RoTH] SICKNESS AND HYGIENE relate 
930. Poison antidotes.—In the case of curare (sec. 121) Schom- 
burgk was told by the Indians that sugar and salt were antidotes for 
the poison, but could not guarantee the statement (SR, 1, 445-447). 
“Curare will not hurt anyone who keeps salt in his mouth,’ says 
Gumilla, but he naively adds, “ Who can suffer to keep salt for any 
length of time in that situation?” (G, 1, 130). A decoction of the 
leaves of Potalia amara Aubl. is employed as an antidote for cassava 
poisoning. 
931. Like all the Indian tribes, they (Maiongkong) awake early 
and chatter to each other while lying in their hammocks. At 5 
o’clock they rise to bathe in the neighboring brook or river, while 
their morning meal is preparing by the women, after which they 
go out to hunt or lounge in their hammocks (ScF, 238). In Cayenne 
they ordinarily rise with the sun, and then their wives take down 
their beds and hammocks and hang them in the carbet, which is 
their kind of hall or outhouse, the props of which not only serve to 
support the roof, which is made of palm leaves, but also to hang 
up all the beds of the men and boys of the family and those of 
strangers, when at any time they entertain them. This carbet is 
placed 10 or 12 paces on the upper side of the cottage, in which the 
women always leave their own beds... Some of these cottages 
have a loft above to hang their beds in at night, and then the lower 
part of the hut serves for the carbet... In the hut the women 
make their cassava and ovicou, etc. In the carbet the men spend 
the day making bows and arrows, etc. (GB, 46). 
932. The personal cleanliness of the Indian is proverbial. Thus, 
in Demerara, says Bancroft, a part of their idle hours they pass in 
bathing and swimming in the rivers, which they do in companies, 
without distinction of sex, several times a day (BA, 327). The Suri- 
nan Indians are a very cleanly people. They greatly delight in bath- 
ing, which they do twice at least every day, men, women, boys, and 
girls, promiscuously together. They are all excellent swimmers with- 
out exception. Among these parties not the smallest indecency is 
committed, in either words or actions (St, 1, 384, 394). So also, on 
the lower Amazon, it is the habit of all Indians, male and female, to 
bathe early in the morning. They do it sometimes for warmth’s sake, 
the temperature being often considerably higher than that of the air 
(HWB, 140). At all the malokas on the Caiary-Uaupes River, espe- 
cially at the falls, there are regular bathing places marked by curi- 
ous fences built of poles stripped of their bark, a material which, 
when rubbed with water, produces a froth like soap. With this the 
folk clean both their bodies and clothes, each person owning a little 
bundle of the bark (KG, 11, 249). With the Island Carib, it was said 
of them that their first occupation before daybreak was to bathe in 
