Page:A narrative of travels on the Amazon and Rio Negro.djvu/378

 338 ON THE ABORIGINES

mandiocca, and, by mixing this with the ordinary pulp, forming a very superior cake.

They use plantains extensively, eating them as a fruit, and making a mingau, or gruel, by boiling and beating them into a pulp, which is a very agreeable food. From the fruits of the Baccaba, Patawa, and Assai palms {(Enocarpus Baccaba, <E. Batazva, Euterpe oleracea and allied species), they produce wholesome and nourishing drinks.

Besides these they make much use of sweet potatoes, yams, roasted corn, and many forest fruits, from all of which, and from mandiocca cakes, they make fermented drinks, which go under the general name of " caxiri." That made from the mandiocca is the most agreeable, and much resembles good table-beer. At their feasts and dances they consume immense quantities of it, and it does not seem to produce any bad effects. They also use, on these occasions, an intensely exciting pre- paration of the root of a climber, — it is called capi, and the manner of using it I have described in my Narrative (page 205).

The weapons of these Indians are bows and arrows, gravatanas, lances, clubs, and also small hand-nets, and rods and lines, for catching fish.

Their bows are of different kinds of hard elastic wood, well made, and from five to six feet long. The string is either of the " tucum " leaf fibre {Astrocaryum vidgare), or of the inner bark of trees called " tururi." The arrows are of various kinds, from five to seven feet long. The shaft is made of the flower- stalk of the arrow-grass {Gynerium saccharinum). In the war- arrows, or " curubis," the head is made of hard wood, carefully pointed, and by some tribes armed with the serrated spine of the ray-fish : it is thickly anointed with poison, and notched in two or three places so as to break off in the wound. Arrows for shooting fish are now almost always made with iron heads, sold by the traders, but many still use heads made of monkeys' bones, with a barb, to retain a hold of the fish : the iron heads are bent at an angle, so that the lower part projects and forms a barb, and are securely fastened on with twine and pitch. Lighter arrows are made for shooting birds and other small game, and these alone are feathered at the base. The feathers generally used are from the wings of the macaw, and, in putting them on, the Indian shows his knowledge of the principle