Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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Animals May With Impunity Be Wounded With Poisoned Arrows, If
The Wound Be Well Laid Open, And The Point Imbued With Poison Be
Withdrawn Immediately After The Wound Is Made.
If salt or sugar be
employed in these cases, people are tempted to regard them as
excellent specifics.
Indians, who had been wounded in battle by
weapons dipped in the curare, described to us the symptoms they
experienced, which were entirely similar to those observed in the bite
of serpents. The wounded person feels congestion in the head, vertigo,
and nausea. He is tormented by a raging thirst, and numbness pervades
all the parts that are near the wound.
The old Indian, who was called the poison-master, seemed flattered by
the interest we took in his chemical processes. He found us
sufficiently intelligent to lead him to the belief that we knew how to
make soap, an art which, next to the preparation of curare, appeared
to him one of the finest of human inventions. When the liquid poison
had been poured into the vessels prepared for their reception, we
accompanied the Indian to the festival of the juvias. The harvest of
juvias, or fruits of the Bertholletia excelsa,* (* The Brazil-nut.)
was celebrated by dancing, and by excesses of wild intoxication. The
hut where the natives were assembled, displayed during several days a
very singular aspect. There was neither table nor bench; but large
roasted monkeys, blackened by smoke, were ranged in regular order
against the wall. These were the marimondes (Ateles belzebuth), and
those bearded monkeys called capuchins, which must not be confounded
with the weeper, or sai (Simia capucina of Buffon). The manner of
roasting these anthropomorphous animals contributes to render their
appearance extremely disagreeable in the eyes of civilized man.
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