These women have a variety of ornaments, but little clothes. Necklaces of various kinds are highly esteemed among them, especially when they are made of the teeth of the jaguar and alligator, inasmuch as such ornaments indicate the prowess of their admirers. The appearance of a Carib woman in full dress is not very attractive. These people are short, thick necked, and awkward looking, and in those respects the women are much worse than the men. Of the ten portraits there is not one that can bear comparison with the female inhabitants of Southern Africa, such as have been figured in the first part of this work. Their short necks are cumbered with row upon row of necklaces, their only dress is a narrow strip of blue cloth, and they have done their best to make themselves entirely hideous by the abominable sapuru.
Then, by way of adding to their attractions, they perforate the under lip, and wear in it one or several pins, the heads being within the mouth and the points projecting outward. Some of the women smear their whole bodies and limbs with the annatto dye, which gives them the appearance as if blood were exuding from every pore; and the reader may well imagine the appearance of such women, with pins sticking through their lips, their bosoms covered with row upon row of necklaces, their reddened limbs variegated with blue spots, and their legs swollen and distorted by the effects of the sapuru.
The Carib men wear an article of dress which is almost exactly like that which is worn by the inhabitants of the Nicobar Islands. It is a narrow but very long scarf, woven from cotton fibre. After passing round the waist and between the legs, it is tucked into the girdle, and then is so long that it can be hung over the shoulder like a Highlander’s plaid. The men are very proud of a good girdle, and adorn it plentifully with cotton tassels, beetles’ wings, and similar ornaments.
Of all the Guianan tribes, the Waraus are least careful respecting dress. Even the women wear nothing but a triangular piece of bark, or a similarly shaped article of apparel formed from the spathe of the young palm leaf. This spathe is also used for a head dress by several tribes. In order to understand the structure of this article the reader must remember that the palm tree is an endogenous plant, and that all the leaves spring from a central shoot. From this same spot there also starts a conical shoot, which contains the flowers. In its earlier stages of development this shoot is covered with a membranous envelope, called a spathe, which bursts in order to allow the enclosed flower-stalk to develop itself. Before it has attained its full development, the spathe is drawn off the flower-stalk and soaked in water for a time, until all the green substance becomes decomposed, and can be washed away from the fibrous framework. The well-known skeleton leaves are prepared in exactly the same manner.
When decomposition is complete, the spathe is carefully washed in running water, so that the whole of the green matter is removed and nothing is left but the tougher fibres. These are tangled together in a very remarkable manner, so as to be very elastic, and to allow the fabric to be stretched in different directions without causing any interstices to appear between them.
In this state the spathe is conical, of a yellow-brown color, and extraordinarily light. A specimen in my possession, though measuring twenty-seven inches in length, weighs barely half an ounce.
When the native wishes to convert the spathe into a cap, he doubles the open end twice, and then makes a deep fold within eight or nine inches of the tip, thus causing it to assume the shape which is seen in the [illustration] on page 1249. Slight as is the texture of this odd cap, it forms an excellent defence against the rays of the sun, which is the only object of the headdress in such a climate.
The reader will see that the shape, as well as the lightness of the spathe, conduces to its usefulness as an apron as well as a headdress. Such at all events is the only dress for which the Waraus care; and whether on account of the perpetual exposure of their skins, or whether from other causes, the short, stout, sturdy Waraus are much darker than the other tribes—so dark, indeed, that they have been said to approach the blackness of the negro. Mr. Brett thinks their want of cleanliness is one cause of this deeper hue. They are the best native laborers that can be found, and, when they can be induced to shake off their national apathy and fairly begin work, they will do more than any other tribe. Neither do they want so much wages as are required by the other natives, preferring liberal rations of rum to actual wages.
Living as do the Guianan natives in the forests, amid all the wealth of animal life which is found in them, and depending chiefly for their subsistence on their success in hunting, they attain an intimate knowledge of the habits of the various animals, and display considerable skill in taking them. They capture birds, monkeys, and other creatures, not for the sake of killing them, but of domesticating them as pets, and almost every hut has a parrot or two, a monkey, or some such pet attached to it.
The women are especially fond of the little monkeys, and generally carry them on their heads, so that at a little distance they look as if they were wearing a red or a black headdress, according to the species and color of the monkey. They carry their fondness for their animals to such an extent that they treat them in every respect as if they were their children, even allowing them to suck at their breasts in turn with their own offspring.