Cuap. XI. TURTLE CATCHING. 307 
the older Indians, including Pedro and Daniel, had begun their sport. 
They were mounted on little stages called moutds, made of poles and 
cross-pieces of wood secured with lianas, and were shooting the turtles 
as they came near the surface, with bows and arrows. The Indians 
seemed to think that netting the animals, as Cardozo proposed doing, 
was not lawful sport, and wished first to have an hour or two’s old- 
fashioned practice with their weapons. 
The pool covered an area of about four or five acres, and was closely 
hemmed in by the forest, which in picturesque variety and grouping of 
trees and foliage exceeded almost everything I had yet witnessed. The 
margins for some distance were swampy, and covered with large tufts of 
a fine grass called Matupa. These tufts in many places were overrun 
with ferns, and exterior to them a crowded row of arborescent arums, 
growing to a height of fifteen or twenty feet, formed a green palisade. 
Around the whole stood the taller forest trees ; palmate-leaved Cecro- 
piz ; slender Assai palms, thirty feet high, with their thin feathery 
heads crowning the gently-curving smooth stems; small fan-leaved 
palms ; and as a background to all these airy shapes lay the voluminous 
masses of ordinary forest trees, with garlands, festoons, and streamers 
of leafy climbers hanging from their branches. The pool was nowhere 
more than five feet deep, one foot of which was not water, but extremely 
fine and soft mud. 
Cardozo and I spent an hour paddling about. I was astonished at 
the skill which the Indians display in shooting turtles. They did not 
wait for their coming to the surface to breathe, but watched for the 
slight movements in the water which revealed their presence under- 
neath. These little tracts on the water are called the Siriri ; the instant 
one was perceived an arrow flew from the bow of the nearest man, and 
never failed to pierce the shell of the submerged animal. When the 
turtle was very distant, of course the aim had to be taken at a consider- 
able elevation, but the marksmen preferred a longish range, because the 
arrow then fell more perpendicularly on the shell, and entered it more 
deeply. 
The arrow used in turtle shooting has a strong lancet-shaped steel 
point, fitted into a peg which enters the tip of the shaft. The peg is 
secured to the shaft by twine made of the fibres of pine-apple leaves, the 
twine being some thirty or forty yards in length, and neatly wound 
round the body of the arrow. When the missile enters the shell, the 
peg drops out, and the pierced animal descends with it towards the 
bottom, leaving the shaft floating on the surface. This being done, the 
sportsman paddles in his montaria to the place, and gently draws the 
animal by the twine, humouring it by giving it the rein when it plunges, 
until it is brought again near the surface, when he strikes it with a 
second arrow. With the increased hold given by the two cords he has 
then no difficulty in landing his game. 
By midday the men had shot about a score of nearly full-grown 
turtles. Cardozo then gave orders to spread the net. The spongy, 
swampy nature of the banks made it impossible to work the net so as 
to draw the booty ashore; another method was therefore adopted. 
The net was taken by two Indians and extended in a curve at one 
