118 TROPICAL WILD LIFE IN BRITISH GUIANA 



Photo by W. B. 



FIG. 33. NUPEE. OUR AKAWAI INDIAN HUNTER. BRINGING IN 

 AGOUTIS AND CURASSOWS. 



parrots green, macaws scarlet and gold, and so on. But 

 Snakebird, as his share, got only the snake's head with its 

 sombre tints; however, he remained content with this. 



The usefulness to man of native Guiana birds may be 

 divided into three heads — ornaments, pets and food. Thanks 

 to most excellent laws which have been passed and are well 

 enforced, all exportations of plumage for millinery purposes 

 have ceased, although for some birds almost too late, for scar- 

 let ibises are a rare sight even on the coast. The ornamenta- 

 tion then is confined to the Indians of the interior who deco- 

 rate their arrows, head-dresses and medicine bags with bril- 

 liant feathers. The birds whose plumage is chiefly used are 

 macaws, Amazon parrots, curassows, toucans, the inner wing 

 plumes and iridescent breasts of trumpeters, cocks-of-the- 



