RESIDENCE AT TARAPOTO 67 



to kill a snake I have found among the native races 

 all the way across South America, but nowhere so 

 strong as in the roots of the Andes. A woman 

 must never kill a snake when she can get a man or 

 boy to do it for her. In some places it must not 

 only be killed but buried. When among the wild 

 Jibaro and Zaparo Indians in the Forest of Canelos, 

 I have sometimes had to kill two or three snakes 

 a day for the women. How is it that the woman 

 and the serpent are in mysterious relation in the 

 early traditions of many civilised nations, and in 

 the actual customs of savage nations even at the 

 present day ? 



[It may be as well to continue here Spruce's 

 experience of the results of the bites and stings of 

 venomous insects, especially as they include one 

 during his residence at Tarapoto which had results 

 as bad as those of his Indian host above described.] 



After snakes, the venomous animals most to be 

 dreaded are the large hairy spiders, especially the 

 species of Mygale, of whose bird-hunting propen- 

 sities Mr. Bates and others have told us. I never 

 saw a case of their sting, and all I ever heard of 

 proved fatal except one, and that was of a woman 

 at San Carlos, who was bitten in the heel and im- 

 mediately dropped, with a shriek, as if shot, 

 lay at the point of death for ten days, but finally 

 recovered. I have been bitten by spiders, but 

 never seriously. At Tarapoto a smallish green 

 spider abounded in the bushes, and would 

 times be lurking among my fresh specimens 

 bit furiously when molested, with an effect al> 

 equal to the sting of a bee. At the 

 cockroaches were a great pest in the 



