$6.

95

Wizard of the
Upper Amazon
This is the true and astounding story of a Peru

vian youth from Iquitos who, on a rubber-cutting

expedition into the Amazon forest, was taken cap

tive by Amahuaca Indians and carried off to their
remote jungle village at the headwaters of the
Madre de The Huni Kui were savage,
E>ios River.

cannibalistic tribesmen, and Manuel a frightened

and inexperienced young man from adically

-
different culture; but as he watc captors
and began to pick up their became
obvious that their pi-- lot of a

gastronomical n- ne their
leader! A**- _^ionged observation a_.ct testing,
they inducted him into f ^
- se him to
- 1

replace rhe ;
'
~ a _ju~r. /is p<-. A t w- *^^ training,

he was schooled in the use of the ''vision vine,'

7

t$*e elaborate ritual surrounding the drinking of

this hallucinatory extract, and the lessons to be

learned froirtits effects. The vibrant and haunting

descriptions of Manuel's "trips" on the wings of
this vision vine, with the wizened old headman as
his mentor, provide somo-t5l the most arresting
.
{begitirtued on back flap)

FACKET DESIGN: JAMES AND RUTH MCCREA

 1AP8 BY AVA MORGAN

Copyright 1971 by F. Bruce Lamb

All rights reserved

Library of Congress catalog card number 7$-l$9$14

Published simultaneously in Canada by

McClelland and Stewart Ltd.

Manufactured in the United States of America by

Kingsport Press, Inc., Kingsportt Tennessee
Designed by Kathleen Carey
First Edition
 ry/v fss* rxx. /xx.
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vvx fss. vvx vvV xx V vv V xxx SSx ^^t

Foreword

THE YISION-PRODTTCING extract o

Tittwca, ajungle vine, became a subject of discussion
soon after my arrival in Peru. I came to survey the
forest resources in the drainage area of a group of
tipper Amazon River tributaries. Support personnel
and equipment for my field work in this primitive
area came from a local mahogany sawmill with an
operations base at Iquitos. This company had a river
fleet of log-towing motor launches and men familiar

with the streams and forests of the region.

At Iquitos I met the man who was going with me
as a guide. I learned that Manuel Cordova had spent
most of his lif e in the forest and because of his knowl
edge was retained by the company to obtain medi
cinal and other extracts from forest plants for test-

7103193
KANSAS CITY (MO.) PUBLIC LIBRARY
 FOBE WOBD
ing and commercial use. Among these was the deadly
curare, jungle-vine extract used by the Indians for
their blpwgun darts and in modern medicine as a
muscle relaxant in delicate surgical operations.
Cordova knew the Indian secret of making an extract
concentrate that could be shipped or stored without

spoilage.
Before leaving Iquitos I found out that Cordova
was a healer of considerable fame the man people
went to for help when the medical profession found
a case incurable. On our trip this became evident.
Whenever we made a stop at some riverside village,
there would soon be someone on board the launch

looking for Don Manuel. He would be greeted

warmly and reminded of a miraculous cure he had

performed on either the visitor or a member of his

family.
'The forest area drained by the Rio Tigre was
firston our resource survey program. After an
aerial reconnaissance ina small chartered airplane,
ground observations were undertaken from the river,
using a motor launch as a floating operations base.
When we left the river to go into the forest on foot
we usually took a man from the closest village as a
local guide. One day we were going along a faint
forest trail without the usual machete trail-cutting.
I noticed that every fifty feet or so Cordova was

breaking over the tip of an undergrowth forest plant

about waist high.
That evening when we were back on the launch I
mentioned that the pnly other time I had seen this

VI
 PO BE W OfcD

trail-marking method used was when working with the

Apiaca Indians on the headwaters of the Rio Tapa-
jos in Matto Grosso, Brazil, Cordava replied that he
had learned this easy way of marking a jungle trail
from the Amahuaca Indians. This led to an exchange
of Indian stories in which I soon found myself doing
most of the listening.
Several days had already been spent examining
the forest at other locations by the time we arrived
at a place on the riverbank called Santa Helena,

graced by a small palm-thatched tambito. By this

time we had established an operating routine and I
was familiar with the crew.
was early in the morning when we eased the
It
launch up to the riverbank and made fast to a tree.
We found the palm-thatched house at Santa Helena
empty and the fireplace cold. But the anchorage was
convenient to the mouth of a small creek nearby, and
we cook to make peace with the owner if he
left the

should return in our absence. The creek provided

access to a forest area we wanted to examine, and
soon we were on our way in a canoe outfitted with an
outboard motor. The trees arched and closed over
the narrow channel, and we found ourselves navi
gating up a wandering tunnel in the jungle vegeta
tion.

Arriving back about midday at the tairibito where

our launch was tied up, we found that the owner had
returned with his family and a friend. The two men
were conversing in a language I could not under
stand. After greeting us in Spanish they went back
to their private idiom. I noticed Cordova listening

intently, and soon, to the surprise

of the men, he

entered the conversation, which continued with ani

mation for many minutes. When it broke up, the two
local men stepped into a canoe and disappeared into
the thick curtain of vegetation that hangs over the
banks of all tropical streams.
Cordova came over and explained that the visitor
5
was from several days canoe travel up a branch of
the Rio Tigre, the Pucacuro. He had been through
a siege of bad backaches and had come to consult
with his friend about a cure. Now they had gone into
the forest to collect the ayahuasca vine and yaje
leaves. Tonight they were going to have a session of
visions from drinking the extract of these plants to
determine what cure should be applied for the back
aches.Cordova expressed interest in participating,
saying that he had had some experience
in this sort

of thing- We decided to wait.

Soon the men returned with several two-foot
in diameter, but
lengths of a vine about wrist size
no yaje leaves. The vine was sent across the river to

a village for preparation, and the men went off again

into the forest to look for the lacking ingredient.
Mid-afternoon we took the launch over to the
village so that Cordova could check
on the medicinal

preparations. While he was doing

this I tried to

photograph a very restless young ocelot that some

boys had on a vine leash. Soon Cordova came

out of
one of the houses and boarded the launch. The motor
started and I boarded to see what was up.

viu
 FO

Cordova explained with disgust that the prepara

tions of the vision extract were completely inade

quate. The boiling-down process was taking place in

a dirty aluminum pot tended by a small boy. Drink
ing such improperly prepared extract would only
cause violent vomiting, intestinal cramps and
diarrhea, according to Cordova. He explained that
to obtain the desired visions, the brew had to be boiled
slowly and with reverence in a special earthenware
pot over a low fire. It was dangerous, he said, to take
improperly prepared ayahuasca.
Cordova's background for making such a critical
judgment became evident as our days of collabora
tion on the forest survey turned into months of joint
effort to extract valuable information from the
Amazon jungle. A broad field of common interest
related to the tropical forest and its inhabitants was
revealed as rapport between us developed.

By fascinating bits and pieces the following story

of Cordova's life as a young man in the forest came
out.In the process my esteem and admiration grew
as I became aware of his desire and ability to al
leviate human suffering and his frustrated urge to
perpetuate the use of his exotic knowledge. All of
which extends far beyond the boundaries of the
present story.

F. BRUCE LAMB
New York City

IX
 Tft

\/
vy

Acknowledgment*
\
\/
\

Acknowledgments are due Michael and Carolyn

Kaye of Pacific High School, Palo Alto, California,
for a critical review of the manuscript ; Maria Luisa
Munoz of the University of Puerto Rico, Dorothy
and Maurice Kamen-Kaye of Cambridge, Massa
chusetts, and Dennis Stock of Magnum Photos, Inc.,
New York City, for review and helpful suggestions ;
Marvin Ginsky of U.S. Plywood Champion Papers
Inc., for advice Allen MacKenzie of U.S. Plywood-
;

Champion Papers Inc., and Ed Palmer of Young &

Rubicam, Inc., for help in finding a home for the
manuscript; and to Elizabeth Lamb for assistance
in producing the manuscript.

F.B.L.
 Contents
\/
\/

Caucho Camp / 5
/ Iff
Strange Village
Visions / 99
Hunting Camp / b
Hunting Stories / 65
Invasion / 77

Apprenticeship / 86
Indian Caucho / 98

Legends / ISO

Marriage / IS

Jaguars / 14-0

Assassin / 14$
Transition / 160
Frustration / 170
Release / 189
Return / 194
Appendix: The Relation of Various Vision-Causing
Extracts I
 BOLIVIA

i Cordova Travel Routs

 Caucho Camp

THE HAUNTING melancholy cry of a forest

tinamou (tropical jungle partridge) floated on the
evening air from nearby and was answered so faintly
from off in the depths of the jungle that it could
hardly be heard. A vague
but persistent feeling of
foreboding lingered in my thoughts as I tended a
fragrant stew bubbling in an iron pot over an open
fire. It was 1907, and I was alone in a
jungle caucho
rubber camp. Darkness was approaching and my
companions should have returned ravenous with
hunger by mid-afternoon. They had gone off in the
forest at dawn
to tap newly located latex-producing
caucho trees. It had been my turn to cook, so I had
been left to tend camp and prepare a meal for their
return.

3
 CATTCHO CAMP
Now, as I added a couple of sticks to the fire, I
remembered the warning of a trader at the last out
post on the Jurua River as we traveled through a
corner of Brazil toward this isolated section of Peru.

My companions had scoffed at the warning those

soft Brazilian seringelros might be worried about

Indians, but not tough Peruvian caucheros!

We had come to this totally isolated area on the
advice of an old cauchero who had tapped rubber
here during an earlier rubber boom. Our camp was
on a small tributary of the upper Rio Jurua. There
was a small palm-thatched cooking shack and, ad
joining it, a larger shelter with supplies stored in
the back and our sleeping hammocks hung in the
front. And all of this set in a small jungle clearing,
to let in some sunlight.
In the fading light of a setting sun a noisy flock
of parrots flew over in pairs on their way to a roost

ing tree, and the sundown cicada buzzed loudly in a

nearby tree* The momentary twilight of the tropics
was quickly fading into the dark of night. I tried to
that my com
piece together the plans for the day
before
panions had revealed in their conversation
departing this morning. Roqui and Encarnacion had
planned to fell and tap caucho trees already located
some distance from camp. Toribio and Domingo in
tended to explore for more distant trees. It was pos
sible they might still come in, but more likely now

that they would sleep in the forest. I knew they

didn't like to travel this trackless forest after dark.
I was only fifteenyears old, impatient and hun
gry, and decided not to wait any longer but to eat
 CATJCHO CAMF

ray portion of the stew. I watched the fire and the

flickering shadows it cast in our small forest clear
ing. Night sounds were replacing those of the day.
A raucous tree frog started cur-awning up in the
crotch of a tree. He was soon answered by another.
Two takuayos (tropical whippoorwills) carried on
a melodious dialogue. Once I thought I heard the
men coming, but no one appeared. The fire died
down and I decided to cover it with dirt and ashes
to hold it till morning.
Frustrated, I went to my hammock and covered
myself to avoid the mosquitoes. But sleep would not
come. The familiar sound of crickets and other in
sects provided a continuous pulsating background
hum for other intermittent sounds of the night.
There was a forest partridge nearby that sang out
periodically with a clear flutelike call. A trumpeter
bird also floated his call on the heavy night air, and
a nocturnal monkey repeated his plaintive piping
note over and over in an accelerating sequence. The
trumpeter calls. seemed to alternate from different
directions around the camp, and there were many
calls and sounds I had not heard before and could
not identify. This increased my uneasiness and I
felt for the rifle under my hammock for reassurance.

It had rained in the late afternoon, and now a

rotten branch of a big tree came crashing down near

by. This brought me sitting straight up in my ham

mock. To my nerves, I thought to myself,
calm
That's the reason for our camp clearing so none
can fall on us.

Settling back into my hammock, I went over the

 C ATT CHO CAMP
events that had brought me here to the depths of
the forest. In Iquitos I had lived with my father and
mother and completed as much schooling as was
available. Steamships coming up the Amazon from
the Atlantic Ocean to this most inland port brought
the news of a rubber boom, and Iquitos merchants

began outfitting of men to organize rubber-

groups
finished
production camps in the forest. Having
school and with some forest experience already, I

persuaded my family to let me go upriver

to the

town Here my sister's husband was active

of Iberia.
in rubber trading, and I would have a chance for a
start in this growing business. When I arrived at

Iberia, Lino agreed to let me go with four of his

caucho cutters who were preparing to move into new
territory.
We traveled east by canoe on a narrow canal,
"sacarita Iberia," which connected the Rio Ucayalli
with the Rio Tapiche at high water. Going north
down the sluggish black-water Tapiche, we came to
the mouth of the Rio Blanco. From there we traveled

up the Blanco to a small tributary, Lobo. Then, sell

ing our canoe, we packed two days overland
to the

headwaters of the Rio Ipixuna. Here, in Brazil, we

went down the Ipixuna to the Jurua and then up the
Jurua until we were back in Peru -or thought we
were. No boundaries had yet been marked between
the two countries, so it was impossible to be sure. We

had established ourcamp, and the first few days of

locating caucho trees around the camp gave us rea
son to expect this would be a profitable location. The
 CAUCHO CAMP
trip made with four seasoned caucheros had been a
challenge and an education for me. My confidence,
at fifteen, was unlimited.
Another tropical downpour with thunder and
lightning passed over the camp. The cool air caused
me to wrap up in my blanket and I dozed off into a
troubled sleep.
With the first light of dawn a group of toucans
awakened me with their raucous calling from a near
by treetop. I took the shotgun with the idea of get
ting one for breakfast, but the partridge I had heard
the night before made the mistake of showing himself
first, and he was soon in my hands. As
I turned to go

back, a sudden impression of not being alone in the

forest startled me and the hair on my neck bristled.
I paused to look around. The tall trees were fes
tooned with vines and lianas, some attached to the
tree trunks, others hanging free from the upper
branches. Small trees and underbrush made it im
possible to see very far even though the undergrowth
was not thick in this forest of big trees. I could nei

ther see nor hear anything but the jungle and its
usual sounds, and I returned to camp with my par
tridge.
There I stirred up and prepared a spit on
the fire

which to roast the bird, thenwent to the stream for

fresh water. The creek was slow and clear. By then
the sun was sending shafts of sunlight to the forest
floor. A dragonfly hovered and darted in and out of

the sunlight over the water. I saw the flash of the

silvery side of a big sabalo fish in the depths of a

 CATJCHO CAMP

pool and thought of catching him later. As I dipped

the bucket for water, a slight movement and spund

caught my attention.
Turning my head, I found myself surrounded by
a group of naked Indians. They had fantastic de
signs painted in black on their brown bodies. Each
had either a wicked lance or a bow and arrow aimed
at me. We were thus frozen for a moment without
movement or sound. Then one of them stepped for
ward and took first the hunting knife from my belt
and then the bucket from my hand. He was immedi
ately followed by two others, who tied my hands be
hind my back.
It was all done so quickly, as ifby plan, that there
was no chance for a struggle and to what purpose
even if I had tried, with the odds at least fifteen to
one?
On
a command which I could not understand, we
allreturned to the camp. There, while two stood

guard beside me, the others took the camp apart. It

was all directed by one man and was well organized.
Everything useful was quickly arranged into pack
loads.The half-roasted partridge I had put over
the was portioned out and gulped down quickly.
fire

I was given some and I forced myself to eat it,

against an unknown future. Our camp shelters went
tip in flames.

During all this my mind was a hurricane of

thoughts, trying to understand what was happening
while at the same time searching for something I
could do. At one moment I thought surely my com-
 CATJCHO CAMP
panions would return and let go with a fusillade of
rifleshots at these savages and set me free. But then
I realized all of our firearms were accounted for in
the equipment being collected into pack loads.
Where were my friends? Had the Indians kept them
from coming in last night? What had been done to
them? And what were the plans for my future? We
had heard stories of cannibals in this area. What
chance of escape might there be?
I looked around at the Indians and noticed that

my guards were intently watching every move I

made, even a turning of the head. All of these men,
though not large, seemed well built, muscular. Their
movements were smooth and purposeful. Each one
was naked except for a belt or band at the waist.
Now my captors formed a single line with me in
the middle, the men immediately in front and behind
me obviously responsible for my actions. Then we
were off through the forest, leaving the camp a
smoldering ruin.
As we left and during the first few hours I kept
track of the direction of travel. The sun was over

my left shoulder, so it was southwest we were going.

There was no sign of a trail that I could see, but the
pace was fast. The Indians seemed to glide through
the forest without effort, while vines and thorns were

constantly pulling at me. It was especially difficult

for me with my hands tied. I needed them for bal
ance. But from the first moment my instinct had
been to show no sign of weakness or emotion, and I
kept up somehow.

9
 CATJCHO CAMP
We maintained a southwesterly direction up and
down hills through rolling country. I tried
keep to
track of the small streams we crossed, as landmarks,
but with the exertion of our pace I soon lost track.
In the forest the sunlight seldom reached the ground,
so it was cool, but with the high humidity and the
exertion of trying to keep up I was constantly in a
running sweat.
As the pace of travel kept on without let-up I be
came less and less aware of the details of my sur

roundings. By mid-afternoon I was exhausted and,

even with extreme effort, was stumbling as I walked.
We stopped by a small stream and my hands were
untied. By example they indicated that I should
wash and rinsemy mouth. But when I gulped the
my mouth, they led me away
water instead of rinsing
from the stream. I was dying of thirst, but they
would let me have no more water. Pieces of smoked
meat were passed around. Mine was so dry I could
hardly swallow it, but I knew I had to eat to survive
. and forced it down.
After only a short time my hands were tied again
and we were off. The food helped, and strength to
go on came from some reserve, perhaps in the mind.
This time it was for all night. As dusk deepened into
darkness the pace slowed somewhat to accommodate

my difficulties, but we did not stop until daylight.

