The uncivilized races of men in all countries of the world; vol. 2 of 2 / Being a comprehensive account of their manners and customs, and of their physical, social, mental, moral and religious characteristics

by J. G. Wood

‘Pressitque jacentem

Dulcis et alta quies, placidæque simillima morti.’”

The reader will see that this account agrees exactly with my own experiment. In neither case was death instantaneous, but in both cases the power or wish to move seemed to be immediately taken from the animal, though wounded in a limb and not in a mortal spot.

Of course the quantity of poison must be proportioned to the size of the animal. The tales that are told of a mere scratch producing death are manifest exaggerations. It has been mentioned that in Guiana no very large animals are found, the tapir and the jaguar being the largest of the mammalia. For the purpose of killing these, or going to battle where man is to be destroyed, the natives employ a very different weapon, and use a bow and arrow of rather peculiar construction.

They are extremely long, some of them being six feet in total length. The shaft is made of a cylindrical, hollow, and very strong reed (Gynecium saccharinum) which runs to some length without a knot or joint. In one end is fixed a long spike of a very hard and heavy wood, called letter wood, because it is covered with red marks like rude attempts at writing, very much like the scribbled marks on a yellow-hammer’s egg. In order to guard it from splitting, the shaft of the arrow is bound for some inches with cotton thread. The commoner kinds of arrow are merely wrapped with this thread, but in the better sorts the thread is woven in patterns almost as neat as those employed by the Polynesian islanders. When the native wants to make a peculiarly beautiful arrow, he ornaments it in a most singular manner. Into the thread which wraps the shaft are inserted a quantity of brilliantly colored feathers, mostly those of the various parrots which are so plentiful in Southern America. Only the smallest and softest feathers are used, and they are worked into the wrapping in a manner which produces the most artistic combinations of color.

The natives have a marvellous eye for color, most likely from having continually before their eyes the gorgeous insects and birds of their luxuriant country, and it is wonderful to see the boldness with which they achieve harmony from a number of hues that scarcely any one would dare to place in opposition with each other. Scarlet, yellow, pink, blue, green, and snowy white are all used in these arrows, and are arranged in a way that would do honor to the best European artist.

Sometimes a cap is made for the arrows, and decorated with feathers in the same brilliant style. Such arrows as these require much care on the part of the owner, who is not content with an ordinary quiver, wherein they might be jolted about and their lovely feathers spoiled, but constructs a special and peculiar quiver for their reception. He takes a number of bamboos, about the thickness of a man’s finger, and cuts them into pieces some eighteen inches in length. These he lashes firmly together, and then ties over them a bark cover, neatly wrapped with cotton string.

Each of these tubes contains one arrow, which fits with moderate tightness, the downy feathers keeping it in its place. They are fixed so perfectly, that when the arrow is pushed into its tube the feathers are pressed tightly against the shaft, and when it is withdrawn, they spring out by their own elasticity, and form an elegant colored tuft. As the long arrow shafts are apt to vibrate by their own weight, and might damage the feather tufts in the tubes, a cap is usually slipped over them—in some cases plain, like the covering of the quiver, but in others gorgeously made of feathers. These arrows are tipped with the barbed tail-bone of the sting-ray or are pointed with iron, and not with bone. These arrows and one of the tubes are [illustrated] on p. 1214.

The heads of the arrows are made in various ways. Sometimes they are simply covered with a series of rather blunt barbs, but the generality of them are constructed after a very elaborate fashion.

The barb of one kind of arrow reminds the observer of the weapon of the Bosjesman, though the arrow is almost a spear in comparison with the tiny weapon of the African savage. The point is tipped with a piece of iron cut into a single barb, and projecting from it and pointing in the opposite direction a curved iron spike is slightly lashed to the shaft with cotton.