320 The Andes and the Amazon. 



a small blue mark on the upper lip. Higher up the Japu- 

 ra is the large cannibal tribe of Miranhas, living in isolated 

 families; and on the Tocantins dwell the low Caishanas, 

 who kill their fii'st-born children. Along the left bank of 

 the Amazon, fi'om Loreto to Japura, are the scattered 

 houses and villages of the Tuciinas. This is an extens- 

 ive tribe, leading a settled agricultural life, each horde 

 having a chief and a " medicine-man," or priest of their 

 superstitions. They are good-natured and ingenious, ex- 

 celling most of the other tribes in the manufacture of pot- 

 tery ; but they are idle and debauched, naked except in the 

 villages, and tattooed in numbers of short, straight lines 

 on the face. The Mariibos, on the Javari, have a dark 

 complexion and a slight beard; and on the west side of 

 the same river roam the Majeronas — fierce, hostile, light 

 colored, bearded cannibals. In the vicinity of Pebas dwell 

 the inoffensive Yaguas. The shape of the head (but not 

 their vacant expression) is well represented by Catlin's por- 

 trait of " Black Hawk," a Sauk chief. They are quite fi-ee 

 from the encumbrance of dress, the men wearing a girdle 

 of fibrous bark around the loins, with bunches looking like 

 a mop hanging down in front and rear, and similar bunches 

 hung around the neck and arms. The women tie a strip 

 of brown cotton cloth about the hips. They paint the 

 whole body with achote.* They sometimes five in com- 

 munities. One large structure, with Gothic roof, is used 

 in common ; on the inside of which, around the walls, are 

 built family sleeping-rooms. The Yaguas are given to 

 drinking and dancing. They are said to bury their dead 

 inside the house of the deceased, and then set fire to it ; 

 but this confiicts with their communal life. Perhaps, with 

 the other tribes on the Japura, Iga, and l^apo, they are 



* Query : Is the name Yagua (blood) derived from the practice of color- 

 ing the bo'dv red ? 



