SEA TRAGEDY OF THE JUNGLE FOLK 131 



ing from forty to sixty, and the largest and most 

 powerful is chief. They make their homes on plat- 

 forms by breaking off limbs and putting them criss- 

 cross. In mating season the male and female live 

 together, but the couples separate after the young 

 are born. The mother takes care of them and the 

 father goes off about his business. 



As they do in the case of most dangerous ani- 

 mals, the native collectors hunt orang-outangs by 

 killing the mother and taking the young. The 

 weapon they most often use, except when they have 

 guns, is the blow-pipe, which, in the hands of an 

 expert, is not to be despised. It is a long, slender 

 tube, measuring from six to eight feet, made from 

 a single joint of a rare bamboo. The tube is allowed 

 to dry and harden and is wrapped tightly with rat- 

 tan. The darts, which are about the size of a steel 

 knitting-needle, are made from the midribs of palm- 

 leaves, and at one end there is a small conical butt, 

 which fits tightly into the bore of the pipe. A small 

 nick is made in the shaft of the dart just below 

 the point, and the end is coated with a deadly poison 

 made from the sap of the upas-tree and another 

 species of the genus Ipo. When the dart strikes, 

 the end breaks off and remains in the wound; the 

 poison acts rapidly, first paralyzing, then killing 

 the victim. In warfare, also, the natives poison 

 kris and spear, and the wound is invariably fatal. 



Fighting a full-grown orang-outang with weap- 

 ons so primitive is extremely hazardous work, and 