Stopping again at a small stream, I followed
gestured instructions, rinsing my mouth out and
swallowing only a small amount of water in spite of
the desire to gulp it down. They allowed me to bathe.

10
 C A TT C HO CAMP
My body was covered with scratches from a thou
sand thorns along the way and my clothes were in
tatters. The pause was only a brief one, and we were

soon walking again at the forced pace of the day be

fore. This we kept up for another day and another

night!
I was near the point of collapse from exhaustion
after these two days and two nights of almost con
tinuous forced march.For the last few hours before
dawn on the third day I was barely staggering for
ward. As it was getting light we came up a small
hill and stopped. Here my captors opened a well-

hidden deposit of supplies. I collapsed on the ground

in an agony of fatigue. Even breathing seemed an
effort beyond my power. I was in fact barely con
scious, my mind able to develop only the most frag
mented bits of thought: Where? . How? . . *. .

Why? . . .

After several hours of tortured rest and fitful

sleep I was prodded into eating and was given a

small clay dish of thick sour liquid to drink. This

proved to be refreshing and stimulating, and I felt

as if I werecoming painfully back to life.
Late in the afternoon two Indians came into camp
from the direction of our arrival and seemed to re
port, with many gestures, to the leader. This must
have been a rear guard who had been checking to see
if we had been followed. I knew that we had not

been, for even if one or more of my companions had

escaped and gone for help, it would take days to
reach the nearest settlement. And the possibility of

11
 C ATfC HO CAMP
their survival seemed very unlikely. The Indians
also must have been satisfied, because we rested on

through the night, but they did not build a fire.

Before dark one of my guards rubbed crushed
leaves of a small shrub on my scratches and cuts,
which relieved the itching and pain and also stopped
the bleeding. This was done withput any show of
favor or feeling.
As soon as the sun went down, moisture from the
high humidity in the air began to condense on the
leaves and was soon dripping from the treetqps with
a constant patter that continued all night. For pro
tection against this cold dripping dew, the Indians

put up individual palm-leaf shelters on stick frames.

They were only large enough to sit in, and mine was
surrounded by others with no avenue of escape. It
was a night of cold, misery, pain and fear that I will
never forget. My whole body ached from unbeliev
able exertion and I was emotionally shattered by
events. My thoughts were still fragmentary and dis

connected mostly of the past. But what of the

future? A formless void to be filled by events still un
dreamed I had heard plenty of Indian stories in
of.

the villages and camps we had visited on the way to

the Jurua. Storytelling was a pastime. But reality
in all that I had heard was unclear.
I was prodded from a troubled sleep at dawn. All
evidence of our camp was carefully scattered before
we set out again. We stopped at the first stream for
a bath, and then the march was on again still

southwest, but at a more moderate pace now. The

12
 CATJCHO CAMP
Indians seemed released from the first pressure of
escape from the area of their attack.
I tried to keep track of the days, and I tried to
observe the country. I knew that the Rio Jurua was
to our right, for we had crossed no major river. It
was up and down hills, over fallen trees, through
swamps and small streams. Compared to the gruel
ing pace of the first two days and nights, this part
of the journey was mild. We stopped every night to
restand traveled only from dawn to dusk.
One day it was cloudy and rainy all day. The
forest was eerie, shrouded in whitish mist. The rain
was through the foliage starting 150 feet
filtered

above our heads. The air was heavy, completely

saturated with moisture. Every leaf and twig dis

charged its load of accumulated moisture if touched.

This was the kind of day when caucheros stayed in
camp, mended their clothes, ate and talked.
On what by my count was the ninth day of travel,
I noticed about noon one of the Indians rejoining
the line with a small forest deer slung over his shoul
der.Later another appeared with two game birds.
This was the first hunting I had noticed on the trip.
The feeling the Indians this morning had
among
been differentsomehow faces less severe and some
conversation back and forth. The pace had definitely

picked up again.
About mid-afternoon I saw off to the left a mo
mentary break in the forest, a whole big patch of
blue sky. Soon after we passed by what was obvi

ously a cultivated patch of yucca.

13
 CATJCHO CAMP
We must be nearing a village, I thought. What
would the end of the journey bring? Why had these
Indians not already killed me? I was quite sure they
had killed one, if not all, of my cauchero companions.
The way now led up a long hill. Suddenly there
was a loud squawking of macaws and almost immedi
ately we stepped into a village clearing filled with
naked Indians men, women and children. They
crowded around and pushed one another for a better
view. There was an immediate hubbub of chattering
that stopped abruptly when a thin, ancient, long
haired old man stepped calmly through the throng.
He came up to where I stood, my hands still tied
behind my back, and deliberately looked me over.
I looked back at him just as deliberately. I saw a

very old man with a distinct Oriental cast to his face.

A feathered headband held back a shock of reddish-
brown hair that came to the middle of his back. A
few long yellowish whiskers on his upper lip and
chin added to the Oriental look. And whereas every
other Indian in sight was naked, he wore a simple
sleeveless garment of coarse white cotton that came

almost to his bony knees. This, I knew, must be the

chief.

I was determined not to move an eyelash or to

show a sign of emotion or fear. The noise soon

startedup again children squealed men and women

:
;

grimaced at one another and shouted; the macaws

were squawking again.
The chief stepped close, carefully unbound my
arms and instructed my captors to remove the tat-
 CATJCHO CAMP
tered remnants of my clothes. More people were
joining the jostling crowd of what must have been
over a hundred. A
group of very old women came up
to look me They tested my solid flesh and
over.
cackled. But one old woman was of a different mood.
She came up with a heavy palm club in her hand and
began to mutter angrily as she glared at me. Sud
denly, with a wailing screech, she brought up the
club and came at me in a frenzy.
The old chief, still at my side, gave a sharp com
mand. The leader of my captors brusquely grabbed
the club from the old woman and with a single, deft

swing of it knocked her to the ground with a crush

A gasping sigh passed through the
ing, killing blow.
crowd as the club was tossed onto the body and, at a
command from the chief, the other old women
dragged the corpse away.
Another command from the chief, and two of my
captors led me behind the old man into the largest
of a group of conical houses. The roof and walls
were one and came clear to the ground. Inside it was
dark and smoky.

15
 v vv \ v\ ,\ V\ aXVs A.V\ AV\ ANN A VV ->V> V>S *\SN JSVs Vt
"TT/
^.
rr* mrSS~SrjSrS ~SSf ~S^S ~SSS ~SS'S~SSf ~SSS ~S^S ~^^^~7^\\

/V Strange Village

/\

/\

WHEN MT EYES adjusted to the darkness in

side this large conical house I could see that it shel
tered many people. The only source of light was two
or three small cooking fires and in one side a small
door opening that would allow only a single person
to pass. Many things were hanging from the pole
rafters in the storage space above, and groups of
small hammocks hung between upright poles that
supported the roof.
My hands were loosely tied again, in front this
time so that I could use them. The chief motioned
me hammocks and I sat down. He and
to one of the

my captors moved to one side and started a discus

sion that went on for many hours, with different
people coming and going. Two or three old women
 STEASTGE VILLAGE
with black palm clubs took up vigilant guard duty
near my hammock. I was aware, in the closed dark
confines of the house, of a strange, persistent, musky
odor given off by these people.
Soon a young girl brought a gourd dish of a thick
semi-liquid drink that was much more strongly fer
mented than that which we had on the trip. I refused
it came back, after speaking to the
after a taste. She

chief, with a similar liquid having the aroma of ba

nanas. This I drank with relish and felt somewhat
refreshed.
I remember very little of those few weeks. It was
a nightmare of confusion and depression, giving
way to a gradual adjustment to my strange sur
roundings. In thinking back over the events of my
capture and trek to the village, I came to the conclu
sion that companions had all been killed. If any
my
had survived they would never be able to find me
here. I thought of them and my family and sank
into the depths of a depression that lasted for several

days. Gradually a feeling of determination replaced

the depression a determination to somehow shape
events to my advantage.
Prom the pattern of daily routine it was evident
that there was no immediate threat to my life. I un
derstood not a single word of the constant talk that
went on around me. It seemed that there was always
a commotion in where some twenty men,
this house,

women and children lived; two or three cooking

fires were always burning; pet animals and birds
tamed from the forest wandered in and out. Day

IT
 STBANGE TILLAGE
seemed Kttle different from night in the windowless
shelter. I was taken out for exercise at least twice a

day, always well guarded.

The Indians' stares of curiosity and grimaces
when they looked at me diminished as the days
passed. A feeling of some confidence
returned when
I realized that the children were showing me a con

siderable clandestine friendly attention. If I were

regarded and spoken of with ill feeling by the par

ents, this would not happen.
A few incidents of the early weeks do stand out
in my mind. Several days after I arrived a group of
men dragged in a woman completely bound, hand
and foot, with vines and gagged. She was brought
to the chief's section of the house, where I was also

kept. When the gag was removed the captive

screamed and raged, writhing on the floor, straining
her bonds. The men went off and left her; the old
women took over, as directed by the chief.

During the two days the captive would break

first

into a ranting rage, screaming and frothing at the

mouth every time anyone approached, but she was
quiet when left alone. She was obviously becoming
weak from lack of food.
On the third day one of the old women of the
tribe came up. She stood and watched for a long time
as the captive writhed on the floor, trying to break
the bonds. Finally the old one, who was one of my

guards also, shook her head and muttered to herself.

She went away but was soon back with a bundle of
various herbs and a wooden bowl with some water

18
 STB AN GE
in it. herbs she chopped and crushed in the wa
The
ter until she had a green semi-liquid mass. Then she

approached the bound woman, who again began to

struggle. At this the old woman took gobs of
her
mixture and spattered them on the struggling,
straining body of the captive, until she was prac
tically covered with a green film of shredded
herbs.

Gradually the struggling stopped and the old woman

left her victim apparently asleep.

next morning she came back and cut off all

The
the bonds. There was no outburst of rage, no strug

gle. The captive was led out of

the house by the arm,
as if in a trance. Later she was brought back, bathed,
and left sitting, unbound, in a hammock. The next
day she placidly went to work with the other women
a slave, perhaps, but not ill treated.
I had heard about jungle medicine, but this was

my first exposure. What of this was in store for me?

Some days later,perhaps two weeks after my
arrival I lost track of time I was led out of the
house to find the tribe assembled. My guards, or
escort, took me up to the chief in front of the silent
crowd. He was dressed in his white robe again. There
appeared to be no feeling of threat in the crowd, but
my insides were crawling. I was determined not to
show it.

The chief started a melodious chant and took

from an assistant some branches covered with leaves
that had a fragrant odor. He brushed my body with
these as he chanted. Then a bowl was brought full
of liquid, also fragrant but different. I was care-

19
fully bathed with this by an assistant as the chief
chanted.
It wasover in a few minutes. Without any
all

great show of reaction toward the ceremony, the

crowd quietly broke up, apparently satisfied.
I was mystified and awaited some reaction to my
ceremonial bath. None came, and the import was a

complete mystery to me because I still understood

not a word of the strange Indian language.
A few days later there started what I recognized
as attempts tocommunicate with me in words. Point
ing to nearby objects or handing them to me, the
chief would say a word and wait expectantly for me
to repeat it and then again, to fix it in my memory.
This helped to relieve the monotony of my restrained
existence. I cooperated voluntarily to relieve bore

dom.
Another time I was led out in the early morning
to finda crowd gathered around the white-robed
chief. He was chanting now in front of a newborn
boy in his mother's arms. The chants sounded the
same as before, and the ceremony with the fragrant
leaves and bath were the same. When they finished
with the baby, it was repeated again with me which
made me think. It seemed like a natural baptism

ceremony. they baptizing me into the tribe?

Were
The lack of communication between us still made

questions or explanations impossible.

The restraints on my existence were gradually
removed, but I was watched very closely, even at
night, and was never left unattended. Other words

20
 STBANGE VILLAGE
were added to my vocabulary of names of objects.
Slowly a link of understanding was developing.
Several weeks after my arrival I was again pre
sented in solemn ceremony before the assembled
tribe. This time the ceremony was different. The
chief began a chant I had not heard before, and the
others responded and participated in a shuffling kind
of dance without moving about. It was long and in
volved. In the end the chief took a branch of large
leaves and carefully brushed them the full length
of my body from the four directions of the compass
east first, then from the west, the north and the

south.
After this I was taken down to the nearby creek
where I now took a daily bath. Here a special herbal
bath had been prepared in a large pot over a fire.
It was only lukewarm as they ceremoniously bathed
me. Then with gestures I was instructed to sit down,
holding my knees under my chin, and to remain mo
tionless. A coarse hand-woven cotton cloth was then
draped to cover me completely. It was suffocating
underneath. With the small daily incidents of life
in the village I had become less and less apprehen
sive. But now the old fears of my capture and arrival
crowded back. Was this a sacrifice ceremony? Would
it be better to jump up and resist and at least die

fighting?
I tried to pray for guidance, but it had been such
a long time since the days when I had had some
meager religious instruction in school in Iquitos that
I couldn't really find any words. Time dragged ; my

21
 STRANGE VILLAGE
nerves were tense awaiting what? Near-suffocation
and muscle cramps became almost unbearable.
Finally the cape was withdrawn with a flourish
and what I interpreted as a joyous shout went up
from the onlookers. It was the first time I had seen

anything pleasant expressions on the assembled

lite

faces. The men crowded around, smiling and talking

rapidly. I could not understand, but the gestures

seemed to say that I was now one of them. They made
no gesture of leading me around any more. We just
drifted back to the village. I still had no idea of
where I was expected to fit into this strange primi
tive world, but it seemed that I was slowly being

accepted as a member of the tribe.

Shortly after the ceremony I was lined up with a
group of young men and we were given a piece of
woody green stem to chew. It was astringent but
not unpleasant. In a few hours our teeth all turned
black. I learned later that this was called paka niccpo
and came from the stem of a forest shrub. If it was
used several times during youth, the teeth would be
protected from decay. A
few weeks after the treat
ment our teeth turned white again.
It was at this time also that I was taken aside by
the old man and
given a piece of coarse string. By
gesture he indicated that I should tie it around my
waist and then he showed me how to tie up my penis
with it as all the men and boys did. I learned later

that it was considered the height of impropriety to

be seen with the cock hanging down even though

otherwise stark naked.

22
 Visions

AF TEK *
perhaps six months with the Huni Kui
I had become accustomed to living in the nude, to
eating their unsalted diet of jungle game, the few
products of their primitive agriculture and wild
fruit. And I understood a few words of their strange

vocabulary.
Now became evident that something new was
it

in the offing.My diet was changed drastically and

was carefully controlled by the old women who were
my constant custodians. Instead of being given the
mixed fare of the daily take from the jungle, which
consisted of roasted, smoked or boiled portions of

nearly any one of the jungle animals and birds,

along with vegetables and fruits in various forms,
*
Meaning the Chosen People or the True, Genuine People.

23
 VISIONS
the restrictions became pronounced. For several days

my food was limited to the carefully roasted white

breast of the jungle partridge, of which there were
several varieties, roasted yucca, and a mushy liquid
concoction of cooked and mashed bananas or sweet

potatoes. In addition to this diet, every two or three

days I was obliged to drink an herbal preparation
of jarring odd flavors which produced unexpected
reactions. These drinks were given to me firmly but
with assurance that they would not harm me. One
caused violent vomiting ; another was a laxative ; and
still another caused accelerated heartbeat, fever and

copious sweating. I was given baths and massages

and felt exhilarated afterward.
After perhaps ten days of this treatment, during
which everyone including the chief, who person
ally supervised the affair showed solicitude for my
well-being and expectation of favorable reaction, it
came to an end with a day of fasting and face paint
ing. A
group of ten men had special intricate de
signs painted on their faces in red paint made of
achote. Late in the afternoon, perhaps an hour be
fore sunset, the group, which I recognized by this
time as consisting of the important individuals in
the tribe, gathered at the chief's dwelling. After a
short consultation, in which I naturally had no part,
we formed in a single file and with a soft rhythmic
chant marched slowly off into the jungle with the
whole village silently looking on.
(My description of what is to come is based
largely qn later repetitions of these events, when I

24
 VISIONS
had attained sufficient understanding of my strange
environment to interpret what was seen and heard or
emerged from unknown recesses of the mind.)

An almost imperceptible gently down

trail led us

ward along a forest-covered hillside through a stand

of tremendous trees of great variety in shape and
form. After a half hour's slow walk we arrived at a
small clearing in the undergrowth, a jungle glade
with a small creek running through it.
Here the large fluted columns of the giant trees
were even more imposing, because the undergrowth
had been cleared out, giving the impression of a
great vaulted cathedral. Shafts of sunlight bril
liantly illuminated occasional isolated spots. At sun
set the birds of the jungle repeat momentarily the
strange cacophony of calls heard at sunrise. Nearby
the plaintive flutelike call of the tinamou was an
swered by another in the distance. A
far-off raucous

cry of the jungle falcon echoed through the forest,

and on the distant sound horizon rose briefly the
roar of a band of howler monkeys getting set for the

night, huddled together in some giant tree crown.

