The arrows are made from the same palm midribs, split as fine as an eighth of an inch in thickness. While at work mining I hired an Indian boy to make a collection of bird skins for me. These boys can skin a bird perfectly and prepare the skin so that it will be like soft, thin kid, without misplacing a feather. I watched this boy make blowpipes and arrows. He dried the palm midribs in the sun a few days and they split readily into as fine arrows as he needed.
Just how he made the deadly poison with which he tipped them I was not certain. I will admit that we kept clear of that poison just as you would keep clear of dynamite. I know that it was made from crushed leaves and roots and put in a gourd. This poison is called “waurali.” As soon as the poison is dried on, in the sun, a string is woven in and out around each end of each arrow until there is a long row of them, and this is rolled around a stick so that there is a solid roll of these arrows, which may be pulled out one by one.
The quiver is made of woven grass, the bottom made of some wax that hardens from trees. This roll of arrows is placed, poison tips up, in the quiver and a skin top put over them to keep out moisture. Attached to the quiver is a small basket containing loose cotton.
When the boy was ready to shoot a bird he would remove one of the arrows, pinch off a bit of cotton from the basket and wrap it loosely around the blunt end. Thrusting the arrow into the tube this cotton made it fit just enough to take the compression of air. Sighting the bird, the boy placed the blowpipe to his lips, aimed at the bird and gave a sudden sharp puff.
The speed of that slender arrow was marvelous. Seldom did the boy miss. If the bird was merely scratched, it would fly but a short distance before the deadly poison would get in its work and then it would come fluttering to the ground, quite dead by the time the boy, running after it, would pick it up. Sometimes the great tapirs, as large as a hog, would be killed by these slender arrows.
Their bows and arrows interested me. Their bows are longer than most of those used by the American Indians, being six feet or more. And these men are generally smaller than the American Indians. They have many kinds of arrows for the various game, and they also use a sort of harpoon, a large barbed spearhead on the arrow with a long stout woven cord fastened to it. This is for shooting fish.
One day an Indian took the fruit of a star apple tree, wove a loose covering for it, hung it in a pool of water at the shore of the river from a limb overhead and waited. I saw a great fish dart for this bait and at the same time “Zowie!” went this harpoon arrow.
There was a great thrashing about in the water, but the Indian calmly hauled in his harpoon and there was a big pacu on it, a very tasty fish when properly cooked. They also use hand spears with a half dozen barbed points branching out and get many fish in that manner.