620 MODE OF SHOOTING AND NETTING TURTLE. 



TIMBO. 



The Indian has also discovered the means of poisoning the 

 fish of the lakes and pools, as well as the birds of the air. 

 He extracts the poison from a certain liana — the paullinia 

 pinnata — which he calls timbo. To do so, he collects a few 

 pieces, about a 3^ard long, and mashes and soaks them in 

 water, which soon becomes discoloured with the milky poison- 

 ous juice of the plant. This he carries in a calabash, and 

 poure out on the ^vater. In aljout half an hour, all the 

 smaller fish, over a wider space than that which he has 

 sprinkled with the juice, rise to the surface, floating on their 

 sides, with their gills wide open. So powerful is its nature, 

 that but a slight quantity aj^pears sufficient to stupify them. 

 Some time afterwards the larger fish appear ; and even for 

 twent^^-four hours afterwards a number rise floating dead on 

 the surface. The fish are evidently suffocated by the poison. 



MODE OF SHOOTING AND NETTING TURTLE. 



Both fish and turtle are shot by the natives with arrows. 

 The Indian takes his post on a little stage made of poles and 

 cross pieces of wood, secured with lianas, on the margin of 

 the pools frequented by the turtles, armed with his bow and 

 arrows. The arrow used for killinof the latter has a stromr 

 lancet-shaped steel point fitted into a peg which enters the tip 

 of the shaft. The peg is secured to the shaft by twine made of 

 the fibres of pine-apple leaves. The line, some thirty or forty 

 yards long, is neatly wound round the body of the arrow. 

 When the muzzle enters the shell the peg drops out, and the 

 pierced animal descends with it towards the bottom, leaving 

 the shaft floating on the surface. The sportsman, hastening 



