244. VQYAGE UP THE TAPAJOS. Cuap. IX, 
Campinas (the scantily-wooded region inhabited by the main body of 
Munduructs beyond the cataracts) have first to distribute their wares— 
cheap cotton cloths, iron hatchets, cutlery, small wares, and cashaga— 
amongst the minor chiefs, and then wait three or four months for 
repayment in produce. 
A rapid change is taking place in the habits of these Indians through 
frequent intercourse with the whites, and those who dwell on the banks 
of the Tapajos now seldom tattoo their children. The principal 
Tushatia of the whole tribe or nation, named Joaquim, was rewarded 
with a commission in the Brazilian army, in acknowledgment of the 
assistance he gave to the legal authorities during the rebellion of 1835-6. 
It would be a misnomer to call the Munduructs of the Cupari and 
many parts of the Tapajos, savages; their regular mode of life, agri- 
cultural habits, loyalty to their chiefs, fidelity to treaties, and gentleness 
of demeanour, give them a right to a better title. Yet they show no 
aptitude for civilised life of towns, and like the rest of the Brazilian 
tribes, seem incapable of any further advance in culture. In their 
former wars they exterminated two of the neighbouring peoples, the 
Jumas and the Jacarés ; and make now an annual expedition against the 
Pardraudtes, and one or two other similar wild tribes who inhabit the 
interior of the land, but are sometimes driven by hunger towards 
the banks of the great rivers to rob the plantations of the agricultural 
Indians. ‘These campaigns begin in July, and last throughout the dry 
months ; the women generally accompanying the warriors to carry their 
arrows and javelins. ‘They had the diabolical custom, in former days, 
of cutting off the heads of their slain enemies, and preserving them as 
trophies around their houses. I believe this, together with other savage 
practices, has been relinquished in those parts where they have had long 
intercourse with the Brazilians, for I could neither see nor hear anything 
of these preserved heads. They used to sever the head with knives 
made of broad bamboo, and then, after taking out the brain and fleshy 
parts, soak it in bitter vegetable cil (andiroba), and expose it for several 
days over the smoke of a fire or in the sun. In the tract of country 
between the Tapajos and the Madeira, a deadly war has been for many 
years carried on between the Munduructs and the Ardras. I was told 
by a Frenchman at Santarem, who had visited that part, that all the 
settlements there have a military organisation. A separate shed is built 
outside each village, where the fighting men sleep at night, sentinels 
being stationed to give the alarm with blasts of the Turé on the approach 
of the Ardras, who choose the night for their onslaughts. 
Each horde of Mundurucus has its pajé or medicine man, who is the 
priest and doctor ; fixes upon the time most propitious for attacking the 
enemy ; exorcises evil spirits, and professes to cure the sick. All illness 
whose origin is not very apparent is supposed to be caused by a worm in 
the part affected. This the pajé pretends to extract; he blows on the 
seat of pain the smoke from a large cigar, made with an air of great 
mystery by rolling tobacco in folds of Tauari, and then sucks the place, 
drawing from his mouth, when he has finished, what he pretends to be 
the worm. It is a piece of very clumsy conjuring. One of these pajés 
was sent for by a woman in Joad Aracuw’s family, to operate on a child 
