318 IN THE WILDS OF SOUTH AMERICA 



lions are growing one is not inclined to be sentimental, 

 and will only bemoan the fact that it requires an hour's 

 hard work to chop through the steel-like trunk before the 

 coveted morsel is brought down. 



The country between the Guapay and Ichilo is probably 

 as little known as any part of South America. This strip 

 of land, covering approximately five thousand square miles, 

 is heavily forested, and is the home of a tribe of savages 

 known as the Sirionos. Judging from the accounts given 

 to us by our canoemen and the priest, they must be a ter- 

 rible and indomitable race. The Yuracares fear them 

 greatly, and as we neared the Ichilo they preferred to keep 

 the canoes in the centre of the river and seemed reluctant 

 to land ; if thev shot at an animal and the arrow missed its 

 mark and dropped in the forest they did not go in search 

 of it ; a half-day of careful work is needed to make an arrow, 

 and as a general rule Indians are very particular to hunt 

 for any they may lose; but in this instance they preferred 

 the loss of the arrows to risking their skins in the dense 

 cover. 



There were four Yuracares at the mission, one, a girl 

 of twelve years, who bore unsightly scars — the result of 

 having been ambushed by parties of the Sirionos tribe; I 

 was also told that occasionally some of them are killed. 



The Sirionos seem to have no permanent homes and cul- 

 tivate the ground to a very limited extent, if at all. They 

 are a tribe of wanderers, and roam the forest in small par- 

 ties, killing game for food. In appearance and stature 

 they are not unlike the Guarayos, but in temperament 

 they are totally different and have successfully resisted 

 every attempt made to subdue them. Their weapons are 

 bows and arrows, the former of great height and so power- 

 ful that they cannot be drawn with the arms alone. In 

 order to shoot the Indian throws himself on his back, grasps 

 the bow with the feet and draws the cord with both hands; 

 the arrows, of which the priest had collected a number, 

 are seven or eight feet long and made of wild cane or chu- 



