SAVAGE WEAPONS AT THE CENTENNIAL EXHIBITION. 295 



For war or for killing the tapir or jaguar, au arrow 6 feet long is 

 made of a reed, having for a head a hard-wood spike, an iron point, or 

 the tail bone of the sting-ray. Poison is used on either. The arrow is 

 projected by a bow. 



The blow-gun of the Uaupes of the Amazon 243 is called the grava- 

 tana, and is made of two stems of the small palm Ireartia setigira, one 

 slipping within the other so as mutually to correct curvatures. The 

 pith is pushed out, and a conical mouth-piece fitted to one end. Arrows 

 are made from the spinous processes of the patawa {JEnocarpus batawa), 

 pointed and anointed with poison of the wouralL The butt of the 

 arrow carries a little tuft of tree cotton to make it fit in the tube. 



The ordinary bow of the Uaupes, 244 the aboriginal Indians of Brazil, is 

 of different kinds of hard elastic wood, and is from 5 to G feet long. The 

 string is either of the tucum leaf-fiber (Astrocaryum vulgare), or the inner 

 bark of trees called tururi. The arrows are 5 feet long or over, are made 

 of the flower-stalk of the arrow-grass, and are tipped with hard wood, 

 barbed with the serrated spine of the sting-ray. For war, the head is 

 anointed with poison, and is notched in two or three places so as to break 

 off in the wound. Arrows for shooting fish have usually iron heads, 

 bought of the traders, but others are made of monkey's bones and barbed. 

 The arrows have three feathers laid on spirally. 



The Indians of the Amazon also use a two-stringed bow for shooting 

 stones. The pellet bow has a pad or net in the middle of the string, to 

 hold a stone or ball of clay, to project it in the manner of an arrow. 

 Such are used in South America and Africa. 245 



The arrow of the Guianians, used iu shooting turtles, is projected by a 

 bow and has a movable harpoon-head of iron detachable from the shaft, 

 but secured loosely thereto by a thong. The turtle-shooting bow of the 

 Central American Indians is made from the Sonpar palm, Guilielma 

 speciosa ; the shafts of the arrows from the dry stalks of the cane, saccha- 

 rin um officinarum, tipped with hard wood or iron. 



The Peruvian arrows were tipped with copper or bone. 246 



The arrows of the Paraguayan Indians are of several kinds. Some 

 have block points to kill birds without bleeding them ; others with long 

 wooden four-sided heads, sharpened and cut into barbs. These heads 

 are carefully lashed on to the shaft, which is in all cases of cane. The 

 arrows were .shown in the Agricultural Building, are from 3 to 4 feet 

 long, and have feather flyers put on straight. 



The Gran Chaco Indian of the La Plata region, 247 destitute of habita- 

 tion himself, employs tire-arrows when attacking a settlement. He binds 

 some cotton around the head of each arrow just behind the head, and then 

 lying down he holds the large, bow with his feet while he draws the 



2<3 Wallaces Amazon, pp. 211,215. 



"■"Ibid., pp. 486,487. 



™ Sec Tylor's " Early History of Mankind," notes, p. 177. 



"6 "Conquest of Peru," p. 73. 



247 Wood, vol. ii, p. 570. 



