630 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1909. 
by the white man. The women alone at the present day paint 
their faces, and they always blacken their teeth on being married. 
All the women, more or less, wear nose rings, and their gar- 
ments consist of a short skirt and sort of chemise of colored cotton, 
composed of various layers of appliqué work neatly sewed together, 
forming very curious designs. (See illustrations.) These garments 
seem to be peculiar to the San Blas women and are identical to- 
day with the description of them that Wafer gave over two hundred 
years ago. (Notice conventionalized figure of a man in the illustra- 
tion.) The Indians of this coast have developed few arts, and make 
no pottery whatever, carved cocoanuts and gourds taking its place. 
They formerly used torches of palm wood dipped in oil and bees- 
wax for light and made also from the palm a sort of braided box, 
covered with an animal’s skin, which is very pretty. They make 
a rough basket of vine roots, very strong and serviceable, and 
some are cleverly shaped to fit the shoulder for the carrying of 
burdens, though their chief industry has been the making of their 
hammocks, many finely woven, from cotton-wool. These ham- 
mocks serve also as their coffins after death, as already stated. 
Then the bodies are hidden away in some remote and dense palm 
grove. They do not appear to have cemeteries. The houses are 
constructed with skill, built high above the ground, with over- 
hanging, thatch-covered roofs, serving to keep out rain and damp- 
ness entirely, and are well suited to the climate. The support- 
ing posts of the roof are large bamboos or palm trees. Three or four 
are driven into the ground at equal distances, according to the size 
that the house is to be, and across these is placed the ridge pole. On 
each side a few shorter posts are sunk, from which the long rafters 
are laid; then the outside is covered with palm or plantain. The high 
entrance is reached by means of notched poles, often large, split bam- 
boo, and usually drawn up at night. The appearance of some of the 
San Blas villages seen from the sea is very attractive, especially those 
built on the islands in the midst of bright sand and waving cocoa 
palms, surrounded by the beautiful blue waters*of the gulf, whose 
white-crested waves dash in over the reefs. Those hamlets of the 
mainland, showing a tawny yellow against the green hills, topped 
with low-lying clouds, present also a charming picture. The 
“poisoned arrow,” formerly much in use by these and all coast In- 
dians, it has been found, was only one dipped in the juice of the 
“ Manzanillo del playa,” which, as its name implies, grows by the 
sea, and, curiously enough, an antidote for the sharp inflammation its 
poison caused was discovered to be sea water. Only one tribe of 
the coast did not use bows and arrows originally, but wooden swords 
and spears tipped with bone instead. Polygamy is allowed among 
the San Blas Indians, but not widely practiced, only the caciques 
