128 
Veneseciion for Head-Ache. 
and geiitleuieii puffed their cigarettes, and tlie enjoyable day was biouglit 
to a close witli singing and dancing to the accompaniment of a guitar. 
oli. The happy company took their departure next morning amidst 
plenty of sliouting and salvo, but not before Captain Leal had promised 
to pay us a visit on our return froni Roraima and to bring us hiniseH" 
the twelve baskets of farinha and tapioca in exchange for the double- 
barrel gun that he took with him. Meanwhile he had the gun, but we 
did not have the farinha. After taking oft* their Sunday clothes in the 
bushes opposite, tlie cheerful crew disappeared from sight. 
315. For the past eight days the heat had again increased con- 
siderably, the thermometer on an average registering from 90 to 9G° 
Fahrenheit in the shade. The sandbank had become a glowing hot tloor 
for the insti'ument, sunk to a depth of 14 inches below the surface, shewed 
a temperature of 110^ taken daily at three o'clock in the afternoon, and 
even the Indians had to protect their hardened soles with sandals: at 
this de])th a temperature of 50° to 60° is kept up the whole night through. 
31(j. The situation of the junction of the Takutu with the Rio Branco 
lieing now fixed, and my brother's object attained, the resumption of our 
journey, up the Cotinga,, was fixed for next morning, and its goal, 
Roraima, became the subject of conversation for the rest of the day. As 
Napoleon had already been there once, Jt bad the opportunity of recog- 
nising in him a geographical genius, because he readily modelled out for 
us in the sand a masterly contour map of the route we had to follow, 
of the course of the rivers we had to cross, of the lay of the mountain 
ranges and heights we had to climb, of the settlements we had to pass, 
and all of this with such precision as would later on astonisli us. He 
represented mountains and villages, according to their height and size, 
with varying little heaps of moist sand, the courses of the streams with 
narrow or luoad furrows. He took especial troulde to give us as faithful 
a picture as possilde of Roraima. • On this same day his gifts 
as a surgeon were also put to the best advantage, but not at the 
expense of my own person. One of our Indians had long been suffering 
with very bad headaches, consequent on a rush of blood to the head : 
venesection appeared to be the best cure. Napoleon understood the 
simple but doubtless very painful operation. After pinching up the vein 
lying immediately above the wrist with the fingers of the left band, he 
pierced it three times with the saw-like spine of a sting-ray naturally, 
upon pulling it out each time the recurved teeth increased the wound 
considerably, thereby releasing a fairly large quantity of excess blood, 
and then tying up tightly witli bush-rope. 
317. We broke camp on September 22nd and made our way up the 
Ootinga, the current of which repeatedly proved a hindrance to our 
onward course. The vegetation along the banks quite corresponded 
with that on the Takutu : flourishing ^Nfarareu trees decorated with their 
white blossoms towered over the dense flowery tops of some Tur/a and 
flfiupa ainrrieano bushes that filled the atmosphere with their scent, 
aad around which those iKautiful beetles, the /htfchi hieta, were 
swarming in countless numbei*s. In the aftei-noon, on the southwestern 
shore we reached the mouth of the small stream Warami where, on an 
iijsignificant eminence, lay the INlacusi settlement of the same name. 
