300 ARTS AND CRAFTS OF GUIANA INDIANS [ETH. ANN. 38 
perpendicularly into the ground, but projecting a couple of inches 
or so above it (fig. 93 A). Sunk into the center of the exposed 
surface is a circular pit, made by fire and scraping, of a diameter 
of about 3 to 5 inches and a depth of 15 or 16 inches, with the bot- 
tom flat. The pounder in these districts is a heavy hardwood pole 
from 8 to 10 feet long, with a tapering truncated extremity (B). 
It is not used as a stamper, but rather as a grinder with a to-and-fro, 
hardly oval, but rather more or less triangular movement, crushing 
the corn up against the pit side during the course of its manipula- 
tion. If the occupants leave the house for a few days they will 
either cover the pit or fill it with clean “mud,” to prevent bees, 
Fic. 93.—Pestles and mortars (wood and bark). 
wasps, or other insects from nesting in it. Similar apparatus has 
been reported from the Demerara (Da, 232) and from the upper 
Rio Negro (KG, 1, 179). <A larger variety of mortar, with a de- 
pressed upper surface, the whole not being so deeply sunk into the 
ground, would seem to be met with among the Makusi (pl. 76). 
Though the arrangement above described is occasionally to be 
seen, on the upper Pomeroon among the Carib and Akawai, the more 
common model among the Arawak throughout the Pomeroon and 
Moruea district is a squared piece of hardwood of about the same 
size, with a plainly cut handle, either in the shape of a ring or pro- 
jection, carved out of one extremity, but having a semiglobular 
excavation cut out of one of the sides (fig. 93 C). The pestle is a long 
double-headed cylinder of hardwood, tapering gradually from each 
