“Wait a bit, patron,” said he. “In ten minutes’ time you shall have what you want, a fire; in twenty, roast arara.”
“But how?” asked the patron. “We have no flint nor steel, any of us; and if we had, where find the tinder?”
“Yonder!” rejoined the Mundurucú. “You see yonder tree on the other side of the igarápe?”
“That standing out by itself, with smooth, shining bark, and hoary, handlike leaves? Yes, I see it. What of it?”
“It is the embaüba, patron; the tree that feeds the lazy sloth, the Aï.”
“O, then it is that known as the Cecropia peltata. True, its crown of peltate leaves declares the species. But we were talking of fire, Munday. Can you obtain it from the cecropia?”
“In ten minutes, patron, the Mundurucú will draw sparks from that tree, and make a fire too, if he can only obtain from it a dry branch, one without sap, decayed, dead. You shall see.”
So saying, he swam out towards the cecropia. On reaching this, he scaled it like a squirrel, and was soon among its silvery fronds, that spread palm-like over the water. Soon the snapping of a breaking branch was heard, and shortly after the Indian came gliding down the tree, and, holding the piece of cecropia above his head, swam with one hand towards the caoutchouc, which he once more ascended. On rejoining his companions, they saw that the stick he had secured was a bit of dry, dead wood, light, and of porous texture, just such as might be easily ignited. Not caring to make any secret of his design, he confirmed his companions in their conjecture by informing them that the embaüba was the wood always employed by his people, as well as the other tribes in Amazonia, when they wished to make a fire; and saying this, he proceeded without further delay to make them acquainted with the proper way. Strange to say, it proved to be the friction process, often described as practised in remote corners of the world, and by savage tribes who could never have held the slightest communication with one another. Who taught them this curious mode of creating fire? Who inducted the Indian of the Amazon, and the aboriginal of Borneo, into the identical ideas of the sumpitan and gradatána,—both blow-guns alike? Who first instructed mankind in the use of the bow? Was it instinct? Was it wisdom from on high?
While Trevannion was reflecting on this strange theme, the Mundurucú had shaped a long spindle from a slender branch which he had cut from some hard wood growing near; and, whirling it between the palms of his hands, in less than ten minutes, as he had promised, sparks appeared in the hollowed stick of the cecropia. Dry leaves, twigs, and bark had been already collected, and with these a flame was produced, ending in a fire, that soon burned brightly in one of the forks of the seringa. Over this the young macaws, supported on spits, were soon done brown; and a supper of roast arara, with parched sapucaya nuts, proved anything but a despicable meal to the party who partook of it.