In our secluded jungle glade the calm of sunset
deepened.One of the Indians imitated several bird
callsand from the depths of the jungle these were
answered from several directions. The chief showed
satisfaction with this indication that we were well

guarded and need not fear unwanted intrusion.

Our group (myself excluded), knowing what to
expect, went calmly about strange preparations.
Pour of the ten men withdrew slightly and took up

25
 VISIONS

guard positions on four sides of the clearing. In the

center a small fire was being kindled from a glowing
coal brought from the village in a small clay pot.
Several feet from the fire were low wooden stools set

in a circle with the legs firmly in the ground.

The soft chanting continued intermittently, but

I was unable to understand any of it. Finally the

participants took positions at their stools as directed

by the chief. My place was beside him.

A large bundle of dried leaves was brought and
laid beside the fire by one of the guards, who then

silently withdrew. The chief, chanting a different

sequence from that I had heard before and softly
accompanied by the others, approached the bundle
of leaves and broke off some small bunches. The
chanting pace quickened and the mood changed. A
branch of leaves was placed on the fire and a cloud
of thick pungent white smoke rose slowly from the
fire.Not a breath of air now moved in the intensely
silent jungle. large scoop-shaped fan made
With a
of brilliant feathers, the chief now carried great
volumes of the fragrant smoke to each of the partici
pants, taking special pains to see that I was well
enveloped in this incense. With this came another
chant, the meaning of which I learned later. The in
tensity of feeling, the chants and fragrant smoke
seemed to create a trancelike atmosphere within the
group. Every movement and action was made with
the greatest calm and deliberation.
A change of mood and intonation came
slight
when a medium-sized clay vessel, highly decorated

26
 VISIONS
with, incised motifs, was placed beside the fire. A
small dipper was plunged into the vessel and six
small palm-nut cups were filled with a dark-green

liquid. Each of us around the was given one of

fire

these cups by the chief, who brought mine last. Giv

ing it up his own in front and indi
to me, he held
cated that we should drink.

Momentarily I hesitated and thought of refusing,

but already I was in a semi-trance, and in such a
calm but intense situation the impulse passed, and I
drank the liquid down in a gulp, as did the others.
It was a bland concoction that tasted rather like

boiled green corn. After taking the potion everyone

calmly sat down on his low stool around the small

The chanting continued but became more ani
fire.

mated and moved into a high falsetto of a florid,

tremulous character with each participant adding
his own harmonious obbligato, coming together in
unison with the chief on certain key words for con
tinuity. The sequence of what happened next has
always been beyond recall, but from many other
such ceremonies continuing over a period of years I
have reconstructed this first experience.
A high pulsating whine started softly in my ears
and increased with intensity until a violent shock
passed through my entire nervous system.
feeling A
of great nausea overcame me, followed by fleeting
sensations of intense erotic stimulation, then utter
confusion of sense perceptions. Chaotic visions of
various colored lights and forms dominated my vis
ual senses. Blue and green shades predominated,

27
 VISIONS

interspersed with intense flashes of other colors.

Emotional involvements of undefinable content ac

companied the color visions. Many other confused

elements entered the visions after the pure colors
and abstract shapes. These included jungle animals
and natural forms, but it was not until many months
and seances later that I established enough control
of the vision progression and content to attempt to
describe or explain these sequences.

Eventually, with no real sense of time, I drifted

into complete lethargy that progressed gradually
to deep but troubled sleep.
I awoke with a shaft of sunlight stabbing through
the forest canopy to strike me in the face. I felt lost
and completely disoriented, unable to distinguish
clearly the shapes and forms of my surroundings.
My first conscious thread of reality was the animated

morning chorus of several jungle birds. My com

panions, aware of my return to consciousness, calmly
encouraged me by gesture and word to enter again
the rational world.
The men sat around in conversation, apparently

exchanging impressions of the night and comment-

ing on my reactions. By noon we were back in the
village, but I was far from the same as when I had
left it. Food helped restore my equilibrium, but for
some time, especially when I was asleep at night,
snatches of visions returned.
After spending the night in the forest sharing
strange visions with my captors, it became noticea
bly easier for me to understand the meaning of their

28
 VISIONS

previously unintelligible language. It was still many

months before I learned to speak with any fluency,
but I began to understand most of what was said to
me after our first seance in the forest.
Soon afterward I was taken to a secluded camp in
the forest to learn how
the vision-producing extract
was made. Early one morning I was instructed to
leave the village with one of the old men whom they
called Nixi Xuma Waki (Maker of the Vine Ex
tract) For a while we were accompanied by a small
.

group of well-armed younger men, but these Indians

soon disappeared into the forest. Late in the after
noon, after a leisurely day on a meandering forest
trail, we came to a small clearing beside a small
creek. There were a few large stones around a fire
place and a small palm-thatched shelter on a frame
work of poles. An assortment of clay pots, dippers
and a pile of firewood were also present.
We set about preparing for the night. A fire was
kindled ;we hung small hammocks under the shelter
and ate a small portion of smoked meat and drank
fruit mush from one of the clay pots. Nixi (the Vine,
for short) exchanged birdcalls with some unseen

phantoms This happened at intervals

in the forest.

during the night, and it was evident that we were well

guarded to counteract any thought of escape on my
part or unwanted intrusion by others. A soft un
intelligible chant was also sung by Nixi Xuma off
and on during the night as he fed the fire.
At dawn I was awakened by the repeated call of
a forest dove and the rapid trip-hammer pounding

29
 VISIONS
of a woodpecker on a hollow tree. The chill and
dampness of the night air still hung on the camp and
a light niist drifted in the treetops as the sunlight
slanted in through the upper crowns. A group of
toucans started a raucous exchange and soon the
forest was alive with the daylight sounds that were
so different from those of the night.
As I head from the hammock and sat
raised my
up, old Nixi glanced from the fire he tended and
nodded a greeting. Again he exchanged bird calls
with our unseen guards in the forest. We ate some
food and arranged the various large and small
earthen pots around the fireplace before Nixi sig
naled for me to follow him into the forest. He took
a stone ax and his bamboo knife.
This was the first time I had been more or less

free in the jungle since my capture, but I knew the

two of us were not alone. Attempted escape passed
through my mind, but I rejected the idea as impos
sible.

My companion moved through the tangled forest

undergrowth with ease and stealth, hardly disturb
ing leaf or branch. I found it difficult to keep up.
Every thorn and vine seemed to grab me. At one
place I disturbed a bush that Nixi had just passed,
and a swarm of stinging wasps were at me from a
small papery nest hanging on the underside of a

large leaf. In a half dozen places I had burning welts

on my naked body as I rushed away out of range. In
a few moments I was given an antidote in the form
of leaves to chew and place on the stings, and the

30
 VISIONS

pain disappeared at once.

After this we went at a more deliberate pace that
gave me a chance to observe how Nixi flowed through
the underbrush. Eventually, as all of my senses be

came attuned to conditions in the forest, I could

make my own way under the worst conditions and
keep up with anyone in the tribe.
After an hour or so we came to a huge buttressed
tree with several strands of a vine the size of my
wrist hanging from the top branches. The vine was
examined in every visible detail the bark, the
strands themselves, their thickness, the roots and
the an examination that was accompanied by
soil,

a chant. Finally old Nixi tested one stem by pulling

itwith the whole weight of his body. When it did
not yield he went up it easily and quickly, hand over
hand, tp the tree crown above. Here he cut loose one
of the stems, which came tumbling down with a
crash. Returning to the ground, he began to cut
with the stone ax, and with my help, this length of
vine into three-foot pieces, and we carried as many
as we could lift back to camp.
Then we went off into the forest in another direc
tion until we found a small shrub with large leaves
that attracted my companion's attention. He pointed
out to me
the strangely marked bark of the main
stem and the shape of the leaves as distinguishing
characteristics. The bark had odd-shaped vari
colored markings similar to those on a boa's skin.
The leaves were lance-shaped and had peculiar vein
markings that conformed to the lance shape of the

31
 VISIONS
leaf itself. Several dozen leaves were carefully se
lected, picked and taken back to our camp.
There the serious preparations started, accom
panied by almost continuous chanting. First the vine
was cut into one-foot pieces with the stone ax and
pounded on a flat stone with a large wooden mallet
until it was well mashed.
The pld man chanted:

Nisei honi9 * vision vine

boding spirit of the forest

origin of our understanding
give up your magic power
to our potion
illuminate our mind
bring us foresight
show us the designs
of our enemies

expand our knowledge

expand our understanding
of our forest

A layer of mashed vine was then carefully

pieces
arranged in the bottom of a large new clay pot. On
top of this was laid a layer of the leaves in the shape
of a fan. And as he did this Nixi chanted:

Bush with markings of the serpent

give us your leaves

for our potion

bring us favor

* Vine whose extract

produces visions.

32
 VISIONS
of the boa
source of good fortune

Then alternating mashed vine and leaves

layers of
were put in place until the pot was more than half
full. Clear water from the stream was then added

until the plant material was well covered.

A slow fire
was started under the pot and the cook
ing was maintained at a very low simmer for many
hours until the liquid was reduced to less than half.
When the cooking process was completed the
firewas removed and, after cooling, the plant mate
rial was withdrawn from the liquid. After several

hours of further cooling and settling, the clear green

liquid was carefully dipped off into small clay pots,
each fitted with a tight cover.
The entire process took three days, being done
with utter calmness and deliberation. The intermina
ble chants accompanied each step, invoking the spir
its of the vine, the shrub and the other forest spirits.
This carefully and reverently prepared extract
provided the potion for many subsequent ayahuasca
sessions in the peaceful and secluded forest glade,
sessions that progressed to incredible vision fanta
sies.

A few days
after returning from the forest with
Nixi the Honi Maker, with a number of small pots
containing the potent green liquid, one of the
hunters came to the chief. It was early in the evening
as we sat around the small fire in the center of the
chief's house. Xurikaya (Colored Bird) came in

33
 VISIONS

quietly and sat down. It seemed almost as though his

coming was expected. The conversation led to the
subject of hunting, and soon Xuri (the Bird) was
telling a long melancholy story of bad luck in his
hunting.
"The last time I came upon the large herd of wild

pigs that usually ranged in my assigned hunting

territory I approached by misjudgment too near the
head of the band. The old sow leader saw me and

gave the grunt of alarm before I could loose an ar

row. The whole band disappeared as if by magic.
Now they seem to have abandoned my hunting
ground. At least they no longer follow their usual
feeding circuit. They leave no trace.
"The other evening I was calling a tinamou. When
it finally came after much too long a time of calling

back and forth I shot it and found it full of worms

from a previous wound almost eaten up.
"The band of howler monkeys in my area manage
to piss and crap on me from the treetops but some
how avoid my arrows. The forest deer sense my
movements from afar and avoid me by leaving con
fusing tracks. The fruit trees that produce the fa
vorite food of the forest animals this year seem to
bear nothing but leaves.
"My familybeing fed by others, which brings
is

me great shame and leaves me with obligations that

I will never be able to pay off unless my luck
changes."
Finally the chief said, "Come back tomorrow
night and we will look at it again, with others. Bring
 YISIO KS

your hunting equipment with you."

Xumu sent word by his old women to a small
selectgroup of the best hunters. They came to sit
around his fire the next evening, and the palaver
went on and on for half the night.
Xurikaya brought all of his hunting gear. It con
sisted of snares made of strong twine of various

thicknesses treated with beeswax ; a large open bas

ket woven of palm fronds of a type used to catch the
small jungle partridges that sleep together on the

ground at night; several lances for night hunting;

a large bow with a dozen arrows of various types ;
and finally his bamboo knife, which was worn on a

string around his neck.

These were passed around the group and all were
examined minutely and the defects pointed out and
commented on. The
snares had not been properly
treated with herbs to eliminate the smell of man,
hence no animals would approach them. The par
tridge basket was just a little too big to handle easily
in theundergrowth and catch birds. The lances had
surely been affected by iuanbo (evil spirits). The
painted designs on the bow and arrows could be im
proved in many details to attract favorable assist
ance from the forest spirits.
After the equipment had been examined, Xuri
was questioned closely about his preparations for
the hunt: his use of herbal baths to bring good luck
and to remove body odors ; special diets for getting
ready to hunt certain animals ; the use of charms for
finding favorite game animals.

35
 VISIONS
Then came a minute dissection and discussion of
Xurikaya's recent hunting experiences and failures.
Finally, about midnight, it was agreed all around
the fire that a horn-drinking and visipn session in the
forest sanctuary was needed to solve Xurfs problem.
On the following day the chief called the same

group together again and prescribed in great detail

the diet and purges to be used in preparation for
this coming session.

When several days of obeying these instructions

had passed, there was the face-painting ritual and
then the slow late-afternoon trip to the isolated for
est meeting place just as before. Xumu led the way,
followed by Xurikaya and myself and the expert
hunters.
This time I understood much more of what was
said among them and was more clearly aware of my
surroundings and of course knew something of what
to expect, as we followed the same route through the
forest of giant trees to the hidden jungle glade. We
got there about sunset, and the upper crowns and
branches of the great trees were illuminated in bril
liant sunlight, but only an occasional deflected shaft
of sunlight broke the gloom on the forest flopr.

Again the four guards took their places at the

edges of the clearing, withdrawn from the partici
pants. A
small fire was kindled and the ancient and

fragile chief, chanting an invocation to the spirits

qf the forest, placed dried leaves on the fire. After
a crackling sound, a cloud of fragrant smoke bil
lowed up. Each of us was again bathed in the smoke

36
 TISIO KS
and its fragrant tranquillity.

This time it was extract I had helped to make that

was passed around in the small palm cups, and I
was determined to control myself and participate
more fully in the sequence of visions.
Each of us drank his cupful of honi acuma, the
vision extract.* The chanting gradually took on the

high falsetto quality, with each one in the circle

adding his tremulous obbligato to the chief's chant,

again coming together on key words which gave

emphasis and continuity to the flow of sound. As be
fore, in a few minutes a pulsating hum dominated
my consciousness, followed by a violent muscle
spasm as soon as the pulsations merged to a continu
ous sound. Nausea did not appear this time, but a
flow of other sensations progressed through my con
sciousness, their content impossible to describe in
terms of the rational world. Exotic sensations, erotic
in nature, produced indescribable feelings of pleas
ure and exhilaration. And I had the impression of
my body, capable of actions, sensations
being free of
and knowledge completely divorced from my physi
cal being.
The sense of time disappeared completely and
perhaps the impressions felt were very fleeting with
relation to normal consciousness. Colored visions be

gan to dominate the scene, and the chanting seemed

to intrude and take over control of the progression
of visions. After unorganized visions developed, of
colored forms and abstract shapes dominated by in-
* Extract from the vision vine.

37
 VISIONS
tense blues, natural objects of the forest began to

appear in vague, imprecise outline at first, but

soon in unimaginable detail.
With the chant of the boa, a giant constrictor ap
peared slowly gliding through the forest. Blue lights
intensified an intricate design of scroll configura
tions that seemed to float along the boa's spine. Light
flashed from and tongue. The bold patterns
his eyes

on the snake's skin glowed with intense and varied

colors.
I was to learn later that the boa was greatly ad
mired by these Indians for his ability to move si
lently through the forest and capture other animals.
To handle a boa and pass a finger over the outlines
of the patterns on his skin brought good luck in
hunting. The boa visions, brought on by a special
chant, therefore came at the start of all auspicious

seances dealing with the hunt. Other snakes followed

the great boa a giant bushmaster, a fer-de-lance,

and many more.
Next came the birds, in particular members of
the hawk family, which is thought to be the source
of knowledge about the forest. With the special
hawk chant there came first into the visions an enor
mous harpy eagle in flight, darting in and out
through jungle vegetation on lightning-quick ma
neuvers. Finally he alighted, spread his giant wings,

displaying his creamy white breast

and striped
wings, then a jet-black back. Turning his
head and
raising the neck feathers into a magnificent crest,
the eagle flashed enormous baleful yellow eyes at us

38
 VISIONS
and snapped his hooked scimitar of a beak.
A snake-eating hawk, the forest sentinel who when
disturbed gives the alarm with a shrill far-carrying
call, alighted and hopped around with wings spread

downward, as when attacking a snake. He was fol

lowed by a parade of birds that served as sources of
food. Each one repeated its various calls and dis

played some characteristic of its habitat that would

be helpful in the hunt.
Next came the animals, large and small, each with
its own chant. The procession took all night and
would be impossible for me to describe; much of it
I no longer recall, since the knowledge did not origi
nate from my consciousness or experience.
In the morning, jungle sounds and an occasional
shaft of sunlight penetrated the depths of the forest
to awaken the lethargic phantom-viewers from their
troubled dreams. The usual unfermented fruit gruel
was passed around to drink. After exchanging im
pressions of the night, the chief questioned Xuri-
kaya.
"You saw the action, heard the calls, talked with
the spirits. Can you dominate them now?"
"Great chief, Xumu Nawa, Dominator of all the

Spirits, leader of the Huni Kui, my understanding

is renewed, increased. The forest will provide for all
my needs now," he answered.
The chief turned to me. "The honi xuma pene
trated deeper this time. We
will try again soon."

All I could do, in my still confused state, was nod.

Soon we were all on our way back to the village,

39
 VISIONS
where an inquisitive group awaited our arrival. I
could tell from the remarks and glances in my di
rection that my progress was watched with satisfac
tion.

