It is not every native who knows how to make this wonderful poison. The knowledge is restricted to the conjurers, who keep it in their families and hand it down from father to son. They are so careful to preserve their secret, that not only do they make the wourali at a distance from their houses, but when they have completed the manufacture they burn down the huts, so as to obliterate every trace of the means which have been employed.
They have a sort of superstitious reverence for the wourali. The ostensible reason which is given for burning down the hut is, that it is polluted by the fumes of the poison, and may never again be inhabited, so that it is better to burn it down at once. They allege that during its preparation the Yabahou, or evil spirit, is hovering over, ready to seize upon those who are uninitiated in the mysteries, and so by the aid of superstition effectually prevent their proceedings from being watched.
In order to carry out this fear of the wourali to its full extent, the professors of poison-manufacture will refuse to make it except when they please, alleging any excuse that may suggest itself. Mr. Waterton narrates an instance where a man who had promised to make some wourali poison declined to do so at the last moment, on the ground that he expected an increase to his family. The maker is always pleased to consider himself ill after he has completed his work, which, in spite of the repeated washing of his face and hands, renders him sufficiently liable to the attacks of the invisible Yabahou to cause indisposition. The manufacturer is not altogether an impostor in this case, but acts from a sort of belief in the mysterious gloom which always surrounds the wourali. Nothing, for example, would induce him to eat while the poison is being prepared, and, however hungry he may be, he will fast until the completed wourali has been poured into its receptacle.
Although the chief poison in Guiana, the wourali is not the only one, the natives having discovered a sort of wood which is sufficiently poisonous in itself to need no other appliance. The wood is that of some endogenous tree, of a pale yellow color. From this wood the natives cut long blade-shaped heads, much resembling those of the Kaffir assagais in form. The peculiar shape of the head may be seen in figures 4 and 5 of [illustration No. 4], on page 1231, which represents two views of the same arrow head. Sometimes the head is left quite plain, but in some specimens a pattern is rudely scribbled on the outer surface of the blade. Annatto is the coloring matter used, leaving a dusky red dye behind it. I possess specimens of these arrows, both plain and colored.
These flat heads are lashed to the hard-wood spike that terminates the arrow by a complicated arrangement of cotton threads, which, though they do not possess the artistic elegance of the Polynesian wrapping, yet are crossed and recrossed so as to produce a series of diamond shaped patterns. Mr. Waterton first called my attention to the venomous properties of this arrow head.
The young men practise diligently with these weapons. The largest, which are intended for the slaughter of tapirs, jaguars, and such like animals, are tested by being shot perpendicularly into the air, each archer trying to send his arrow above that of his competitor.
Mr. Brett, in his “Indian Tribes of Guiana,” gives an interesting account of the skill of the natives as marksmen, and relates one little episode of the shooting, which shows that the “inevitable dog” accompanies sports in Guiana, just as he does in England.
“After several rounds from each man and boy, the archery contest closed by a simultaneous discharge of arrows from every bow. More than two hundred shafts flying through the air together presented a novel spectacle, and in an instant demolished the target amid loud shouts from all. A dog which, unheeded, had wandered behind it, was surrounded by the crop of arrows which suddenly stuck in the sand, some even beneath him. He was a lucky dog, however, for with marvellous fortune he escaped unhurt, though bewildered by the adventure and the roar of applause which followed his somewhat hasty retirement, with deprecating look and drooping tail.”
Spears are also used by some of the tribes. The same writer describes the mode in which a Warau had practised with the spear. His weapon was made of the same material as the arrow, but of greater size, the shaft being of reed, and the head of hard wood. The young spearman had fixed a mark on the soft stem of a plantain tree. As the missile struck the mark, the hard-wood head remained sticking in the tree, while the elastic shaft bounded back toward the thrower.
The lad said that this javelin was used for killing sundry large fishes, which are induced to rise to the surface of the water by means of scattering seeds and other food of which they are fond, and are then killed by means of this weapon.