718 ARTS AND CRAFTS OF GUIANA INDIANS [ETH, ANN. 38 
it was so, or the people would not otherwise have beat the hai-ari 
[fish poison]. In fact, it appears that in the immediate vicinity 
of the mountains they can calculate to a certainty within a few days 
the breaking up of the seasons” (HiA, 38). The appearance of the 
winged kushi-ants (ScK, 174) and that of certain beetles, e. g., 
Phaneus and Copris, especially P. mimas (SR, u, 112), are the sure 
harbingers of the rainy season. The croaking of the rain frog, 
Hyla venulosa Daud, the kobono-aru of the Carib, is a certain sign 
that rain can be expected in the next few days (SR, 1m, 419). On 
the Berbice, “when the Indians see the sawyer beetle [Prionus 
cervicornis| at its work, they know that it is time for them to cut 
down a portion of the forest, to prepare their fields, for it is then the 
commencement of the sunny season” (Da, 15). On the Corentyn, 
Brown relates that he frequently observed a large species of dragon 
fly tossing out large drops of water from small pools in the hollows 
of rocks with the extremity of its abdomen as it hovered over them. 
The men said that when these insects bailed out water in that manner 
it was a sign that the dry season was at its height (BB, 356). 
939. Though the Indians have no conception of weeks nor names 
for days, they measure intervals of less than a month by means of 
the number of days intervening, and for this purpose employ various 
apparatus—strings, knotted or beaded, sticks, and stones, ete. Thus, 
debtor and creditor, husband and wife, ete., will give one another a 
similar knotted cord, each knot corresponding with a day. Every 
morning the first business with both parties is to untie one of them. 
In trading, each one then hastens to fulfill his bargain; those who 
can not pay make their excuses and arrange a new cord or new 
payment day (G, 11, 281). When the chief proposes giving a party, 
he gets prepared a number of strings similarly marked with knots 
or threaded with beads, the number of knots or beads correspond- 
ing with the days intervening. One of these strings he retains in 
his own possession. The others he sends by messenger to each of his 
guests, the messenger delivering all other details orally. The same 
article holds good for all private concerns and business matters, as 
Schomburgk records (SR, 1, 203) for the Warrau on the Barima. 
Waterton gives the converse picture, the guests in this case notify- 
ing the host: When two or three families have determined to come 
down the river and pay you a visit, they send an Indian beforehand 
with a string of beads. You take one bead off every day, and on 
the day that the string is beadless they arrive at your house. (W, 
233). When a son leaves his aged and dependent parents to go on a 
journey he will give them a string with a number of knots in it, one 
of which is to be untied every morning, and he will arrive, if well, 
on the day on which the last is untied (Br, 238). So, again, the 
