POISONS OF VEGETABLE ORIGIN 215 



enclosure. About 5 or 6 cwt. of the roots raay be used. 

 The prepared root is tlirown into the water about a 

 couple of miles above an improvised fence of stakes. 

 In about twenty minutes, as the iuha comes down, the 

 fish are struck with panic and rush wildly down-stream 

 to the fence, where they are speared or clubbed. In 

 staking the stream to make the barrier space may be 

 allowed between the stakes to let small-sized fish pass 

 and so escape, as they are liable to be killed outright by 

 tuba. 



The exciting sport of tuba-fisliing has been described 

 by G. MaxweU (Ref. 15), Hose and McBougall (Ref. 12), 

 and is mentioned in Dr. W. H. Eurness's sketch " Folk- 

 Lore in Borneo." The sport goes on for several hours : 

 fish of all kinds, except small fry which escape by 

 keeping on the sm'face, and cat-fish wliich hide in the 

 mud, are affected by tuba : at first the big ones make 

 desperate efforts to get away by leaping over the down- 

 stream barricade ; but they gradually become stupefied, 

 and turn on their backs on the suiiace of the water, until 

 they gradually cease to breathe, if the dose of poison 

 should be a large one. When Malays are tuba-fishing 

 mention of fish by name is tabooed by the bomor — 

 everybody takes care not to do so : it is thought better 

 to refer to them as leaves whii-ling down the stream. 

 The fish that are stupefied have no ill effects when used 

 as a cooked food by man, because the amount of tuba 

 required to stupefy them is infinitesimal, but they are 

 said to go bad more quickly than usual. 



It has been found by experiment that fish first 

 became very lively, then for a wliile they were more 

 responsive to a poke with a stick than the controls 

 before final stupefaction, with occasional spasms : the 

 respiration becomes slow ; thus a gudgeon with respira- 

 tions 106 per minute slowed down to 69 after five 



