142 WANDERINGS IN SOUTH AMERICA. 



fatal poison ; viz. the death of the hog, and that of the sloth. 

 But still these animals were nothing remarkable for size ; 

 and the strength of the poison in large animals might 

 yet be doubted, were it not for what follows. 



A large well-fed ox, from nine hundred to a thousand 

 pounds weight, was tied to a stake by a rope sufficiently 

 long to allow him to move to and fro. Having no large 

 Coucourite spikes at hand, it was judged necessary, on 

 account, of his superior size, to put three wild-hog arrows 

 into him; one was sent into each thigh just above the 

 hock, in order to avoid wounding a vital part, and the 

 third was shot traversely into the extremity of the nostril. 



The poison seemed to take effect in four minutes. Con- 

 scious as though he would fall, the ox set himself firmly 

 on his legs, and remained quite still in the same place, 

 till about the fourteenth minute, when he smelled the 

 ground, and appeared as if inclined to walk. He advanced 

 a pace or two, staggered, and fell, and remained extended 

 on his side with his head on the ground. His eye, a few 

 minutes ago so bright and lively, now became fixed and 

 dim, and though you put your hand close to it as if to 

 give him a blow there, he never closed his eyelid. 



His legs were convulsed, and his head from time to time 

 started involuntarily ; but he never showed the least desire 

 to raise it from the ground ; he breathed hard, and emitted 

 foam from his mouth. The startings, or subsultus tendi- 

 num, now became gradually weaker and weaker; his 

 hinder parts were fixed in death ; and in a minute or two 

 more his head and fore-legs ceased to stir. 



Nothing now remained to show that life was still within 

 him, except that his heart faintly beat and fluttered at 

 intervals. In five-and-twenty minutes from the time of 

 his being wounded he was quite dead. His flesh was very 

 sweet and savoury at dinner. 