Again my understanding of the language and

activities of the village increased rapidly. After this
second session of visions, the role I was expected to
play in this strange world began to unfold out of
the pattern of incidents in the flow of daily tribal
life.

I found the people pleasant and friendly but un

demonstrative and reserved as individuals. Separate
from the group or tribe, they had no private point of
view. Individually they expressed littleif any emo

tion, and habitually their faces were unrevealing

stolid masks showing nothing of inner feelings. The

children were treated with kindness and understand

ing. only punishment came occasionally from

The
older children of the same family.

They all bathed several times a day in the small

creek near the village. Body hair was eliminated by

applying a tree resin to the skin. Only the chief let

his hair and whiskers grow. The men wore their hair
in a short bobbed style. The women had bangs across
their foreheads, their hair hanging shoulder length
in the back. They were a strong, vigorous and in
dustrious people.
In the principal house of the village, Chief Xumu
had a section separated off from the other families
also using the house. From the first day I was a part
of this special enclave. And as the days passed, it

40
 VISI O 3STS

became obvious that I was neither a slave nor des

tined to be eaten. As my understanding and partici

pation increased, it also became apparent that the

chief observed, controlled and directed everything
that involved me, including diet. From my privileged

position I gradually became aware also of how

Xumu held his tribe together. The activities of the
entire group were to a degree under his control and
supervision. Hunting territories and planting
areas
were assigned. The results were observed and ad
justments made when necessary.
Conditions for hunting were especially good dur
before
ing the early part of the dry season, prepara
tions for planting could start. In order not to kill
off all game near the village, small hunting camps
were set up at this time of the year at a distance of
several days' travel into the forest. These were lo
cated and organized under directions from the chief.
Xumu's knowledge of the forest for several days'
was phe
journey in all directions from the village
nomenal. This came from his own experience when he
was younger and could travel and from the daily
the hunters, who all re
reports brought back by
territorial movement of several
ported to him on the
bands of wild pigs and monkeys. These bands were
relatively easy to keep
track of because of their
Animals that had
group habits and organization.
more tenuous contact among their own kind required
skill to bag.
greater intuition and
 3?^r
^^^* vvv \vx*\xx r >xx"r xvv xxx*>vx*v^\*xxx*>xx^xxx**2J*<

/v
/v

Hunting Camp

SHORTLY after the second session of visions with

the phantoms of the forest, it was decided that I
should participate in one of the hunting camps. In
this way I would make use of the experience from
the visions and increase
my knowledge of the forest.
Nixi was assigned the task of preparing me
and my hunting gear for the trip. Everything had
to be made especially for my use a bow and the
various types of arrows, several lances and a bamboo
knife. I was carefully taught how to make all of

these,and their construction took several days. After

that came several days more of instruction on using
the bow. The villagers watched with obvious ap

proval my eager participation and the rapid prog

ress Imade. For myself, anticipation increased with

A9.
 HUNTING CAM P
each day of preparation.
The day before our departure finally came, and
the six of us who were to go on the hunting trip went

through prehunt rituals which the chief prepared

for us. There were several special potions to drink,
herbal baths, and finally the exposure of our bodies
to the smoke from several different fire smudges, on
each of which burned either the hair of an animal or
the feathers of a bird we would be hunting. On the
last fireburned the feathers of the harpy eagle, the
greatest hunter of the treetops.
All this activity was carried out with ceremony
and chants to the spirits of the animals and the for
est to bring good luck to our expedition. On the eve

ning before we left for the hunting camp there was a

beautiful cloudless sky, sign of the dry season to
come. As
darkness increased and the stars began to
show, a group gathered outside in the village center
to enjoy the pleasant evening coolness after a hot
day.
A silent shadow floated in the deepening dusk and

landed on a bare branch of a dead tree close at hand.

The excited cry of weno (owl) went through the
group. A chant startedand everyone but the chief
joined arms to dance. The animation increased, and
the chants were hilarious insults to the owl from the
forest animals, transmitted
by the hunters.
"Weno, awa
I was with the tapir yesterday. He
said that he would use your oversize beak to make
a soup spoon for his personal use. Whoo ! Whoo !"
"Hooter, the last time I talked with txaxo the
 HUNTING CAMP
deer, he was scraping the ground with his hoof and
he said he would save the scrapings for you. Whop 1
Whoo!"
"Silent-wings, yungururu the tinamou told me
that your leg bone would make a good whistle to
imitate his call for a sleeping companion. Whoo!
Whoo!"
"Big Eyes, hono the pig said he would teach you
to root in the ground for worms. Whoo Whoo !" !

To get revenge on these animals who had so in

sulted him, the owl was expected to direct the
5
hunters arrows to vit$l points in the bodies of the
animals named, when next a hunt was undertaken.
Therefore the appearance of the owl just before the
hunt was considered the best sign of good luck. The
songs and dances lasted until he flew away. As he
owl was chanted an invitation to return, and
left the

the exhausted villagers retired to their hammocks.

At daylight the six of us were assisted in getting
our gear together and given plenty of advice on how
to conduct the expedition. Chief Xumu spent his
time giving Nixi last-minute instructions on my edu
cation and protection. Before sunrise we set off in

single file in a southwesterly direction. There was no

trail and we left
very little sign of our passage
through the forest undergrowth.
Natakoa (Forest Man) , who I learned was one of
the best hunters in the village, took the lead, with
Nixi (the Vine) bringing up the rear. My
place was
in front of Nixi. The front man commanded the
march and the only person allowed to comment on

44
 HUNTING- CAMP
our progress was the man in the rear. On this oc
casion we went silently through the forest at a rapid
but unforced pace. My efforts were concentrated on
watching how the man in front of me made his way
through the vegetation without getting hung up.
We walked the whole day without change of pace
or more than momentary stops. Our route led

through upland country without swamps. We

crossed several small streams where I would have
drunk water but was not allowed to. These Indians,
I found, very seldom drank pure water, all liquids

being prepared with fruit or vegetable extracts. We

carried with us a supply of fermented concentrate

prepared from manihot root. This added to water

would be ready from a clay jar when we stopped for
the night.

During the day I found myself in good physical

condition and able to keep up without any trouble.
Before dusk we stopped near a small stream and
made minimum preparations for spending the night.
This consisted merely of finding places grouped to
gether where each individual could sit under a small
roof of palm leaves to break the drip of dewdrops
from the forest. No fire was built.

We all bathed in the stream, drank our small por

tion of the prepared liquid and ate some smoked
meat from our pack. By this time the gloom of
night was deepening on the forest floor and the night
sounds of the jungle were replacing those of the day.
Close by a jungle partridge sounded its plaintive
call and he repeated it several times during the night.
 H TINTING CAMP
A few tree frogs started an alternating dialogue
back and forth. To this was added various buzzes

and hummings of insects. All of these sounds were

discussed and identified by my companions. Off and
on the exquisite fragrance of a flowering forest
jasmine floated on the evening air, drifting with the
imperceptible air currents.
Before sleep settled on the group, the events of
the day were reviewed in the minutest detail. Animal

signs such as tracks, droppings, chewed fruit, odors

and calls were recalled. Most of these I had missed.

Significant plants along the trail, such as fruit trees

and the state of their flowers or fruit a$ game food,
were discussed. The conversation gradually drifted
into silence and sleep.
At dawn we were awakened abruptly by a band of
howler monkeys singing to the first rays of morning
sunlight striking the treetops. I was stiff and cold
from sleeping naked in a sitting position. Ice-cold
drops of dew falling from the leaves stung my body
as soon as I left the tiny shelter. Mist drifted

through the forest canopy and filtered the light to

a ghostly gray.
We munched silently on smoked meat and then
scattered the leaves of our small palm shelters. All
other indications of our presence were carefully ob
literated before we put on our packs and moved on.
The second day was much the same as the first,
but I was determined to improve my jungle lore. At
a small stream crossing I noted a single three-toed
track of a tapir, heard toucans feeding in a tree,
 HtTNTING CAMP
saw the small had dropped on the ground.
fruit they
At one point I was aware of thepungent musky
smell of wild pig before we arrived at the site where

they had been rooting up the earth of the forest

floor.

Where we crossed a dry rocky ledge we heard a

dry rattling vibration out of sight. The leader im
mediately veered off on another course and soon we
stopped. Taking off our packs, Nixi took me care

fully back to show me a giant bushmaster coiled

around its nest, a conical hump of soil. I was then
taught how to sense the fetid odor of this snake as a
danger signal and told that I would learn to sense
the other snakes also.
That second night in camp I was not without my
comment, but it was evident I still had missed most
of the jungle signs. At midday on the third day
from the village we arrived at our appointed hunt
ing grounds and picked a location for our camp
a flat bench formation several feet above the rocky
course of a small clear stream. Here three of us, in

cluding Nixi and myself, started preparing the

hunting camp. The three others were sent out in
different directions to scout the game signs and
hunting conditions.
First we chose a location between four small trees
where a palm-leaf roof could be built on a vine-and-
pole framework. Material for this we gathered from
the forest around us. By the time the scouts had
returned at dusk, the shelter was ready with space
for six small hammocks and a fire burning in the

47
 HUNTING CAMP
middle under a meat-smoking platform of inter
woven green sticks.

Each of the scouts had brought back game: two

partridges, a small forest deer and a pair of mon
keys. These were cleaned and the choicest tidbits
put low over the fire for fast roasting for our first

camp meal. The rest was prepared for slow roasting

and smoking on the platform.
That night, lying in our ham-mocks, we heard the
minutest details of the hunt in addition to a review
of hunting conditions that had been observed in the
area.
Raci (Bird Hunter) spoke first.

"Nearby are many roosting places of partridges.

I have located their droppings on the ground. We
will have full moon in a few nights and I will bring

them in. Over the next ridge is a large tree with

small fruit almost ripe. The birds are just beginning
to come.They start arriving before the monkeys.
The branches there are good for shooting platforms
and there are plenty of vines we can climb tp reach
the branches.
"It was time to start back and I had no game. Just
as I turned to come back toward camp a small
ground-sleeping tinamou sent out his sad call, close
and he was answered by another. You
to where I was,
know why their evening call is so sad? They don't
like to sleep alone and at sunset each one wanders
around aimlessly calling and calling until an answer
comes back from somewhere, and then the two move
closer and closer together, guided by the calls. And

48
 HUNTING CAMP
so they find a sleeping partner. I answered the call

and found I was between the two birds. So I backed

tip between the buttresses of a big tree where the

ground could be seen for a good distance in front of

me, and I started calling the birds to me. You know
that it is dangerous to call the tinamou without the
protection of a big tree. The jaguar sometimes comes
in answer to the call! The tinamou is also his favorite
bird.
"One bird was nearby and soon had my arrow in
his body. He fluttered his wings and kicked a few

turns, but was soon with me at the base of the tree.

I broke his leg and put a long streak of his blood
under each of my eyes to bring good luck.
"The other bird for some reason came slowly. My
call didn't seem to please him, though I thought it

was the same as Finally, but very cautiously,

his.

turning back and forth, he came within range and

had my arrow in his side. By then it was getting dark
and I had to hurry to get back here during day
light."
Then Txaxo Anika, the deer hunter who had gone
scouting in a different direction, spoke up.
"As I went through the forest I was watching for
a place where my deer plant might grow. You know
that little plant that has the spotted leaves like the
sides ofa young fawn. After walking awhile I found
some good ones, with well-marked leaves. The best
one I dug up and I chose a piece of the swollen root
to chew in my mouth. Then I felt good and knew I
was sure to find a deer.
 HUNTING CAMP
"After walking around for some time the root
in my mouth was all going to tiny bits and going
away and there was no sign of deer though I
still

was being careful not to miss any indication. Finally

I came to a hillside where the wind of a storm had
blown down a large In the open space left by
tree.
the fallen tree young plants were coming up with
fresh green leaves. I stopped at the edge of this

opening and saw the leaves of a young plant vi

brating on the other side. I watched, I listened, I
tested the air but could detect no sign of the animal
I knew must be there.
"Very carefully I moved toward the plant, which
was now motionless. When I got there I found that
some of the leaves on the plant had been chewed, and
on the soft ground beside it was a perfectly shaped
deer track. But the animal had sensed
my approach
and left before I could see
However, there are
it.

ways, if you know them and have time, to make a

runaway deer come back. I very carefully worked
my hand into the soft earth under the deer track
without disturbing it and lifted it whole out of the
earth. Then I turned it over and placed it upside
down in the hole where it had been. At the same time
I spat out the chewed-up root of the deer plant, and
I returned to the place where I had entered the
opening being very careful not to disturb any
thing or make a sound.
"There I could see the spot where I had turned
the deer track upside down. I squatted down in a

position I could shoot my bow from, and waited; To

break the shape and hide my face I put a small leafy
 HUNTING CAMP
branch in my mouth and I almost closed my eyes.
The smallest sign will make a shy deer go away, but
I knew this one was still hungry and would be back,
He didn't come quickly. I had and say
to be patient
his name, 'txaxo, and over to
tocaxo, tocaxo* over

myself. Finally I heard a very slight sneeze and

knew he was clearing his nose and trying to smell me.
But I had rubbed myself with herbs before going out
and he couldn't sense me that way. I knew from the
sneeze that he was very close, and I was ready. In a
moment, without making another sound or moving
a leaf, my friend was standing over his upside-down
track ready to take another bite of leaves. His side
was toward me. All I had to do was pull my bow
string back hard and release the arrow. It struck
him just behind the shoulder. He went straight up
in the air and fell back quivering where he had been

standing. A few kicks, a few eye flutters and mouth

movements and it was over. I came straight back
with him to arrive before darkness. I think we will
find all the game in this place that we can carry
back to the village. Tomorrow I am going after a
band of wild pigs whose trail I saw."
Natakoa then told how he had heard a band of

monkeys going through the tops of the trees, out of

sight. By giving the call of a baby monkey fallen to
the ground he stopped them and brought the band
down to his arrow range to shoot two. One had fallen
to the ground dead, but the other held on by his tail

up in the trees. He had to go up a vine to bring this

one down.
After this recital of the hunting stories was fin-

51
 HUNTING CAMP
ished, the men listened to the sounds of the night

jungle and explained them to me. Their hearing was

much more acute than mine. Much of what they de
scribed I could not hear. This was true also of my
sense of smell. Gradually we drifted off to sleep, all

except the one assigned to tend the smoking fire and

the turning of the meat on the smoke rack. Sleep was
never continuous in a hunting camp men were up
and down and the fire watch changed several times.
The man on guard, I learned, was also expected

continually to be aware of the sights, sounds, smells

of the surrounding jungle as the guard changed

during the night hours. Animal activity at night is

often more intense than during daylight hours in the

tropical forest.
As I was settling down to sleep I went over in my
mind everything that had happened on the hunting
expedition so far. I realized that I had learned more
about the forest in these few days out with the
Indians than during all my previous experience. I
was also well aware that by compariso;a my knowl
edge was extremely limited and the acuity of my
my companions. This I was
senses far below that of
determined to change.
The next day Nixi and I went off with Txaxo
Anika to look for his band of wild pigs. One man was
left in camp and the other two were to go to the tree

with ripening fruit. There they would build covered

hunting platforms up in the tree crown. These would

make easy to take the large birds
it and monkeys
that came to eat the fruit*

52
 HUNTING CAMP
Single file we went through the forest Tinder-

growth, with me in the middle. Immediately my

bodily coordination and sense perceptions were
taxed to the utmost to keep up with the pace set and
remain alert to the jungle signs I was learning to
recognize. We came to the place where Txaxo had
observed the trail of the wild pigs and we stopped

briefly for consultation to decide what to do next.

Before we moved off opposite to the direction the
band of pigs had taken I was given additional hunt
ing information.
They explained that in hunting a large band of

pigs the timing of approach and an understanding

of the animal signals were the major factors in the
success of bagging these animals. The two
principal
signals of this species were imitated and explained
to me. At a certain type of grunt from the leader,
the band would break into a wild run and scatter in
all directions. At a loud clicking of the teeth and a
high-pitched squeal, the whole band would immedi
ately bristle and attack any moving object that was
not part of the band. To protect oneself in the hunt
and obtain meat it was necessary to anticipate and
recognize these signals.
We went off again at a killing pace that required
all my attention. It seemed we went at this fast speed

for a long time and exhaustion was beginning to

show on me, when we came to fresh tracks and
stopped to look, sniff the air and discuss the signs.
The odor I now associated with wild pig was strong
here. Tracks and disturbance of the earth gave my

53
 CAMP
companions considerable information the approxi
mate size of the band, what they were eating, how

fast they were traveling and in what direction.

