214 MALAY POISONS AND CHABM CUBES 



by the mahout. " There were many stick-insects about, 

 which were swept into the howdah as we pushed through 

 the tangled jungle growth about the jungle path ; so 

 collecting a couple of these creatures, I gave them to the 

 mahout, who placed them at my direction in the midst 

 of a sheaf of vnld ginger plants and gave them to the 

 elephant. The elephant seized the wild ginger plants 

 eagerly and began to eat them, but finding the stick- 

 insects presently, at once threw them away." 



Methods in which Tuba is used by Natives for 

 Fishing.— The method in which tuba is used by Malays 

 in sea fishing is described by Wray : ** It Ifthe root) is 

 poimded or ground fine and mixed with stiff clay and 

 crushed refuse, slnrimps or small fish, and the mixture 

 is then made into balls and dried. These balls are 

 thrown into the sea, like ground bait, and fish eating 

 them become poisoned, rise to the surface, and are 

 caught by the watching fishermen. This way of using 

 it is probably not very harmful, though the same cannot 

 be said of its use in fresh waters." 



River fishing with tuba is now prohibited in the 

 Federated Malay States ; but it used to be done to a 

 very large extent in the following way : The effective 

 part of the plant, i.e. the sap, is obtained by pounding 

 the roots with clubs to a puJp under water, to which 

 lime is sometimes added to make the resulting milky 

 watery fluid sink and spread when pom"ed into the river. 

 Two or three bucketfuls of the milk-hke extract when 

 thrown into a river or pool will stupefy the fish and 

 bring them to the surface. Sometimes a stretch is 

 dammed for the express purpose of spearing, clubbing, 

 netting and trapping them. The roots may also be 

 bruised with hme and tobacco in dug-out canoes half 

 full of water, which, when the pounded roots have been 

 thoroughly soaked, are upset, or baled out within an 



