Inside the arrangements are curious. There is a wide hall or avenue in the middle – that extends from end to end throughout the whole length of the parallelogram – and on both sides of the hall is a row of partitions, separated from each other by split palms or canes, closely placed. Each of these sections is the abode of a family, and the place of deposit for the hammocks, clay pots, calabash-cups, dishes, baskets, weapons, and ornaments, which are the private property of each. The hall is used for the larger cooking utensils – such as the great clay ovens and pans for baking the cassava, and boiling the caxire or chicha. This is also a neutral ground, where the children play, and where the dancing is done on the occasion of grand “balls” and other ceremonial festivals.
The common doorway is in the gable end, and is six feet wide by ten in height. It remains open during the day, but is closed at night by a mat of palm fibre suspended from the top. There is another and smaller doorway at the semicircular end; but this is for the private use of the chief, who appropriates the whole section of the semicircle to himself and his family.
Of course the above is only the general outline of a malocca. A more particular description would not answer for that of all the tribes of the Amazon. Among different communities, and in different parts of the Montaña, the malocca varies in size, shape, and the materials of which it is built; and there are some tribes who live in separate huts. These exceptions, however, are few, and as a general thing, that above described is the style of habitation throughout the whole Montaña, from the confines of Peru to the shores of the Atlantic. North and south we encounter this singular house-village, from the headwaters of the Rio Negro to the highlands of Brazil.
Most of the Amazonian tribes follow agriculture, and understood the art of tillage before the coming of the Spaniards. They practise it, however, to a very limited extent. They cultivate a little manioc, and know how to manufacture it into farinha or cassava bread. They plant the musaceae and yam, and understand the distillation of various drinks, both from the plantain and several kinds of palms. They can make pottery from clay, – shaping it into various forms, neither rude nor inelegant, – and from the trees and parasitical twiners that surround their dwellings, they manufacture an endless variety of neat implements and utensils.
Their canoes are hollow trunks of trees sufficiently well-shaped, and admirably adapted to their mode of travelling – which is almost exclusively by water, by the numerous canos and igaripes, which are the roads and paths of their country – often as narrow and intricate as paths by land.
The Indians of the tropic forest dress in the very lightest costume. Of course each tribe has its own fashion; but a mere belt of cotton cloth, or the inner bark of a tree, passed round the waist and between the limbs, is all the covering they care for. It is the guayuco. Some wear a skirt of tree bark, and, on grand occasions, feather tunics are seen, and also plume head-dresses, made of the brilliant wing and tail feathers of parrots and macaws. Circlets of these also adorn the arms and limbs. All the tribes paint, using the anotto, caruto, and several other dyes which they obtain from various kinds of trees, elsewhere more particularly described.
There are one or two tribes who tattoo their skins; but this strange practice is far less common among the American Indians than with the natives of the Pacific isles.
In the manufacture of their various household utensils and implements, as well as their weapons for war and the chase, many tribes of Amazonian Indians display an ingenuity that would do credit to the most accomplished artisans. The hammocks made by them have been admired everywhere; and it is from the valley of the Amazon that most of these are obtained, so much prized in the cities of Spanish and Portuguese America. They are the special manufacture of the women, the men only employing their mechanical skill on their weapons:
The hammock, “rede,” or “maqueira,” is manufactured out of strings obtained from the young leaves of several species of palms. The astrocaryum, or “tucum” palm furnishes this cordage, but a still better quality is obtained from the “miriti” (Mauritia flexuosa). The unopened leaf, which forms a thick-pointed column growing up out of the crown of the tree, is cut off at the base, and this being pulled apart, is shaken dexterously until the tender leaflets fall out. These being stripped of their outer covering, leave behind a thin tissue of a pale-yellowish colour, which is the fibre for making the cordage. After being tied in bundles this fibre is left awhile to dry, and is then twisted by being rolled between the hand and the hip or thigh. The women perform this process with great dexterity. Taking two strands of fibre between the forefinger and thumb of the left hand, they lay them separated a little along the thigh; a roll downward gives them a twist, and then being adroitly brought together, a roll upwards completes the making of the cord. Fifty fathoms in a day is considered a good day’s spinning. The cords are afterwards dyed of various colours, to render them more ornamental when woven into the maqueira.
The making of this is a simple process. Two horizontal rods are placed at about seven feet apart, over which the cord is passed some fifty or sixty times, thus forming the “woof.” The warp is then worked in by knotting the cross strings at equal distances apart, until there are enough. Two strong cords are then inserted where the rods pass through, and these being firmly looped, so as to draw all the parallel strings together, the rod is pulled out, and the hammock is ready to be used.
Of course, with very fine “redes,” and those intended to be disposed of to the traders, much pains are taken in the selection of the materials, the dyeing the cord, and the weaving it into the hammock. Sometimes very expensive articles are made ornamented with the brilliant feathers of birds cunningly woven among the meshes and along the borders.
Besides making the hammock, which is the universal couch of the Amazonian Indian, the women also manufacture a variety of beautiful baskets. Many species of palms and calamus supply them with materials for this purpose, one of the best being the “Iu” palm (Astrocaryum acaule). They also make many implements and utensils, some for cultivating the plantains, melons, and manioc root, and others for manufacturing the last-named vegetable into their favourite “farinha” (cassava). The Indians understood how to separate the poisonous juice of this valuable root from its wholesome farina before the arrival of white men among them; and the process by which they accomplish this purpose has remained without change up to the present hour, in fact, it is almost the same as that practised by the Spaniards and Portuguese, who simply adopted the Indian method. The work is performed by the women, and thus: the roots are brought home from the manioc “patch” in baskets, and then washed and peeled. The peeling is usually performed by the teeth; after that the roots are grated, the grater being a large wooden slab about three feet long, a foot wide, a little hollowed out, and the hollow part covered all over with sharp pieces of quartz set in regular diamond-shaped patterns. Sometime a cheaper grater is obtained by using the aerial root of the pashiuba palm (Iriartea exhorhiza), which, being thickly covered over with hard spinous protuberances, serves admirably for the purpose.
The grated pulp is next placed to dry upon a sieve, made of the rind of a water-plant, and is afterwards put into a long elastic cylinder-shaped basket or net, of the bark of the “jacitara” palm (Desmoncus macroacanthus). This is the tipiti; and at its lower end there is a strong loop, through which a stout pole is passed; while the tipiti itself, when filled with pulp, is hung up to the branch of a tree, or to a firm peg in the wall. One end of the pole is then rested against some projecting point, that serves as a fulcrum, while the Indian woman, having seated herself upon the other end, with her infant in her arms, or perhaps some work in her hands, acts as the lever power. Her weight draws the sides of the tipiti together, until it assumes the form of an inverted cone; and thus the juice is gradually pressed out of the pulp, and drops into a vessel placed underneath to receive it. The mother must be careful that the little imp does not escape from under her eye, and perchance quench its thirst out of the vessel below. If such an accident were to take place, in a very few minutes she would have to grieve for a lost child; since the sap of the manioc root, the variety most cultivated by the Indians, is a deadly poison. This is the “yucca