CRUZ DAS almas: a BRAZILIAN VILLAGE — PIERSON 



83 



BASKETKT 



Basketry is the principal handicraft in the com- 

 munity. Crude, but strong and serviceable arti- 

 cles are produced, without ornament or decoration 

 except, occasionally, that obtainable by alternating 

 the darker outer side of the strips of taquara, of 

 which they are made, with a lighter inner side. 

 Taquara is excellent for this purpose since, when 

 green, it is pliable and bends readily into any 

 desired shape and, when dry, it holds that shape 

 firmly. 



At least three men, but no women, regularly 

 make baskets for their neighbors. Many farmers 

 also know how to construct them for their own 

 use. Regularly made in the community are a num- 

 ber of baskets of various shapes and sizes, includ- 

 ing the jacd, used with the pack saddle, and the 

 embornal, or feed basket to go over a horse's nose. 

 Also commonly made are apds, or winnowing 

 trays, and peneiras, or sieves, including the large 

 sivnmica. 



Taking up a green taquara pole, a man first 

 splits off strips the length and width of which are 

 in keeping with the utensils to be made (pi. 12). 

 If a large basket is desired, the strips may be over 

 an inch wide and several feet long; if a peneira, 

 they are much shorter and narrower. Each strip 

 is then taken and placed on a wooden block and 

 hammered with a wooden mallet to make it more 

 pliable. To begin a basket, several strips are laid 

 side by side on the ground and other strips are 

 interlaced at right angles, the numbers in each case 

 depending upon tlie shape and size desired for the 

 bottom of the basket. When the base is complete, 

 the strips are bent upward and other long strips 

 interwoven around them at right angles, until the 

 sides are finished. The ends of the strips are then 

 bent over and tucked in securely to make the rim, 

 sometimes with a braided effect. A strong, pliant 

 strip of other wood may also be laced into the rim, 

 to give tlie basket greater strength. 



MAKING OF FIREWORKS 



The rockets and honibas used in connection with 

 religious or secular ceremonies, are all manufac- 

 tured locally. The present artisan is the mail car- 

 rier who has performed this service during "more 

 than 20 years'' in a small shop in the back yard 

 of his home. 



"They are not hard to make,"' he says, "but one 

 must be very careful or they will not go off as 

 they should." Fuses and powder are the only ele- 

 ments purchased, usually in Boa Vista, occasion- 

 ally in Sao Paulo. The sticks for guiding the 

 rockets are cut in a nearby patch of timber from 

 either of two plants whose branchless stems ordi- 

 narily grow to about 5 feet in height and "the 

 thickness of a finger." The plant most used is 

 called locally vara de rojao (rocket stick), or 

 cravojYina {Ambrosia polystachya) . The other 

 plant is known as iuva. When dry, these sticks 

 are quite light. The tube is made of a section of 

 taquara do reino, about 6 inches long, cut so that 

 one end is closed off by the natural joint of the 

 taqua7'a. 



Powder is poured into this tube and tamped 

 down tightly with a wooden rod. A fuse is in- 

 serted and held in place by a hucha de terra^ a 

 fibrous growth of a plant related to the gourd, 

 squash, and cucumber, or the Luffa cylindrica, 

 sometimes also used as a sponge for washing dishes. 

 The tube is then inverted and attached with a cord 

 to the guiding stick. Small holes are bored in the 

 tube near its upper extremity, through or just 

 under the joint, and the short fuses of as many 

 iorribas as desired, usually either one or three, are 

 passed through into the powder. 



When the main fuse is lighted and the powder 

 in the taquara tube set afire, the rocket will rise, 

 guided by the stick, until all the powder is con- 

 sumed, shortly before which the fuses of the borrv- 

 ba.s will catch afire and each, in due course, will go 

 off with a loud "boom." 



The bomhas are made of special powder, tightly 

 packed in strong cardboard or cloth containers, the 

 size of which varies but averages about an inch and 

 a quarter in diameter and 5 inches long. Besides 

 being used for rockets, they are also shot off in 

 baterias (batteries). A bateria is made by at- 

 taching, at intervals of several inches, from 10 to 

 24 bombas to a limber but strong stick several 

 feet long which has been stuck vertically into the 

 ground. The lower fuse sets off the first bomba^ 

 and this explosion sets fire to the fuse of the second, 

 and so on. The last bomba is about twice the size 

 of the others and is sometimes called the morteiro. 

 This term is also applied to a large bomba set off 

 singly on the ground. 



