392 EXCURSIONS AROUND EGA 



race — soon became employed in scalding and plucking 

 fowls for the dinner, near the fire on the ground at the other 

 end of the dwelling. The son-in-law, Pedro-uassu, and 

 Cardozo now began a long conversation on the subject 

 of their deceased wife, daughter, and comadre ^. It 

 appeared she had died of consumption — ' tisica as they 

 called it, a word adopted by the Indians from the Portu- 

 guese. The widower repeated over and over again, in 

 nearly the same words, his account of her illness, Pedro 

 chiming in like a chorus, and Cardozo moralizing and con- 

 doling. I thought the cauim (grog) had a good deal to do 

 with the flow of talk and warmth of feeling of all three : 

 the widower drank and wailed until he became maunder- 

 ing, and finally fell asleep. 



I left them talking, and went a long ramble into the 

 forest, Pedro sending his grandson, a smiling well-behaved 

 lad of about fourteen years of age, to show me the paths, 

 my companion taking with him his Zarahatana, or blow- 

 pipe. This instrument is used by all the 'Indian tribes 

 on the Upper Amazons. It is generally nine or ten feet 

 long, and is made of two separate lengths of wood, each 

 scooped out so as to form one half of the tube. To do this 

 with the necessary accuracy requires an enormous amount 

 of patient labour, and considerable mechanical ability, 

 the tools used being simply the incisor teeth of the Paca 

 and Cutia. The two half tubes, when finished, are secured 

 together by a very close and tight spirally- wound strapping, 

 consisting of long flat strips of Jacitara, or the wood of 

 the climbing palm-tree ; and the whole is smeared after- 

 wards with black wax, the production of a Melipona bee. 

 The pipe tapers towards the muzzle, and a cup-shaped 

 mouthpiece, made of wood, is fitted in the broad end. A 

 full-sized Zarahatana is heavy, and can only be used by an 

 adult Indian who has had great practice. The young lads 

 learn to shoot with smaller and lighter tubes. When 

 Mr. Wallace and I had lessons at Barra in the use of the 

 blow-pipe, of Julio, a Juri Indian, then in the employ of 

 Mr. Hauxwell, an English bird-collector, we found it very 

 diflicult to hold steadily the long tubes. The arrows are 

 made from the hard rind of the leaf-stalks of certain palms, 

 thin strips being cut, and rendered as sharp as needles by 



^ Co-mother ; the term expressing the relationship of a 

 mother to the godfather of her child. 