This time we set at an angle to what appeared

off

to me to be the traveling direction of the pigs. After

going up over a hill and down into a small valley

with no sign of game, my companions came abreast
and strung their bows with arrows. I did the same
without sensing any reason why. Suddenly with a
loud grunt there were wild pigs all around us, run
ning and squealing in utter confusion. I managed to
shoot one arrow and get strung up for another shot
when I realized that as suddenly as the pigs had ap
peared they had gone without a sound. I looked
around and my hunting companions were gone also.
My quarry was nearby, gasping his last breath
and kicking feebly with my arrow in his side. Soon
Txaxo and Nixi came back, each with two pigs and
each with a daub of blood on both cheeks. This was
another good-luck charm for future hunts, and they
insisted that I daub blood on my own cheeks from
the animal I had killed and that I also rub some on
my new bow.
My first kill with a bow and arrow gave me a
feeling of satisfaction. Nixi and Txaxo both showed
their pleasure at my accomplishment. We
immedi
ately made vine slings and started back to camp with
loads on our backs. On the way the animals were

gutted, but only one at a stop in order to leave the

least evidence atany one location in case a possible
enemy might wander by.
 CAMP
We were back at the hunting camp by noon. After
a bath in the nearby creek and food, we prepared
the fresh meat for the smoking rack, cutting it into

long thin strips. The Indian who had stayed in camp

had, in our absence, woven one large carrying basket
out of branches and vines and had started preparing
back pads. This he did by pounding the inner bark
of a certain tree to make it soft and flexible.
The others came back from building the treetop

hunting blinds in the fruit tree. They brought with

them two large birds, curassows. During the ex
change of hunting experiences for the morning, they
told us that several large flocks of birds had come to
eat while they were building the blinds, but they had
been able to shoot only two because their prepara
tions had been incomplete, and the birds had flown

away. It was agreed that we would all hunt birds the

next day at the fruit tree.
Txaxo told all the details of our chase after the
band of wild pigs. In the process he explained all he
knew about the feeding and habits of these animals.
"A band of white-lipped pigs has an old sow for a
leader ," he said. "They fan out behind her but no one
goes in front of her. She leads them on a circuit
around their territory. They come back to the same
place in their travels about every two or three moon
changes.
"If you can approach the head of a band of pigs
undetected and kill the leader the rest wander around
completely disorganized until a new leader takes over
and begins to give signals. At this time of confusion

55
 HUNTING CAMP
you can kill many pigs. They don't know what to do.
"If you are lucky enough to take the leader of the
band and know the secret, you will always have meat.
What you do is cut off the head of the old sow and

dig a deep hole in the ground. Then you place the

head very carefully in the bottom of the hole facing
opposite to the direction they were traveling. You
then tamp the earth in well around the head and fill
up the hole to make the ground look just as it was
before. If you do not put the head in deep enough the
pigs will dig it up.
"If you do all of this with reverent chants to the

spirits of the forest, the band of pigs from which you

have taken the leader will, as long as it exists, con
tinue to pass this location on every circuit of its ter

ritory. To have the meat you need regularly all you

have to do study the habits of this band and be
is

ready, hiding in a blind when they pass. You can

always Tall two or three if you are quick with the bpw
and arrow. But don't try tp kill the leader again."
With dusk came the call of a yungururu close at
hand. This one of the partridges awakens and calls
out at intervals during the night. The hauntingly

plaintive call of several limpid notes seems to come

from nowhere. It is repeated only at long intervals,
and to identify the direction of the source is almost
impossible by sound alone. If you have scouted the
area, know the sleeping habitat, have observed
droppings and can correlate all the jungle signs,
intuition tells where to find the bird. Raci had done
all these things, but he waited for the night and the

56
 HTJN TIN G CAMP
bird to settle in before he went out to get his quarry.
After the call was repeated an hour or so later and
then again after a similar period, he left camp in a
direction opposite to that from which the call seemed
A bird spear was in his hand. He soon
to be coming.
came back with another bird for the smoking rack.
As Raci was telling us the details of finding the
yungururu a sound new to me came from the nearby
forest and all conversation stopped. The sound was

repeated several times before there was any com

ment. It seemed to me to be a singing insect of some

kind, but I was sure I had not heard it before. The

sound appeared to come from a different direction
each time. As near as it can be reproduced in letters
it sounded wyetee tee." My
like "wyetee, wyetee,

companions explained that this was one of their best

talismans for finding game, but to capture one took
extreme patience and the best of luck. No one made
a move for a long time, but talked about where the
call was coming from. It was repeated occasionally
C
as we listened: wyetee, wyetee tee, wyetee, wyetee
tee."
"I saw the bush he likes to live on over there,"
said Nixi, "but others are down near the stream."
"He not always on the bush he prefers to eat,"
is

came a reminder from Raci, which further confused

the search.

Finally after quietly discussing all the alterna

tives, two men slipped silently into the forest in

op
posite directions. Watching from the shelter, we

could barely see them moving as they slipped with

57
 HUNTING C AMP
the utmost caution into the undergrowth. The call

was not repeated for a long interval. The slightest

disturbance near the insect would shut off the call
for a long time, so this one must have been upset.
After what seemed like half the night, at last, "tee,"

then "wyetee tee" was hesitantly repeated. Not a

sound from the hunters, nor any other discernible
sign. Another long, long wait, then a stronger call

confidence then another, repeated several times.

Hours of this, and the insect was finally found
hanging on the underside of a leaf, feeding on his
favorite bush. He was brought to camp wrapped in
the leaf, cupped in the hands of his captor. The
others set about immediately making a small cage of
woven twigs and fibers. Finally the camp settled
down to sleep in a mood of great satisfaction over the
possession of wyetee tee, a small inoffensive insect,
the greatest game-finding charm an Indian hunter
could have.
The next morning before sunup we went to the
fruit tree and I was told about the preparations for
the day. Up in the top of the tree were three small

cages, each one just big enough for one man with an
upright bow. These were completely covered with
leaves except for a horizontal slot through which a
man could see part of the tree crown and through
which he could shoot his arrows. The cages were
placed so that, combined, the whole tree crown was
within range of at least one hunter, but also in such
a position that a hunter would not shoot his com
panions.
 HUNTING CAMP
Just before sunrise three men took their positions
in their treetop houses, with two of us on the ground
to gather up the birds or monkeys that fell when
shot. We were also alert for the arrival of ground-
dwelling animals that might come to eat fallen fruit.
This might include agoutis, peccaries, tapirs, land
turtles and others, even the jaguar.
The action started soon after sunrise and con
tinued until late afternoon. This was a caimito tree
in full fruit, the favorite food of large game birds
and many animals. My companions in the treetops
were astute enough to allow the first arrivals of the
birds that came in groups to send out calls of their
fruit discovery before sending them to the ground
with arrows. It was also difficult to distinguish the
true bird calls from the Indian imitations.
As a bird ground one of us immediately
fell to the

picked it up, extracted the arrow and attached the

arrow to a vine by which it was returned to the tree-
top for reuse.
It was a day of action and when it was over we had
all the birds the five of us could carry back to camp.

My friends reminded me with glee that we had cap

tured a wyetee tee! We were long into the night
preparing our day's take for the smoking rack.
The next day we decided to build another smoking
rack and shelter because of the amount of game we
had. It was also necessary to prepare additional

packing baskets for the trip back home. Three men

went to the fruit tree and three stayed in camp work
ing. Mid-afternoon two men came back from the bird
 HUNTING CAMP
tree with a few choice birds and word that Raci had
gone off elsewhere to hunt when the action slowed
down too much for him.
After dark Raci came in with two small animals
and a very disturbed look on his face. He told us that
at dusk hehad heard the call of a lonesome partridge
and had answered it while finding a good place to
wait.
"We called back and forth for a long time, and the
call seemed to come from different directions. There
may have been more than one, but within my memory
I cannot recall failing to bring my bird tp shooting

range. I might not always get him, but I always at

least see him.

"This time I saw nothing and turned back at

dark, but something was wrong. I am not sure just
5'
what.
<r
Nisi broke in, We are not the only ones in this
forest who know how to imitate calls of birds and ani
mals. You should have recognized this and broken
off calling sooner. You may have given a clue of our
presence to an enemy, perhaps even the Guaca-
mayos."
This created a stir in camp, the tension running
through the group like an electric shock.
Nixi took command. "Prepare everything to
break camp. At first daylight we start back. Screen
the smoking fires so they cannot be seen. We will fill

the carrying baskets in the morning from the smok

ing racks, but put the cured meat in now. The fresh
will go on top."

60
 HUNTING CAMP
The camp turned into a beehive of mumbling,
scurrying men. As preparations were finished we
went to our hammocks, but no one slept much from
the mumbling and whispering that went on.
In the middle of the night everyone was aroused
by a wailing, echoing call that no one could identify.
Itwas not repeated, but there was no more rest in
camp. Packs were prepared and adjusted. The shel
ters were taken apart and the pieces scattered, the
fires extinguished.
At the first faint break in the darkness we de
parted in pairs, going in different directions, to meet
later atan agreed-upon hilltop. So we hoped to con
fuse any possible followers. I went with Nisi, and
we met the others after sunrise as planned. Without
comment we formed a single line and set out at a
killing pace which we held to without let-up except
for momentary stops to adjust the packs on our
backs. At dark we stopped, exhausted. Each one
made his own tiny shelter against the cold dew drip,
and then rested or slept fitfully, leaning against his
pack.
Before daybreak we broke camp and again sepa
rated for the start of our trek. Well after dark on
the second day we stumbled into the village. An im
mediate hubbub started. Chief Xumu
was waiting
for us, having anticipated our trouble and early ar
rival. He now sent out a message calling for the men
in the more distant houses to come in.

We were relieved of our packs by the women, who

brought us refreshing thick fruit mush to drink. Dis-

61
 ING CAMP
cussion started as the men began to gather. My
companions were commended by the chief for re
turning at the first sign of possible danger, as they
had been instructed.
The events leading up to our return were re
counted in detail and the tension mounted. Much of
the discussion was still beyond my understanding,
but it seemed to me that Xumu deliberately built up
the tension by his comments. He seemed to challenge
them. Finally it was decided to send a group back
with Raci to investigate. They were instructed by
the chief and outfitted to leave that same evening.
After they had gone, the other men were cautioned to
take extraordinary care in their hunting, to watch
for and report immediately any sign of an invasion.
Several days later Raci's group came back with
out positive evidence, but the feeling persisted from
inconclusive signs that our territory was being vis
ited from outside. And I realized and felt the tension
thisproduced in the whole tribe.
Meanwhile Xumu and Nixi took pains to review
with me in infinite detail the subtleties and signifi
cance of every incident, every sound, sight and smell
of our recent hunt, thus fixing in my mind what I
had learned and increasing my knowledge and back
ground of jungle lore.
I recall that when Nixi tried to imitate the
myste
rious echoing sound we had heard coming only once
from the forest our last night in the hunting camp,
Xumu explained that there were a very few forest
sounds that could not be identified. These rarely

62
 HUNTING CAMP
heard sounds came from the yene, a spirit source no
one could explain, and these eerie sounds always
caused profound uneasiness among hearers.
From these discussions and from my own daily
experience in the village I became aware of how
closely these Indians were molded to their environ
ment. Their muscular coordination and visual sense
of their surroundings in the forest made it possible
for them to move quickly and with ease through the
most tangled undergrowth. They could anticipate
the hazards and difficulties and avoid most of them.

They reacted to the faintest signals of sound and

smell, intuitively relating them to all other condi
tions of the environment and then interpreting them
to achieve the greatest possible capture of game.

Development of the other senses compensated for the

limited visibility found in the forest. Often on the

ground in the forest, visibility is no more than fifteen

feet or so. Looking upward into the canopy, one
may see one hundred feet but seldom any farther.
Most of the jungle animals have protective coloring
or camouflage that make them difficult to see even
close at hand.
The Indians had great patience when it was re

quired and they used it, together with knowledge and

intuition, to capture game with the least possible

expenditure of energy. Many of the best hunters

seemed to know by some special extra sense just
where to find the game they sought, or they had
developed some special method of drawing game to
them. Knowing how to imitate and to use the signals

63
 HUNTING CAMP
the animals made to communicate between their kind
in various situations helped in locating game and
drawing it within sighting range of an astute hunter.
It took skill, keen development of all the senses, pa

tience and experience to enable a hunter to prpvide,

constantly, sufficient game to feed a family.
 Stories
Hunting
/v
XV

HUNTING lore was passed down from father to

son by demonstration in the forest, hut hunting

knowledge was disseminated through the tribe by
means of hunting stories. Whenever a group of men
were together with nothing in particular to do the
conversation soon focused on an exchange of hunting
information, both recent and traditional. As my
ability to understand and respond
became evident,

they made an effort to include me in these inter

changes.
One of the favorite times for telling hunting
stories was around the fire in the house on a cold
in the village clear
rainy night. Another was outside
ing on a clear balmy night of
the dry season. On
clear nights with full moon a nightjar often repeated

65
 HUNTING STORIES
its melancholy call in our clearing before going off

to catch insects out of the night sky. This bird,

known in Brazil as mai da lua mother of the
moon was called by the Indians nawa kano. Its soft

four-note plaintive call on a descending minor pro

gression never failed to give the impression of utter

melancholy. It would usually bring the people out to
repeated calls that nearly always came
listen for the

before the bird flew off on its nightly mission of

catching insects. They would gather to listen, and

then linger on to watch the moon rising higher and
higher in the clear sky. As they sat quietly on mats
or animal skins, talking casually, some chance re
mark would remind someone of an incident and a
long evening of storytelling would have begun.
The group could usually tell from which dead tree
of our clearing the mother-of-the-moon was calling,
and they would watch to see in which direction it
flew. This, they thought, indicated where the good
hunting would be the next day.
One night I remember led to the telling of a series
of stories about the howler monkeys. On this
particu
lar bright moonlit night nawa Jcano flew off to the

comments from Awawa Xuko,

west, which brought
whose hunting territory was in that direction.
Awawa Xuko was named after the largest toucan,
which he hunted for its bright feathers.

Awa said, "I was out that way today and did not
have any great reward for my efforts. There is a
fruit tree that I have been
watching. It is in the
territory of a large band of howler monkeys and the

66
 HUNTING STORIES
last time I went by this tree, a few days ago, there

were a few green fruit on the ground, picked and

dropped by these monkeys. When I arrived there

today I could hear the monkeys coining way off in

the forest. From the sound and knowing their trail-

ways through the treetops, I knew they would come

this way.

"There was not time to make a proper hunting

blind in the treetop, but I went up to a crotch and
broke off some leafy branches to fix around me and
hide my presence as well as possible. It seemed to
take the howlers much too long to arrive where I was
waiting.
"As the band approached within reasonable hear
ing distance, but still far out of sight, I realized
from their calls that something was troubling them.
I could hear the old males leading the pack give
their sharp roaring barks that are their warning
signal. These barks whole group to trouble.
alert the
When they came closer still I could also hear the
leader making a deep, hoarse clucking sound to sig
nal his move ahead.
"They seemed to move a few trees and then gather
together. The leaders would give their warning
barks and roars, then they would move on again. As
they approached my fruit tree I could see them
through the treetops and could tell from their actions
that it was something on the ground that was bother

ing them. This made me very cautious and I tried

to improve my cover so I could not be seen from
below.

67
 HUNTING STORIES
"When they were all gathered in a treetop just a
few trees away there was a break in the foliage and
I could see the ground. There I saw a
young spotted
jaguar, almost full-grown, prowling on the ground
and looking up into the trees. I could tell he was
following the monkeys, hoping one of the young
might fall to the ground. This often happens at a
careless moment. But this time the monkeys had
spotted their enemy and were fighting back with all
the weapons they had.
"In addition to the shouts and roars, they were
breaking off dried limbs and dropping them. Also I
could see them deliberately pissing and crapping on
the prowling cat beneath them. When they hit the
mark there would be a furious, snarling growl from
below. This would be answered by a Ipud roar frpm
the treetops.
"As they came nearer to my tree I could see that

they were traveling with great caution, and this was

the reason it took them so long to reach me. The
fruit was ripe and when the first of the band entered
my tree they gave the signal for feeding, but they
were very nervous and unsettled by what was on the
ground below.
"I knew if I shot a monkey the jaguar would get
it when it fell, so I sat still and watched below. It

was quite open beneath this tree and I could see a

fairly large area of ground. The jaguar was trying
to stay under cover to avoid the debris flung from
the treetops, but I could tell where he was. He was

spitting mad from the insulting treatment from

above.
 HUNTING STOEIES
**While I was watching, I noticed the attention of
the jaguar change to something on the ground out of

sight in the bushes. I looked and I saw a giant ant-

eater come ambling out of the underbrush. He was

nearly as big as the jaguar. Immediately the jaguar,

in his youthful frustration and ignorance, con
fronted the anteater, who calmly sat down on his
tail facing his challenger and opened his arms as if
inviting an embrace.
"The jaguar circled with caution, and the ant-
eater calmly turned in response. Finally in anger
and frustration, the big cat plunged with a roar into
the embrace, grabbing the anteater by the throat.
At the same moment the two great forearms of the
anteater, fitted with tremendous claws for pulling
apart termite-infested logs, closed around the

jaguar. As the exposed neck of the anteater was

ripped with great teeth, the backbone and ribs of the
jaguar were pulled apart by the powerful claws of
the anteater. Both animals died almost instantly in
each other's embrace.
"At commotion, a tremendous roar broke out
this

from the band of howlers. In the excitement of

watching the battle below, the branches hiding my
presence fell away, and the monkeys scattered before
I could get a shot at one.
"AH that I obtained from this encounter were the
teeth and claws of the dead jaguar, since we eat
neither the meat of the jaguar nor of the anteater.
This was a rare occurrence, because a grown jaguar
will not attack an anteater. He respects claws su

perior to his own. On the way home I got a small

69
 HUNTING STORIES
partridge, my only game for the day."
Awa's story led Natakoa, my recent companion at
the hunting camp, to speak up. "Several days ago I
was up in a blind we had prepared in a fruit tree,

hoping to get birds. son was on the ground

My
below. Before any birdscame I heard the clucking
of a howler leading his group toward our tree.
Howler monkey is not my favorite meat, so I was
disappointed. The monkeys permit no birds in a
fruit tree while they are eating there.
"This tree was a tall one and from my position I
could see out over the forest. As the monkeys ap

proached the tree a tremendous harpy eagle ap

peared, seemingly from nowhere. He swooped and
darted in among the
treetops as fast as lightning.
Before the monkeys realized what had happened,
the eagle had grabbed with his terrible yellow talons
one of the largest males of the group. There was a
roar from the others as they scattered.
"The eagle, laboring mightily over his unex
pectedly heavy burden, flew to the very top of a

nearby giant lupuna There he placed the dead

tree.

monkey securely in a crotch and examined it care

fully. It was obviously more than he could eat by
himself. He sat there looking around, raising and

lowering the impressive crest of feathers on his head

and neck. Then he started calling off across the
treetops with that piercing whistle we sometimes imi
tate for an emergency call. In a few mi-mites two
others of his kind came winging in over the treetops
to help the hunter dispose of his kill.

