458 NOTES OF A BOTANIST 



turn their backs. " These women appeared to be 

 very tall, robust, and fair, with long hair twisted 

 over their heads, skins round their loins, and bows 

 and arrows in their hands, with which they killed 

 seven or eight Spaniards." This is all that they 

 profess to have seen with their own eyes of those 

 warlike women; and, as Herrera remarks on it, "it 

 was no new thing in the Indies for women to fight, 

 and to use bows and arrows, as has been seen on 

 some of the Windward Islands and at Cartagena, 

 where they displayed as much courage as the men." 

 In the account of the return of Columbus from 

 his second voyage we read that when he arrived 

 at Guadeloupe (having started from Hispaniola), 

 numbers of women, armed with bows and arrows, 

 opposed the landing of his men. This is one 

 instance, of many such, recounted by the Spanish 

 historians. 



I have myself seen that Indian women can fight. 

 At the village of Chasuta, on the malos pasos of 

 the river Huallaga, which in 1855 had a population 

 of some 1800 souls, composed of two tribes of 

 Coscanasoa Indians, the ancient rivalry of those 

 tribes generally breaks forth when a large quantity 

 of chicha has been imbibed during the celebration 

 of one of their feasts. Then, on opposite sides of 

 the village, the women pile up heaps of stones, to 

 serve as missiles for the men, and renew them 

 continually as they are being expended. If, as 

 sometimes happens, the men are driven back to and 

 beyond their piles of stones, the women defend the 

 latter obstinately, and generally hold them until the 

 men are able to rally to the combat. At that epoch 

 there was no permanent white resident at Chasuta, 



