J 12 INTRODUCTION. 



Among the Arecuna Indians I observed a kind 

 of net which they called pente^ with which they 

 secured a number of smaller fish, perhaps three 

 to four inches in length, which bury themselves in 

 holes in the banks of rivers. The Indian knocks 

 with the net at the hole, and the alarmed fish rushes 

 out into the net. This is the only instance in which 

 I saw the Indians of the interior make use of a net. 



We are too little acquainted with the habits of 

 fishes in general, and even with the modes and 

 periods of propagation of those which inhabit Eu- 

 rope; it is therefore not to be expected that I, 

 during the comparative short period which I spent 

 in the interior of Guiana, should have become ac- 

 quainted with what has remained in many instances 

 a riddle to the investigating eye of European philo- 

 sophers for centuries. The general belief among 

 the Indians is, that at the period when the annual 

 rains cause the rivers to overflow and inundate the 

 low countries, the fish ascend to those inlets which 

 the rivers form In their upper parts, and where the 

 water is currentless ; here they are said to deposit 

 their spawn. An old Macusi chieftain at Pirara 

 informed me that even the pacu deposited its eggs 

 in those still waters. It is a singular fact, that the 

 fry of the pacu is entirely unknown at the lower 

 regions of the rivers, where the adults feed in num- 

 bers on the lacis or waia and other similar water- 

 plants. Mr. Hillhouse, who so frequently visited 

 the interior, observes, in his " Voyage up the Mas- 

 caroony," — "I have caught, by poisoning the 