70
 HUNTING STOBIES
"The howlers had disappeared, and with the
to our
eagles nearby I knew nothing would come
fruit tree, so we departed to look for game some
55
where else.

As Natakoa finished his story everyone turned in

anticipation toward Xumu. He gave a slight smile,

and a sigh of pleasure went through the crowd. They
knew what was coming but I did not.

With deliberate calm, the old chief started his

story. "When I was a young man and my people

lived in the forest many days' travel off to the north
of here, we had as chief a wise old man Awawa
called

Toto (Great Leader). He tried to teach me every

thing he knew about the forest and I wanted to
learn.

"One day Toto said that we should go off in the

forest for several days there was a special band of
howlers that he wanted to show me. We prepared our
gear and smoked meat carefully and departed from
our village early one morning toward the place of
the setting sun.
"While traveling we did not talk, but when we

stopped to rest or to observe something special he

would tell me about the howlers. On the way we saw
several small bands of these monkeys. Toto would
call my attention to their actions and teach me to
understand their signals. These I have taught to
you, as Natakoa and Awa have shown in
their sto

ries.

"The howlers are not as fast as the other monkeys,

but they are better organized and smarter than the
others. As you know, a small or medium-sized band

71
 HUNTING STOEIES
is usually led by a small group of old males. A large
band of fifty or more is very rare, but such a group
is always led by one powerful male with a group of
other large ones under him.
"Toto was looking for a large band to show me
how it worked. He was a wise old man who knew the
ways of the forest and could usually find whatever
he wanted there. This time it took us several days,

but finally one evening we heard rolling through the

forest the great roar that could come only from the

throat-sounding boxes pf a great band of howler

monkeys.
"We moved nearer and before they had settled
down for the night found their lodging tree. Then
we withdrew and prepared to wait for daylight. Toto
told me that the last time he had seen this band of
howlers they were led by a large white male. He
was larger than all the rest, which were of the usual
brown or black color. Toto explained that the white
one had been seen first several years ago near our
village as ayoung monkey with a band. The hunters
had all been anxious to kill him and persecuted the
band until it broke up in small groups and disap
peared, along with the white one. He told me that if
you kill too many of a band of howlers they become
wary and all hide at the least disturbance. They will
also change their feeding territory. But if you hunt
them only occasionally they will continue to provide
food that usually the easiest to find in the forest
is

because of their howling at dawn and dusk.

"Only recently had Toto found again the range

72
 HUNTING STOEIES
of the white howler and discovered that he now
dominated a large band. Before dawn we returned to
the tree we had located the night before and waited
there for sunrise. With the first
bluish-green light of
dawn penetrating to the depths of the forest we
could hear stirrings and grunts in the tree above.
As the first rays of sunlight lit the treetops a loud
coarse roar broke the silence and was soon joined by
what seemed like a thousand others, as the roaring
reverberated through the forest.
{C
We
very carefully maneuvered into position for
a better view. In the bright rays of the morning sun,
seated on the large branches of the tree there was as
sembled a host of brown and black howlers of all
sizes. In their midst, but standing apart, was a
grayish white one, half again as big as the rest. All
their eyes were on him. He would rise on his hind

feet, draw in a breath and roar. The rest would

join in and the sound would go rolling off through
the forest.
" <White
ghost/ whispered Toto.
"The roaring was repeated several times and then
stopped. The white one made several hoarse metallic

clucking sounds deep in his throat and started off

through the treetops, moving from the sleeping tree
to the feeding area. The began to follow. At
others
this point I was cramped and stood up. Toto pulled

me back down but not before there was a loud bark

from the treetops. Then one of the large black males
c
came to investigate, grunting who! who! who!' at
us. All the others were quiet. The white one had

73
 HtnSTTING STOEIES

completely disappeared.
<r
We
pulled back under coyer and stayed quiet
hardly breathing. Soon a gurgling or crackling
sound was followed by the clucking call to travel, and
the band was off again through the treetops. We
waited until they got to the feeding trees, which
Toto recognized. While they were* busy eating we
approachd cautiously. We could get only the brief
est glimpses of the white one. He was extremely wary
and cautious, staying in the densest foliage out of
sight. We stayed with the band all day, and Toto
estimated from their movements what their present

range would be. He Described this to me, and we

started for home.
"Not long after our trip to see the great white
howler and his tribe,Awawa Toto died. Then I had
to organize and control our village. It was a long
while before I had time to think again of the white
one. But one day we were talking about hunting,
and someone reminded me of the white ghost. We de
if he was still there, far off in the forest.
cided to see
"I chose three men to go with me to find him. We
went to the area where I had seen him with Toto
and searched for several days. One night I had a
dream that showed me where to look, and we went
there. Andone evening we heard the roaring, far

away, and hurried after the sound. The band was

getting ready for the night when we arrived. There
was the great white howler standing in the midst of
his band in the last rays of the sun. I had a sudden

impulsive (Jesire to have his white robe as a trophy.

 HUNTING STOEIES
The range was too great for an effective shot, but I
brought up my bow and let fly an arrow on impulse.
"He heard the twang of my bow string during a
chance moment of silence and whirled. The arrow
just grazed him, and there was instant pande
monium. The white ghost disappeared into a dark
mass of vines and leaves in the tip top of the giant
tree crown above all the rest of the forest.
"We examined the ground below where he had
been directing the chorus and found spots of blood.
The forest was silent, the band of monkeys gone.
But nothing had come out of the clump of vines and
we thought we could hear a soft grunting. I decided
to go up and investigate. It was a long hard climb
and darkness was falling as I reached the lower part
of the tree crown. I could see the dark mass of vines
above but there was no sign of life inside. There was
only one approach that would hold my weight. Near
the hiding place of my prize there was a fork in the
branches. As I reached for this to pull myself up, the
head of a tree-climbing viper rose up with a hiss and
its tongue flashed out. This, the most poisonous

snake of the forest, blocked my access to the hiding

place of the white ghost.

"There was no alternative but retreat and no
other means of access to my prize.
"We slept under the tree and heard not a sound
of the howlers during the night nor in the morning.
At up the tree again. The last fork
sunrise I went
in the branches I approached with care. The viper
was still there and I could do nothing to dislodge him

75
 INa STOBIES
while clinging to a vertical tree limb. Retreat again
was my only choice. Westayed around the tree all
day and could sense no sign of our quarry. The band
of howlershad disappeared without a sound. That
night asleep under the tree I dreamt that it was all

a fantasy.
"The next day we went sadly home, without the
any of the band of howlers. And all the
least sign of

way back to the Tillage I was wondering if Toto

would have approved.
"Many times while we stayed in that village we
went back into the deep forest but never again
could we find any sign of the white ghost nor of his
brown and black people. Only in my dreams did the
white ghost come, now and again, to send his great

deep-throated roar echoing through the forest."

As Xumu finished his story there were small mur-
murings of appreciation from his listeners. We all
sat on quietly for a time, then gradually men and
women drifted back to their houses. Xumu sat long
that night, looking into the night sky, before he
went back to his house.

76
 xx^rx/ r /yxr rxx x>x ^xx, x>x xxx ^xx rxx rxx
xV^V^VVvVSSVX^V VvV SSV SSV VSV VvV S&V
j>
/v

ft

Invasion

/v

/v

ft

FTEN in the afternoon groups of men and boys

would gather in a clear area at one side of the village.

The boys would have target practice with their bows

and arrows and play games. The men were there to
comment on and sometimes to participate in the tar
get practice. A small bow was a boy's first toy, and
he could shoot an arrow almost as soon as he could
walk.
In one of the games a dozen or so boys would form
two lines facing each other, about one hundred feet
apart. They would then shoot blunt arrows back and
forth at one another in opposing pairs. This was

training for quick action and coordination, demon

strated by picking the arrow out of the air as it went

by. To let one go by without catching it was reason

77
 INVASIO K
for unfavorable comment. To be hit by an arrow
caused universal howling and insults from every on
looker. Occasionally the men would play the game
with hunting arrows a dangerous pastime that
frequently drew blood.
Target practice by the men demonstrated mar
velous Hitting a small target at unbelievable
skill.

distances, then splitting the arrow with another one,

or shooting down an arrow in flight were common
demonstrations by the good shots and the goals to
ward which the others worked.
Shortly after our interrupted hunting expedition
we were watching one of these displays when the
chief came out and handed me one of our caucho
rifles. This was the first time since
capture thatmy
I had seen any of our equipment, and it was a shock.
The chief must have seen this, and to divert my at
tention he pointed at the shooting target attached to
a tree trunk and with gestures indicated I should
shoot at it.

I tested the action of the Winchester repeater and

found a shell in the chamber. With the breach open
I looked to be sure that a dauber wasp had not

plugged the barrel with his mud nest, and I found it

free. The gun had apparently been kept with metic
ulous care there was no rust, but a heavy smell of
smoke,
I levered a shell into the chamber and tested the
How strange it felt now to my shoulder Dur
rifle. !

ing our trip from Iberia and at the caucho camp I

had been proud of my marksmanship, but now . . .

78
 INVASION
The rifle felt easy in my hands. I raised the barrel
and came down on the target, a small feather fas
tened on a distant tree trunk. This was the way
Domingo, the cauchero, had taught me, and I eased
down on the trigger with a steady continuous pull.
There was a loud report, exploding in our unac
customedears, and the feather flew into a puff of
and pieces.
tiny bits
The sound was too much for my companions,
especially the children, who went screaming toward
the houses. But they stopped halfway and looked
back and, hesitantly, returned. Some of the men
went to look where the target had disappeared.
Others wanted to touch the gun, which I handed
back to the chief.

At this point a pair of squawking blue and red

macaws flew over at one hundred feet or so. I was to
find later that this bird was the symbol of the tribe's

worst enemy. One of the hunters pulled back and let

fly with an arrow. There was a gasp from the crowd
as a gyrating bird spiraled to the ground. A few
minutes later I noticed a hawk come soaring over the
jungle. He picked up a hot-air current from our
sun-heated clearing and went up it in a turning
circle away from us, but soon came back around.

The chief saw me watching the hawk and handed me

the rifle. As the hawk came swinging back at an im

possible range for bow and arrow, I put up the rifle,

leading the hawk a bit with my aim to compensate
for his speed, and eased down on the trigger. This
time it was the hawk that exploded in a cloud of

79
 INVASION
feathers, and the crowd went wild. My reputation
as amarksman was made. And every one of the men
had to look at the gun and touch it with awe.
It was shortly after this that unmistakable signs
of an encroachment on the tribal hunting territory
were reported to the chief by returning hunters.
This caused a great change in the mood of the tribe.
The women didn't want to go work in the plantations
at a distance from the village where the crops needed
their attention. The children were apprehensive and
quiet, moping around without purpose. And the
hunters were unsuccessful.
Drastic action was called for, and the chief sent
out several small scouting parties to find the source
of invasion. He told one party where he thought

they would find the interlopers.

In a few days this group was back with a report
and the village went into a frenzy. A
small camp of
two houses had been found three days away from our
village, just where the chief had expected it. He im

mediately dispatched another small group to spy and

check on the daily habit? of the trespassers.
The other men he called into a series of daily

meetings where each head of a family group was re

minded of past losses to his family by attacks from
outside. Each was told by Xumu of his responsibility
to avenge both the family and tribal integrity.

Plenty of opportunity was given the men to boast

of all the great and terrible things they would do to
the enemy. Tension and pressure grew. By the time
the scouting party was back the tension seemed to

80
 INV ASIO N
be approaching a stage of violent reaction.
After the detailed report on our enemy's daily
routine was heard, plans for a raid were begun by
the chief. The
invaders were only a small party of

eight, including men, women and children, but they

undoubtedly were backed up by a larger group far
ther away. Any sign of weakness now on our part
would surely lead to deeper and stronger encroach
ment.
The chief carefully picked fifteen
men, including
me, as the nucleus of the raiding party, with ten
more men vanguard and rear guard.
to act as
Then serious preparations and consultations started.
Pighting equipment was assembled, inspected by
Xumu and put in order if anything was found de
Included in this outlay were two Winchester
fective.
I
repeating rifles from the caucho camp, which
checked for my use. One was to be borne by my as

signed bodyguard.
An important part of preparation for the raiding
on
expedition was the painting of black decorations
the body such as I had noticed on my captors at
the caucho camp. The juice from the fruit of the
huito tree was used, and it produced a blue-black
stain that lasted for several weeks. Paint on the body
consisted of various designs of wavy, jagged or
broken lines alone or in combination, or spots ar
ranged in different ways. The women were artists

at applying body paint. On the face a wide band

was started, covering the area between the nose and
and extended to each ear, tapering to a point
chin,

81
 INVASION
at the ear. In addition various narrow lines and
small dots were used to embellish the basic design. It

gave the face an awesome appearance when seen

unexpectedly at close range but had a camouflaging
effect viewed from a distance.

Our preparations ended with a ceremony that put

us all in a fighting frenzy.We sat around a large

circle, and as a small clay pot was passed around

each dipped his forefinger into the mixture in the
pot and then licked his finger. From the taste, the
basic ingredient of this liquid preparation was to
bacco, but there were other ingredients I did not
know.
The effect, after a few rounds, was heightened
nervous agitation and tension. Talk of battle and of
what would be done to our present annoyers pre
vailed. And when an individual could stand the ten
sion no longer he would jump to the middle of the
circle to give a loud wild demonstration of what he
would do to any enemy that came within his reach.
The fervor and frenzy were contagious working
back and forth around the circle. And the displays
of individual violent aggressiveness were awesome.
Late in the afternoon when the chief could hold
them no longer, we prepared to depart. A rendezvous
in the forest away from the village was fixed, and we
left by twos and threes in different directions to
confuse any possible observer. Several hours later
we gathered in the depth of the forest, after much
imitation birdcalling back and forth. Here we waited
for the dawn, and then very cautiously set out. Our

82
 INVASION
pause for the night had given me time to think and
wonder why I had been thrown into a feud between
Indian tribes. Prom our preparations it was clear,
of course, that the Huni Kui (now including myself)
were defending their home territory from encroach
ment.
We were spread out, with me and two bodyguards
and There were right and left
carriers in the center.
flankers along with the vanguard and rear guard.
Each group had its agreed-upon vocabulary of the
forest animal and These were used spar
birdcalls.

ingly, however, to avoid confusion among us and

possible detection by an enemy.
Nothing happened that first day, but in the late
afternoon of the second day as we approached the
general area of the enemy camp, there was a ringing
shout in front of us and then complete silence again.
With even greater caution than before we moved
up in the direction of the call. There we found the
front guard grouped around a prostrate body with
an arrow sticking out, front and back, of his chest.
He was not one of us he was from the nearby enemy
;

camp. One of our men had come on him but was dis
covered in time for the warning shout we had heard
before he could be silenced.
The shout was cause for some anxiety among us,
since we did not know who, besides ourselves, might
have heard After a long discussion we decided to
it.

move into position around the nearby camp, ready

for a predawn attack. Signals for the night and for
attack were decided on and we moved stealthily

83
 INVASION
into position in the falling darkness.
It was a terrible night of tension, waiting for calls
to interpret and trying to anticipate what might
happen. I had nearly dozed off when I was nudged
by a companion at the first blue-green light of dawn
penetrating the forest.
The signal had come to move to the edge of the

clearing to await the final call for attack, which

was to be the hoot of an owl repeated in a certain

rhythmic sequence. The hooting came a few minutes

laterand brought a wild shouting, screaming rush
from the jungle into the small clearing. But what
an anticlimax! The two houses were empty and in
the dim light of dawn we realized that the strangled
call of the previous afternoon had been heard and

the camp immediately evacuated. We picked up a

few abandoned artifacts and set fire to the palm-
thatched houses. My rifle had not even been fired!
After a brief consultation a party was sent to ex
amine the nearby forest for signs of the inhabitants,
and we agreed on a point to meet in the afternoon,
on the way home. Then we went our separate ways,
in small groups, to the rendezvous. The main reason
for extreme caution was now over, and the return
trip was more relaxed than the moving out. How
ever, I learned that in the forest pne must never be
off guard.
The following morning, after sleeping together
in the forest,we were met with a shower of arrows
aswe broke camp. No one could be seen in the forest
undergrowth; the arrows had been sent flying at a
sound target, not a sighted one, and no one was hit.
 INVASION
But a shout went up, and, since I had a rifle in my
hands, I discharged the magazine of shots in rapid
succession, firing in the direction from which the ar
rows had come. My companions had never heard
such a display of sound. When they had recovered
from their surprise and admiration for this exhibit
of fireworks, a party was sent to search for the at
tackers, but nothing was found.
That evening when we entered the village and re
ported to the chief, an oma, a victory celebration,
started and continued for two days and nights. A
good supply of fermented drink was on hand, made
by the women in large pots and buried in the ground.
With the strongest, which had sugar-cane juice
added, it was possible to get violently drunk*
The oma began with a chant about battle and
domination of enemies, growing in animation as it
progressed. Soon a snake dance developed, the men
and women linking their arms together at the elbows
and forming a long line. They weaved in and out
around the village behind a leader with a feather-
tipped baton. The chant alternated between leader
and his followers. With a change in the chant, the
women formed an inner circle with the men outside.
The dancing continued in this way, with the chants
alternating now between the men and the women.
Rattles of large seeds hollowed out and attached to
leg bands accentuated the rhythm of the chants and
the stomping feet. This continued, with only brief
intervals of slowdown, until everyone was exhausted
and the tension built up by the raid had completely
worn off.

