RorH |] WAR AND WARFARE 587 
765. Of the tactics employed in defence the information available 
leaves much to be desired. Speaking of Cayenne, Barrére says that 
the Guianese do not palisade their villages. They do not know what 
it is to build forts or to make intrenchments. The forests are their 
ordinary defence and their greatest security (PBA, 165). It would 
seem, however, that some of the Island Arawak houses were pali- 
saded (RO, 529), while on the mainland there is evidence that such 
structures were customary among Arawak and Carib (Akawai, 
Arekuna). With the former, the contained building was a well- 
appointed arsenal (sec. 291). Brett speaks of the Pomeroon Arawak 
making a “fort” by clearing a piece of ground in the forest and all the 
cut trees laid around in a circle, with their branches turned outward; 
in the middle a strongly built house, two arrows’ flight from the sur- 
rounding wood (BrB, 36). [At the taking of Grenada, besides the 
mischief which the Carib did the French by an extraordinary 
shower of arrows and the barricades they placed in the avenues, 
they courageously opposed their landing and laid several ambushes 
for them, and when they saw that the French, notwithstanding their 
resistance, were resolved to come and forced them to make a retreat 
into the woods they rallied on an eminent place which they had forti- 
fied, and whereas it was somewhat steep on all sides save only one, 
which had a spacious avenue, they had cut down certain trees, of the 
boals whereof they had made long rollers, which, being lightly 
fastened at the top of the mountain, might be rolled down the descent 
with a more than ordinary force and violence against the French if 
they had attempted any assault (RO, 534).] In the story of a fight 
* between the Carib and Arawak on the Haimora-kabura, a branch of 
the Moruca River, the Arawak place a massive log of heavy wood in 
the stream, and fix it tightly to each bank, so as to rest not two hands’ 
breadth below the water surface. ... A decoy fishing craft draws 
the Carib’s first canoe toward the spot, which the former easily passes 
over, while the latter, warming to the chase, strikes up against it 
with such force that it is upset and the occupants thrown into the 
water (BrB, 40). In another legend of a battle with the Carib, the 
Akawai are said to have escaped by means of a tunnel when the former 
fired their fortified stronghold by means of flaming arrows (BrB,139). 
Gumilla speaks of the sagacity with which the Orinoco Indians have 
invented means of escape, so that in order not to be followed they 
walk backward on moist soils, or in the environs of the rivers for 
the purpose of pretending that they are coming, when at the same 
time they are really going. And on lands subject to inundation, 
where they are forced to leave tracks and footsteps, they leave 
plenty. They go in and come out so many times that those who are 
following them get confused and upset (G,1, 106). St. Clair makes 
