132 INDIAN MODE OF FISHING. Book T. 
part of the State of California between the Colorado desert 
and Los Angeles. 
A fire was burning under the roof on which some fish 
and a number of plantains were roasting. The fishes were 
of the species which, at Granada, is called guapote. I 
saw, besides, some little stores of mandioca-roots, sugar- 
cane, pine-apples, supa-nuts, and a fine guanavana. The 
latter, which is a well-known fruit of exquisite flavour and 
taste, is extremely rare at Granada, and, as it is not very 
likely that the foresight of these Indians should extend to 
planting of fruit-trees, must be supposed to grow wild in 
this region. The mandioca, however, the sugar-cane, 
and the pine-apples, are cultivated near their habitations, 
I saw them fishing on the river, which they did with bow 
and arrows, passing slowly and quietly along in a small 
canoe. The arrows, for that purpose, have a peculiar 
construction, being composed of two pieces, one of reed of 
the length of a common arrow forming the shaft ; the 
other of very hard wood, to which an iron point is fixed. 
The wooden piece is inserted into the reed in such a man- 
ner as to separate from it in consequence of the movements 
of the fish which has been hit ; when the former remains 
in the body of the fish, the latter, attached to it by a 
thread, swims on the water. The whole arrow is about 
six feet long. The iron points are of English manufacture, 
imported from Bluefields. Fish seemed to be a principal 
nourishment of these people. But the country is rich in 
game of all sorts. Manatees are in the river, tapirs in the 
thickets on its banks, deer, rabbits, cavias, pheasants, 
curassows, partridges, &c, everywhere in the bush and on 
the savana. 
From an old man, who seemed to be the head of the 
family and tolerably well understood the Spanish language, 