85
^^^

Apprenticeship
/Jy
',
/

AFTER THE RAID, since the enemy invading

cnxr territory had apparently withdrawn, life in the
Tillage settled down. Although the routine of daily
life still seemed strange to me, it was a known
pat
tern for the Indians. The tension was gone; the
women went back to work in their little cleared and

planted plots in the forest; the men again took up

organized hunting. The chief kept a close watch
over all these activities, giving the necessary direc
tions to keep things moving according to his wishes
and plans.
My own position had noticeably improved after I
took part in the defense of the village against the
invasion threat. And my ability to shoot the rifle
without flinching from the awesome noise of thunder

86
 APPRENTICESHIP
exploding when I pulled the trigger gave me a spe
cial statusamong the Indians, to whom the rifle was
a strange and awesome thing.
I soon found that the chief's program for my

training was far from finished. He prepared now a

combined herbal purges, baths and diet that
series of

had subtle effects on my feelings and bodily func

tions. Icooperated without hesitation now, since the
recent events made me sure that I was in a secure

position within the tribe. Before my life among these

Indians had begun I had heard the usual rumors of
Indian medicine and witch-doctor activities. There
had always been a certain fascination in this for me,
so now I was determined to observe and learn all

that I could.
After several days of preparation in which every
detail was closely supervised by old Xumu, we began
a series of incredible sessions with the extract of the
vision vine, nixi honi xuma.
A small shelter was built especially for the two of
us at a spot slightly removed from the village. It
was just within the edge of the forest that sur
rounded our small settlement. There was only room
to swing two hammocks with a small fire between.
Outside there was also a small clear space in which
to swing hammocks among the Here we were
trees.

well guarded from intrusion of any kind. Food was

brought only on signal from the chief and always

by the same old woman. Sounds from the village did
not reach us.
The chief and I went to this secluded site alone

87
 APPRENTICESHIP
one morning. On the way I remember wondering how
old this man might be. Actually, his physical fea
tures did not give the usual signs of age. His skin
was not unusually wrinkled and the flesh did not sag
on he gave the impression of
his bones. Nevertheless,

being ancient, and

was evident
it that reverence and
admiration dominated the feelings of the tribe to
ward their headman. He maintained a calm, distant
aloofness from the people and their activities, yet
gave the feeling of complete awareness of present,
past and future events. And one felt that their awe
of him was justified.
He led the way toward the forest at his usual slow,
deliberate walk, which also gave the impression of

great age. He seemed to choose each step with care.

On the way he started a low chant, seemingly to
himself:

Spirits of the forest

revealed to us by honi xuma
bring us knowledge of the realm
assist in the guidance of our people

give us the stealth of the boa

penetrating sight of the hawk and the owl
acute hearing of the deer
brute endurance of the tapir
grace and strength of the jaguar
knowledge and tranquillity of the moon
kindred spirits, guide our way

It was a clear, still day of the early dry season. A

few isolated cotton puffs of clouds drifted in an
azure sky as we stepped from the
village clearing in-

88
 APPRENTICESHIP
to the mottled shade of the cool forest.
Preparations
had been made for our arrival, but no one was pres
ent. The old man sounded a birdcall that was an
swered from somewhere out of sight.
I looked around. A
tiny, newly kindled fire glowed
in the center of a small opening in the forest under

growth. Beside it was a bunch of the leaves used for

the fragrant ceremonial smoke. The small clearing
revealed the massive buttresses to the columns that

supported the leafy roof of the forest a hundred feet

above our heads. These columns, draped in vines and
hanging plants, were also visible in the diffuse fil
tered light that was occasionally broken by a bril
liant shaft of direct sunlight. Details otherwise
unnoticed would stand out momentarily in vivid
clarity in these illuminating shafts of light from
above.
At a motion from the chief, I sat down comforta
bly in a hammock swung low outside the shelter.
Chanting, the old man deliberately put a bunch of
leaves on the fire. Billowing clouds of fragrant smoke
filled the still air.

O most powerful spirit

of the bush with the fragrant leaves
we are here again to seek wisdom
give us tranquillity and guidance
to understand the mysteries of the forest
the knowledge of our ancestors

We savored the fragrant tranquillity of the scene

as the smoke drifted around us and up into the
vaulted structure of the forest. Every immediate
 APPRENTICESHIP
sound and movement seemed suspended by the magic
smoke. Before the enchanted spell drifted away with
the smoke, Xumu poured a single large gourd cupful
of honi xuma from a pot and began another low
chant:

Phantom revealing spirit of the vine

we seek your guidance now
to translate the past into the future

to understand every detail of our milieu

to improve our life
reveal the secrets that we need

He came over to me and said: **You drink alone

this time. I will be present to guide you. All is well.

Your preparations have been completed. Every re

action is favorable. Drink it all at once, without

hurry and without fear, and prepare for visions.

Pleasant and profound visions will come to you."
He took back the empty cup, calmly sat down
opposite me in the other hammock and said, "The
diets and purges have prepared you well. No un
pleasant reactions will appear this time. With care,
we can direct the flow of visions into desired chan
nels. I will not leave your side. I have done this
times without number. When prepared with care, it

comes out well."

We both lay back in our hammocks. Impercepti
bly a feeling of euphoria entered my consciousness.
I heard a brief pulsating hum in one ear, which
seemed to float off, up into the treetops. My eyes
tried to follow it, and as my glance wandered in the

90
 APPEENTICESHIF
treetops I became aware of undreamed beauty in
the details of the textures of leaves, stems and
branches. Every leaf, as my attention settled on it,

seemed to glow with a greenish golden light. Un

imaginable detail of structure showed. nearby birdA
song the irregular arpeggios of the siete cantos

(seven songs) floated down. Exquisite and shim

mering, the song was almost Time seemed

visible.

suspended ; there was only now and now was infinite.

I could separate the individual notes of the bird song
and savor each in its turn. As the notes of the song
were repeated, I floated in a sensation that seemed
somewhere between smelling an elusive intoxicating
fragrance and tasting a delicate ambrosia. breath A
of cool air drifting in from the forest created an
ecstacy of sensations as it cooled my exposed skin.
Sensations of a pleasant aroma again seemed in
volved.
The chief spoke in a low, pleasant tone, '^Visions

begin." He had completely captured my attention

with two words of magic, I instantly felt a melting
away of any barrier between us; we were as one.
The mere glance of an eye had infinite meaning.
The slightest change of expression conveyed full in
tent. We had complete rapport at all levels of under
standing. I knew thought as he knew mine. Did
his

this telepathic facility come from some primitive

recess of the mind used before ancestral man com
municated in formal language?
Xumu said, "From the hunting camp we find
there is much of the forest that you do not see and

91
 APPRENTICESHIP
understand. We will change this. You must have
complete knowledge of the forest to lead the men in
-vision ceremonies to improve their hunting. Thus

they can eat well and be content." few simple A

words and slight gestures transmitted the full in
tent of his message.

(Cordova stopped his story and explained to me

at this point: "You must realize, my friend, that
the deeper we go into this, both written and spoken
words of formal language become less and less ade
quate as a medium of expression. If I could arrange
it we would have a session of visions ourselves and
then you would then understand. But that would
take time. Meanwhile we will continue with indiffer
ent words and inflexible modes of expression.")
The chief said, "Let us start with the birds. You
know the medium-sized tinamou, the partridge that
gives the plaintive call at sunset because
he does not
like to sleep alone on the ground. Visualize one for

me ground between the

there on the trees in the al

ternating light and shadow."

There he was I saw him in infinite
! detail with his

rounded tailless olive gray, washed

rump, plumage
and barred with shades of cinnamon, chestnut and
with
dusky brown, colors that blended imperceptibly
the light and shadows on the leafy forest floor. My
visual perception seemed unlimited. Never had I

perceived visual images in such

detail before.

"Yes, Chief, I see him," was my response, mentally

if not aloud.
5
"He will move around now. Watch closely.'

92
 APPE ENTICE SHIP
A few shy, furtive movements and the bird was in
another pattern of light and shadow where he was
much more difficult to see. But I had followed him
there and could pick out every detail still. The chief
then brought a female, and the male went through
his mating dance. I heard all of the songs, calls and
other sounds. Their variety was beyond anything I
had known. Finally a simple saucer-shaped nest ap
peared on the ground between the birds, with two
pale-blue eggs in it. The male then sat on the nest,
to my surprise. "Yes, he raises the children," said
the chief.
We went from the various tinamous to the trum
peter, the curassows and other important game
birds, all seen in the same infiniteand minute detail.
Then the chief said, "Close your eyes now and let
the visions flow before we go on to other things."
I do not know how much time had passed time
had meaning for me. As I closed my eyes
lost its

vague traceries of light and shade developed, gradu

ally taking on a bluish green color as the patterns
changed. They seemed like living, changing ara
besques, moving in rhythm over a geometric back
ground, with infinite variety of form. Sometimes

they slightly resembled familiar patterns of spider

webs or butterfly wings. A
moving current of air
with a barely perceptible fragrance translated itself
on this visual screen of my mind as a faint violet
wash over the moving arabesques. A birdcall or

buzz of cicada a brilliant flash of color or a subtle

rippling of waves, depending on its character.

93
 APPRENTICESHIP
All the senses seemed to be intensely acute and

integrated into a single system. A

stimulant to one
was immediately translated to the others. The im
agery gradually faded away, and the chief was aware
of this.
He spoke, and I roused myself. It was late after

noon.
"We have night work to do/' he said. "It will take
another cup of honi suma to make it effective. You
this second cup even more illuminating. Lis
will find

ten for my instructions and have no fear/'

He up the smoldering fire so there was a
built

dancing flame in the gathering dusk. Then he handed

me another large cupful of the clear green liquid,
which I drank without hesitation.
There was an almost immediate reaction. As the
darkness deepened I became aware of an acute depth
of visual perception far beyond anything known to
me before. The mighty trees around us took on a
deep spiritual quality of obedient benevolence that
set the character of the whole scene. As the fire died

back down to a glowing coal, the darkness settled

over everything. At the same time my visual powers
were so augmented that I could see things that in
other circumstances would have been totally invis
ible tome. This explained how the Indians could
travel with ease through the forest and even hunt at
night.
A passing firefly lit up the scene with a brilliance
that seemed to approach the light of day. My
sense
of hearing was also much more acute. I could sepa-
 APPEENTICESHIP
rate the night sounds far and near. When a cricket
buzzed nearby I could see him in the dark on a stem
rubbing his legs against the sound box of his body.
A group of small yellow frogs up in a nearby tree
started an alternating exchange of a bell-like call,

"chill-ing, chill-ing," echoing back and forth with

the exquisite clarity of a small silver bell. From the

treetops there drifted down on a descending air cur

rent the heavy musky fragrance of a night-blooming
orchid. In my state of heightened sense perception,
this was almost overwhelming in its intensity and it

overflowed into indescribable sensations of taste.

The an owl, * Vhooo whooo," floated on the
call of

still night air and was answered in the darkness.

**You will learn to see and hear at night as clearly

as the owl," was the chief's comment. And I felt that
it was true.
With chants and the calls of the various animals,
the chief evoked in my visions vivid episodes in the
lives of the nocturnal forest animals. The chants,
the calls and the visions they brought were all to
become part of my own repertory.
The morning
sunlight breaking through the for
est canopy awakened me from a strange sleep that

I could not remember falling into. Orientation with

time and space returned, but only slowly. I felt as
though I were coming back from a distant journey
tounknown and unremembered places.
The chief offered me a calabash of thick fruit
gruel to drink, which helped my senses return to

reality. We soon walked, at Xumu's usual measured,

95
 APPEENTICESHIP
deliberate pace, back to the village.
I was kept on a strict diet, and it turned out
still

that this was to be a period of intensive training for

me. Once every eight days I would have a session of
visions with the chief. These included examination
of plants and their various uses both as food and as

medicine, as well as further study of the animals.

During the time between sessions I was taken often
to the forest on both day and night trips with small

groups of hunters. On these excursions I found to

my delight that the intensified sense of perception

and increased awareness of my surroundings origi
nating in the sessions with the chief stayed with me.
In the forest my companions would point out origins
of sound and smell and continually test my progress
in becoming completely one with the forest environ
ment.
After each series of four sessions with the chief
eight days apart, I would have an equivalent pe
riod to work with and absorb the new experience and

knowledge. A strict diet was still kept up, and then

another series of vision sessions would begin. At
times during all this, which went on for months, I
became nervous, high-strung and afraid of going
insane. The chief and the old women noticed this.

They took pains to explain and reassure me that as

long as I followed the diets and instructions every
thing would come out well.
During my training I became aware of subtle
changes in my mental process and modes of thought.
I noticed a mental acceleration and a certain clair-

96
 APPEENTICESHIP
voyance in anticipating events and the reactions of
the tribe. By focusing my attention on a single in
dividual I could divine his reactions and purposes
and anticipate what he would do or what he planned
to do. This was all Xumu gov
important to the way
erned the tribe, what
and I began to lay under
see

the surface in his management of their community

life. The old man said my power to anticipate and

know future events would improve and grow, also

that I would be able to locate and identify objects
from a great distance. All this, he told me, would
help protect and control the tribe.
As the training process went on I began to sense
a vague feeling of urgency on the part of the chief
to impart his fund of knowledge and experience to
me adequately. In actuality, I believe you could say
that he was transmitting the accumulated tribal

knowledge of, perhaps, centuries. The tribe could

stand no rivalries in the chieftainship and it became
clear that I was being prepared.
During the rest period between the vision sessions,
in addition to going out with the hunters, Xumu
himself often took me on short excursions to the

nearby forest. There he would take great pains to

show me and to explain the use of the plants, many
of which we also saw in the visions. He would explain
to the secrets of their preparation for use and
me
repeat the chants that should accompany both prep
aration and application. It was strongly believed

among them that the chants helped in bringing

about the desired effect of the treatment*
 xS.xxS.xxSv"' vvx* vvx vvx vvxxxx
%
vv v xx x vvx xxv ^

Indian Caucho

SEVERAL weeks after my last session of visions,

we were watching the boys shoot arrows at one an

other in the open area beside the village. It was a

pleasant, cool afternoon. A

group of young men
were batting a cornhusk ball back and forth, trying
to keep the ball from touching the ground. The game
broke up and they started target practice with bow
and arrow.
It had been several months since our raid on the

invaders, and firearms had not been seen nor men

tioned. Now Xumu asked me to demonstrate the
rifle again and sent one of the men to get one. My
shot demolished a small target on a distant tree.
first

Some of the men showed less reluctance toward the

gun than before, and the chief encouraged one or

98
 INDIAN CATJCHO
two to handle it, which they did with considerable
awe. Then Xumu turned and asked me if they could
learn to shoot it.

Now all eyes were upon me; no one breathed. I

felt somehow that this was a crucial turn of events.
Deliberately, calmly, I answered, "Yes, but it will
use up many bullets. We might need this ammuni
tion to defend ourselves against invaders if they
come back."
The changed hands carefully among the
rifle

group, but there was no more comment, and with

dusk coming on everyone drifted back toward the
houses. I was walking slowly along beside the chief.
After some moments of silence he paused and turned
toward me. "Could you not get for us more guns and
more bullets?"
A bomb burst in my brain and for a moment I
could not control the racing chains of thought buy
guns, where, with what? I was careful to let none of
these disturbing questions show on my face, and
after a brief pause I answered slowly, "Well, it de

pends on producing caucho rubber to trade."

