202 
A Bulwark Against Illicit Freedom. 
runi tills every Negro with terror because lie is made to work there. The 
Pennsylvania system would at all events in the ease of the lazy Negro 
drag after it none of the dismal consequences which it lias undeniably 
entailed in North America but, as is generally the case, would rather miss 
than attain the special object of the punishment, 
058. The Cuyuni at its mouth consists of fairly high clay banks 
which are here and there interrupted by masses of granite between 
which the muddy water of the current slowly makes its way. The 
Carib settlement soon rose ahead of us, the houses corresponding almost 
entirely in their construction with those of the other tribes whom we had 
hitherto visited. But the occupants seen here differed essentially in 
their whole outward appearance from the latter, not only in the darker 
colour of their skins, but also in their more thick-set and robust build of 
body and coarse hardly prepossessing features. The few men and 
women whom I found present were indeed not tattooed but on the other 
hand painted out of all proportion with Rucu and the dark blue juice 
of Genipa americana, in the most varied angular patterns which par- 
ticularly appeared most numerous on the legs. In the pierced ear-lobes 
they wore pieces of bamlm or jaguar teeth: in the pierced under-lip and 
at both corners of the mouth, several needles which, stuck from inside 
out, at the same time for the women formed a keen bulwark against any 
illicit freedom. Instead of the apron belts being made out of beads or 
tree bark, the women wore a covering of “salempores” reaching down 
to the middle of the thigh, the shape of which much resembled our 
bathing pants. To give unnatural girth to the calves, which amongst 
them is regarded as the greatest female perfection, 3-inch wide cotton 
bands are tied on the girls already in their earliest childhood both im- 
mediately below the knee as well as al>ove the ankle. The girl wears 
these fetters unaltered until she reaches full development. By this 
means the muscular growth becomes limited beneath the spaces that are 
tied, while the calves swell to an ungainly mass of muscle. The 
women wore their hair cut short immediately over the forehead while 
that of the rest of the head fell, disordered and tangled, over the 
shoulders, or in some cases was tied up in a bunch on top of the head. As 
soon as I entered the village it was evident that their whole character 
corresponded just as little with that of the tribes already known to me. 
The men were at the time busy finishing some paddles and the women 
making earthenware. After scarcely vouchsafing ns a haughty almost con. 
temptuous look, they turned their sulky eves back on their work, which 
they silently resumed without taking any further notice of us. We had 
been standing alongside them for some while without getting a syllable 
in reply to our questions when Hancock hit upon an expedient that 
formed the most exquisite mastefikey for opening the closed doors of 
their mouths. Without bothering further about them he turned round 
specially to Stöckle, and asked him to fetch the spirit-flask, as he had a 
powerful thirst on, and wanted to pour some of its contents into the 
water as was generally advised by doctors in general when drinking 
river-water. Hardly had the word “brandy” reached the ears of the 
company apparently absorbed in their work, than as if by magic all fiends 
