156 STEPPES AND DESERTS. 



attain a length of 48 feet; but the largest skins which have as yet 

 been brought to Europe, and carefully measured, do not exceed 21 to 

 23 feet. The South American boa (which is a Python) differs from 

 the East Indian. On the Ethiopian boa, see Diodor. lib. iii. p, 204, 

 ed. Wesseling, 



(s ) p. 41. "Using ants, gums, and earth as food" 

 - It^was a very prevalent report on the coasts of Cumana, New Bar- 

 celona, and Caraccas, visited by the Franciscan monks of Guiana on 

 their return from the missions, that there were men on the banks of 

 the Orinoco who ate earth. When, in returning from the Rio Negro, 

 we descended the Orinoco in thirty-six days, we passed the day of 

 the 6th of June, 1800, in the Mission inhabited by the earth-eating 

 Otomacs. This little village is called La Concepcion de Uruana, and 

 is very picturesquely situated at the foot of a granite rock. I Tound 

 its geographical position to be 7 8' 3" N. lat., and 67 18' W. long, 

 from Greenwich. The earth which the Otomacs eat is a soft, unc- 

 tuous clay; a true potter's clay, of a yellowish-gray color, due to a 

 little oxide of iron. They seek for it in particular spots on the banks 

 of the Orinoco and the Meta, and select it with care. They distin- 

 guish the taste of one kind of earth from that of another, and do not 

 consider all clays as equally agreeable to eat. They knead the earth 

 into balls of about five or six inches diameter, which they burn or 

 roast by a weak fire until the outside assumes a reddish tint. The 

 balls are re-moistened when about to be eaten. These Indians are 

 generally wild, uncultivated beings, and altogether averse to any 

 kind of tillage. It is a proverb _even among the most distant of the 

 nations living on the Orinoco, when speaking of anything very un- 

 clean, to say that it is "so dirty, that the Otomacs eat it." 



As long as the waters of the Orinoco and the Meta are low, these 

 Indians live on fish and river tortoises. They kill the fish with 

 arrows when at the surface of the water, a pursuit in which we have 

 often admired their great dexterity. During the periodical swelling 

 of the rivers, the taking of fish ceases, for it is as difficult to fish in 

 deep river water as in the deep sea. It is in this interval, which is 

 of two or three months' duration, that the Otomacs swallow great 

 quantities of earth. We have found considerable stores of it in their 



