“Je remarque que ces Indiens, comme les Roucouyennes et les Oyampis, out les plis de la peau beaucoup plus saillants que chez les races blanches et noires. Les plis du genou resemblent À une peau d’orange. Je voudrais reprÉsenter exactement ces dÉtails, qui m’intÉressent au point de vue anthropologique, mais je trouve la difficultÉ insurmontable. Il me vient toutefois une idÉe; je fais barbouiller un Indien avec du roucou des pieds À la tÊte, et, À moyen d’un papier mince que j’applique avec la main, j’obtiens tous les dÉtails de structure. Le roucou agit comme de l’encre d’imprimerie. Avec un pen d’exercice je recueille les dÉtails anatomiques de toutes les parties du corps, et particuliÈrement des pieds, des mains, du genou et des coudes. Il est À noter que la peau d’enfant À la mamelle prÉsente des plis aussi accentuÉs que ceux d’un blanc À l’Âge adulte. La peau d’un jeune homme vue À l’oeil me semble grossie trois fois À la loupe” (Crevaux, p. 303). We have already noted that there Issa-Japura tribes are free from the skin diseases that Napo and other Indians frequently develop. This probably accounts for the contradiction of my observances with the notes of other writers.

[424] See note on Depilation, p. 282.

[425] According to Wallace, though the Uaupes Indians remove facial or body hair the Isanna tribes do not (Wallace, pp. 353, 356).

[426] Wallace, p. 354.

[427] I have found this amongst all people who sleep on the ground, I take it, for obvious buffer reasons.

[428] Simson, p. 93.

[429] During menstruation women wash more frequently, with intent to arrest as well as to hide their condition. A girl at such times will bathe as often as twenty times in a day. The cold water acts as a styptic.

[430] Bates, i. 200.

[431] Simson, p. 234.

[432] Simson, p. 235.

[433] Four inches to fourteen inches in length (Keane, p. 551).

[434] Orton, pp. 482-3.

[435] Ratzel, ii 170.

[436] Oakenfall, p. 26.

[437] The only yellow free colour.

[438] Approximate measurements.

[439] Outer measurements not, as they should have been, from head of fibula to top of great trochanter.

[440] N.B.—As Case 2 was growing, further measurements will be useless if not misleading. These were taken with the help of a medical man and are therefore more correct than other measurements.

[441] Neva = also sun, morning.

[442] Navena = ghost, devil.

[443] Bope = also disembodied soul.

[444] Yaya = father.

[445] Yaperikuli = heroes.

[446] Originally father or creator, not Great Spirit.

[447] Soul of father or parents.

[448] Soul of Evil.

[449] Heroes of the tribe.

[450] Also great-great-grandfather.

[451] House.

[452] Ri-e-i, white man.

[453] Itoma, sun.

[454] Ei-fo-ke, Turkey-buzzard.

[455] Privy name. Reference to the fact that all Indians have two names. See p. 154 for note on nomen penis sui.

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