through, to facilitate their breaking off.

TIMBO.

The Indian has also discovered the means of poisoning the fish of the
lakes and pools, as well as the birds of the air. He extracts the
poison from a certain liana--the paullinia pinnata--which he calls
timbo. To do so, he collects a few pieces, about a yard long, and
mashes and soaks them in water, which soon becomes discoloured with the
milky poisonous juice of the plant. This he carries in a calabash, and
pours out on the water. In about half an hour, all the smaller fish,
over a wider space than that which he has sprinkled with the juice, rise
to the surface, floating on their sides, with their gills wide open. So
powerful is its nature, that but a slight quantity appeal's sufficient
to stupify them. Some time afterwards the larger fish appear; and even
for twenty-four hours afterwards a number rise floating dead on the
surface. The fish are evidently suffocated by the poison.

MODE OF SHOOTING AND NETTING TURTLE.

Both fish and turtle are shot by the natives with arrows. The Indian
takes his post on a little stage made of poles and cross-pieces of wood,
secured with lianas, on the margin of the pools frequented by the
turtles, armed with his bow and arrows. The arrow used for killing the
latter has a strong lancet-shaped steel point fitted into a peg which
enters the tip of the shaft. The peg is secured to the shaft by twine
made of the fibres of pineapple leaves. The line, some thirty or forty
yards long, is neatly wound round the body of the arrow. When the
muzzle enters the shell the peg drops out, and the pierced animal
descends with it towards the bottom, leaving the shaft floating on the
surface. The sportsman, hastening to the spot in his canoe, sends
another arrow into the turtle, and then humouring it by means of the two
cords, quickly gets it on board. It is extraordinary, the skill the
Indians will display on these occasions. They do not even wait for the
turtle coming to the surface, but watch for the tracks which it makes in
the water when swimming beneath it, and shoot with unerring aim.--At
certain seasons turtle in vast shoals wend their way up the Orinoco,
when, as they come to the surface to breathe, the Indians--who are on
the watch--shoot them with heavy arrows, which, falling perpendicularly,
pierce their thick coats; and they drift on shore, or are picked up by
the canoes kept in readiness for that purpose. Nets also are em