"Can you not train a group of men to make
caucho?"
<c
And my answer, a simple Yes, I can, if they will
follow my instructions."
We went on slowly toward the houses. My mind
was seething with the implications of this exchange.
Uppermost was a feeling that I might after all have
some power over my future, which I had not had in
all my time with the Huni KuL I had simply gone
 INDIAN CA TJ C HO

along from day to day, blotting out the future. Now

perhaps I could have some influence on that future.
There might be alternatives. Dangers, too, but risks
mean little to a seventeen-year-old.
The next day the chief brought the matter up
again. "To produce caucho, tools are needed. What
are they?"
"Good sharp axes and machetes," I answered.
"We have some, but the people do not know how
to use them."
"Show them to me," I said.
Xumu ordered all the axes and machetes brought
to him. The tribe still used Stone Age axes and did
not know that a steel ax must have a sharp edge to
cut effectively. The few axes they brought out had
the cutting edges worn down to the kind of blunt

edge found on their stone axes. The machetes were

largely fragments, except for a few which I thought
probably came from the raid on our caucho camp
on the Jurua and which the chief had kept, unused.
We found a piece of sandstone that would do for
a grinding stone, and I began to sharpen one of the
axes to show the sharp tapering edge the tools must
have. The chief ordered the men to sharpen the axes
and the machetes my way. I asked him to tell all the
hunters to locate the caucho trees in their territories,
so we would know where to begin.
In a few days the equipment was ready the axes,
machetes, and some heavy wooden mallets made to
my specifications. Meanwhile the hunters had located
many caucho trees in the forest surrounding the

100
 INDIAN CATTCHO
village. Now the chief picked a group of men to learn
how to cut caucho.
I was not an experienced cauchero, but I knew
how it was done. It was mostly hard, tedious work

and I wondered how the Indians would take to it.

As for me, the new enterprise gave a new meaning to
and I was inwardly greatly excited. I knew this
life

must not show and I think it did not, although

Xumu was undoubtedly aware of how I felt.
The caucho one of the large forest trees, has
tree,
a smooth gray bark filled with the milky latex which
forms rubber. It is not easy to extract the latex.
First all of the large surface roots of the tree must
be traced along the ground and the underbrush
cleared around them. Then small saucer-shaped de

pressions are dug with a machete at three-foot inter

vals along the roots, and these are lined with green
leaves.
While other men are building a pole and vine
platform around the main trunk of the tree above
the low-buttressed roots,ground roots are
the

tapped. This is done by taking a machete and heavy

wooden mallet and cutting inch-wide grooves in the
bark at intervals along the root so that the latex will
flow into one of the leaf-lined depressions.
When the platform around the trunk is finished

the axemen start felling the tree. This is done in

such a way as to leave the bottom of the tree trunk
resting on the stump, forming a triangle with stump
and ground. Thus the trunk is up off the ground and
may easily be tapped. This kind of tree-felling cou
 INDIAN C AIT CHO
trol is not easy to
develop. Once the tree is felled,
excavations to receive the latex are made at intervals
beneath the trunk and are lined with leaves. When
these are ready, rings are cut in the bark around the
trunk just above each depression in the ground. All
of this must be done in one day, because the latex
flows most freely just after a tree is felled. Two
trained caucheros can finish the work on a tree a

day, but we were far from this.

In the leaf -lined depressions the latex collects and
the moisture drains into the ground from the natu

rally coagulating latex, so that in three days the

chunks can be gathered. These are then put in a
crude press near the next tree to be worked. When
the press, made of four rough slabs of wood and a
primitive lever, is closed, fresh latex is poured on
the rubber chunks to hold it all together in a com
pact block. These blocks are made the size a man
can carry on his back.
What a mess we had at the beginning Teaching!

the men
the various tasks involved was complicated

by the fact that they alternated the caucho produc

ing with hunting. Even the most willing of them
could not be kept at this kind of hard sustained work

day after day ; it was too different from their usual

way of life. However, they were eager to learn when
I told them about some of the things I could buy for
them when the rubber was ready.
With their good muscular coordination the men
learned quickly to use the sharp axes and machetes
and to cut into the bark without going too deeply*

102
 CAUCHO
However, a great many caucho trees were felled

improperly before they learned the skill needed to

get one to fall exactly right. After the first group

of Indians were relatively good at the caucho-cutting
I had them teaching other Indians and before long
had a good rotating labor force. There was no labor
shortage, for the chief assigned the men to work just
as he appointed hunting areasand agricultural plots.
At any rate, it was many weeks before we had twenty
blocks of rubber weighing nearly half a ton alto

gether.
Xumu determined that this number of blocks
one-man loads would be best for the first trip to
the trading post. Any discussion of the trading post
was always vague. I was unable to find out anything
about how far away it was or in which direction.
When the rubber blocks were ready, the chief be

gan to pick the men for the trip. Each packer was

assigned his block of caucho and set about preparing

his pack harness and back pad for it. The chief made
a careful selection, choosing the strongest and most
reliable men. By this time I knew the men fairly well

myself from working so closely with them in pro

ducing the caucho, and I was pleased at his selection.
My own equipment consisted of one of the rifles,

a machete and a small back pack containing a rolled-

up pair of pants and a shirt which the chief dug up
from his store of captured goods from past raids.
When I tried this outfit on, the Indians looking on

laughed and poked one another. I felt strange, too,

and the clothes were not a very good fit. They would

103
 INDIAN CATTCHO
get me by, though I could hardly go into a trading

post naked.
In a few days we were off through the trackless
forest, moving toward the northeast. This was com

pletely unfamiliar territory to me, and I still had no

idea where we were going. It was obvious though
that the Indians were heading for a specific location.
For several days we traveled overland in the
same general direction, without crossing any major
streams. One day at mid-afternoon we came to a

large stream. I wondered what its name was, and my

companions told me they called it Hono-Diri-Ra,
river with rapids. This did not help me in trying to
locate myself.
Beside this river we stopped and made a camp of
sorts. Nixi was the leader and I found out he knew

that the blocks of rubber would float. While we were

busy making camps, he sent scouts out ahead along

the riverbank. They came back during the night and

reported all clear. In the morning we tied the blocks

of rubber together with vines and made two small
rafts of logs from the riverbank forest. The men
worked at meant relief from the
this eagerly, for it

tedious packing of a heavy load.

Scouts and hunters went out ahead on foot, and
we launched our flotilla of rafts, all tied together.
We could control navigation somewhat with long

rafting poles which we pushed against the river bot

tom, but this was mainly to keep us in the main
current. We
were content to float downstream at the
river's speed. After several days, we began to travel

104
 INDIAN CAUCHO
on the river only at night. The rafts were hidden and
we rested during the day while the scouts were out.
As we floated downriver there was time for me to

consider the situations and problems I might run

into at an unknown trading post where I would be
a stranger. I thought it unlikely the Indians were
taking me would provide easy means
to a place that
of escape. Actually, escape was not foremost in my

thinking at this time. I was for the moment purpose

fully occupied with the Indians, learning much
of

their jungle medicine, and, as I think back on it, I

was perhaps under the thought control of the old
man through the trances. At least he felt confident
enough in me to send us off to a trading post. No
I
doubt my companions had instructions to see that
had minimum exposure to the outside world.
One day we pulled our flotilla up onto the river-
bank and separated the caucho blocks, which we put
out on the riverbank to dry. The rafts were broken
up and the logs scattered. I noticed that the Indians
were edgy, and I thought we must be coming to the
end of our journey. We camped here and the men
assembled their packs again. At dawn the following
morning we were off through the forest. Late that
and
night we came to a stop again on the riverbank,
the men started threading the rubber blocks on a

long vine.
Off in the distance I thought I heard a dog bark.
In the light of a descending moon and the first
streaks of dawn, the men drew around for a confer
ence. Nixi was spokesman, since he had worked most

105
 INDIAN C A TJ C HO
with me. I distinctly heard a cock crow off down the
river. I was sure then what this gathering was all

about.
Nixi said, **We have tied all the blocks loosely to

gether and put them in the water. There is also a

three-log raft, big enough for one man. If you go
down along the bank and avoid the deep water you
will come to a Brazilian trading post around the
next point. It is small, two or three houses, only a
few people. Take the caucho down and trade it for
guns. Be back here not later than sunset, sooner if
possible. We will have the village surrounded. In
case of serious emergency, signal us with the whistle
of the eagle that we have taught you, and we will
come. We outnumber those in the village two to one,
and the men there are few. We have studied the place
weH/'
I put on the pants and shirt from my pack. They
felt incrediblystrange on my body. Nixi gave me a
long rafting pole, and he and a couple of the others
held the log raft while I climbed onto it. With the

pole I gently pushed the raft into the shallow water,

and the string of blocks on the vine rope followed.
Now I had time to think of what I would say at
the trading post. I tried to remember the few words
of Portuguese I had learned when I had come

through Brazil with my Peruvian companions ; that

was at least two years ago now. I had lost track of
time, except as the Indians marked its passage. It
seemed would be a good strategy to talk as little
it

as possible, in spite of my curiosity about many

things.

106
 IN DIAK C ATI CH O

As
I came around the point the sun was just coin

ing up over the horizon. There in a cove was the

small village on the riverbank just as Nixi had told
me. It was merely a small clearing with a group of
several small palm-thatched houses. Smoke was ris

ing out of the roof of two. On the bank a man was

drawing water with a bucket. He looked up and saw
me, then rushed up to one of the houses with his
bucket of water.
By the time he was back I was tying up my raft
at the canoe landing.
"Bom dia9 " he called as he approached.
"Bom dia," I responded.
5
"Caucho for sale?' he asked.
"Yes."
"Where from?"
"Upriver."
"You can trade it here no need to go farther
down."
"Good. You have rifles?"
"Just
got a shipment in."
"Winchester?"
<c
Yes, of course !"
I began to pull up the string of rubber blocks to
tie it securely.

"Well-made blocks," he said, "must be nearly a

ton. I will send a man down to help you bring them
up to the scales."
It took the two of us until mid-morning to carry
all the blocks up to a deposit where the weighing
scale stood.Then, with the trader, we started weigh
ing each block. I tested the beam scales for balance

107
 INDIAN C A TJ C HO
before we started, and the trader noticed this.

"What price?" I asked. From and my

his reply

memory it seemed the price had gone up since I had

entered the forest on the Rio Jurua.
It was nearly noon before we finished weighing. I
had to fend off a thousand questions with a one-
word reply where my caucho camp was, how many
people, all Peruvians, etc. I was anxious for the tally
and to start making my purchases. We went into the
store and I checked the tally over a thousand

pounds.
First I bought a box of rifles and had to check
each of the six contained, then two shotguns and
it

a big load of ammunition, ten axes, twenty machetes,

new pants and shirt, mirrors, knives and beads.
Lunch was brought in by a middle-aged Brazilian
woman, and I thought of my mother. How was she?
Did she consider me dead?
We ate Brazilian bean stew, feijoada complete, a
complete meal with farina to mix with the rice, beans
and meat. All this was followed by sweet black coffee.
The food tasted good, and it reminded me of my
past.
As we more questions.
ate there were a thousand
"When would I be back with more caucho?"
"Soon."
"Seen any Indians?"
"A few."
"Any trouble with them?"
"No."
"Well, be careful, they are notorious around
here."

108
 INBIAK C ATT CHO
"So . . ."

I noticed by a marked calendar that it was June

15, 1910. Then
I had been gone over two and a half

years. I had a thousand questions of my own I

wanted to ask, but didn't because of the complica
tions that might develop. However, it came out in
conversation withoutmy having to ask that the trad
ing post was on the Purus River near the border
between Peru and Brazil, and the trader was An
tonio Rodrigues.
It was the middle of the afternoon before I could

get everything tallied up. I asked, "You interested

in more caucho if it comes out on the river above
here?"
"Of course, any time."
There was a considerable balance of money after
my purchases and I was not sure how to handle it.
Money had no use where I was going, but I thought
I might be able to leave a deposit here as the men did
at the trading posts I knew in Peru.
Finally Rodrigues himself suggested it. "Look, if
you are coming back, I can open up a book for you
and hold your balance for future purchases. What's
your name for the account book?"
He wrote down the balance, and I signed it in a
halting, unpracticed hand.
"Can your man take me around the point upriver
with my purchases, in a canoe?"
"But of course, if that's what you want."
Another hour to load the canoe and shove off. It
was close to sundown when I finally arrived back
where I had started from in the morning. There was

109
 INDIAN C AtT C HO

not a whisper nor the slightest evidence of my com

panions, but I heard a familiar birdcall and knew
they were there.
The Brazilian and I unloaded the canoe, and as
the man turned the point returning downriver to the

village, theIndians swarmed out around me, and

there was a rush to get my load out of sight and to

get moving before we could be discovered or fol

lowed.
I had been careful to have things packaged in
convenient-sized loads for back packing. Of course
the packs going back were small and light in rela
tion to the rubber blocks that had been packed out.
Soon we were ready, and as we melted into the forest
Ifelt tension go out of me. I removed shirt and pants

and belonged to the forest again.

As we moved through the forest I became in

creasingly aware of distress in my stomach. When

we stopped at midnight I was in trouble with di
arrhea. For over two years I had eaten nothing
seasoned with salt and felt that this and the un
accustomed food must have caused my upset. My
companions were immediately suspicious of poison,
but I assured them there was no reason to be.
In the morning they prepared an herbal concoc
tion for me to drink, and
helped my distress.
it We
went on, but I was weak. After my system cleared
completely of salt and my food was again limited to
smoked meat and fruit from the forest, my condition

improved.
Going back, we stayed away from the river. It

110
 INDIAN CAT! CHO
took us ten days at a forced pace, but we did not
On this trip I made an effort to ob
travel at night.
serve natural features of the forest and terrain. I
was sure this would not be the only trip we would be
making over this route. From my companions' talk,
I sensed that the general route had been scouted out
in advance of our trip.
On the last day our pace picked up, and one of
our party went on in advance to advise the chief of
our arrival. As we entered the clearing there was a
shout from the assembled villagers, a shout that we
answered. The chief came directly to me for the

greeting, and the whole tribe gathered around us.

Xumu ordered the pack loads put in front of us in
the large circle of onlookers. The new guns were

unpacked first and there was a gasp from the crowd

at the sight of them.
The chief made a speech. "These will defend us
from our enemies," he said. <cYou have seen what
happens when they speak with the voice of thunder.
We will dominate the forest and live without fear.
You know who obtained these things for us." The
Indians shouted as he put his hand on my shoulder.
"We can get more if they are needed. Other things
can be obtained with caucho. Let me show you." He
opened the packages.
Next were the axes and machetes, which were un
wrapped. The chief told the crowd, "With these we
will produce more caucho to buy more guns, and
these tools will make it easier to clear our planta
tions."

Ill
 INDIAN CATJCHO
Another shout of approval went up from the
crowd.
Then the knickknacks were opened up mirrors,
beads, fishhooks and other small items. The women
screamed with delight at sight of the varicolored
beads. But the real sensation came when the men and
women both realized they could see themselves in
the dozen small mirrors I had brought.

Everything was community property and all was

passed around for inspection. Finally it all came
back to Xumu for his final disposal of the items
among the various houses of the village.
Our return was cause for a big celebration, and

body painting got under way in preparation. The

use of the mirrors to inspect and modify the facial
decorations soon became an exciting diversion. In
addition to the broadband of black painted from one
ear across the mouth to the other ear, intricate com
binations of small dots and fine lines were used to
decorate the rest of the face. A great deal of care
was taken to produce an original design, and the
effects were often striking. Of course the whole ex

panse of the body provided space for additional

artistic effort. With various combinations of red
and black colors and design motifs
of large and small

dots, wavy and zigzag and

lines various geometric
forms, a great variety of effects was produced. The
painting was done with great care, and the men and
women were proud of the impact of the final over-all
effect.

In addition, the women wore wide necklaces and

112
 IXDIAN CATJCHO
armbands of beads and animal teeth. The men wore
headbands of flaring, brightly colored feathers that
gave an effect of wearing a brilliant crown. The men
also often placed bright feathers in their perforated

earlobes, nose septum and lower lip. Some also wore

feathered arm and leg bands. When the tribe was

assembled, fully decorated, for a celebration, they

filled the village with a gay, strikingly colorful me

nagerie.
Large jars of fermented beverages had been pre
pared by the women in our absence; large piles of
fire wood were ready. At sundown several small fires

were started to light the dancing area between the

houses.
Chief Xumu appeared from his house dressed in
his ceremonial shirt decorated with brilliant feathers

woven into the cotton fabric. In one hand he had the

dance leader's baton a whisk of feathers and coarse
animal hair on a string, tied to one end of a short
stick. He
gave orders for the women to pass around
gourd cups of fermented drink. The men tied strings
of rattles around their ankles, and soon the chants
started.
The actual dancing began in a casual way after
the chanting had been in process for some time. At a

signal from Xumu the men and women formed in a

line,alternating men and women, joining arms.
At
the beginning the chief led the line in a slow chanting
snake dance, but as the pace and animation picked
up he handed the baton to a younger man.
The tribe had a large and varied repertory of

113
 INDIAN CATJCHO
chants. The dance itself changed in tempo with the
mood of the chant, but there was little variety in the
dance. At times the men and women would form
separate lines with hooted elbows and dance in op

position or form two concentric circles, moving and

changing direction on signal from the leader.
Every two or three hours there would be a pause
to cool off and the drinks would be passed around
again. By morning some showed the effects of alco
and the dancing
holic intoxication, but the drinking
went on. Disorders among the men began to show
up by the afternoon of the next day. These were
drunken brawls or pushing contests which the chief
stepped in to settle before serious bodily damage was
done. He received instant response and respect, even
from the drunkest and most disorderly of the par
ticipants.
I found out later that the chief used these dances
and drinking bouts to relieve harmlessly the ag
gressions and tensions of personal and interfamily
rivalries. Xumu took care to see that differences
were settled to the apparent satisfaction of all who
were concerned. His word on any settlement was
final. some latent rivalry or misunderstanding re
If

mained, it had to wait for the next dance. No fight

ing or disorder among the men was permitted during
the routine daily life of the tribe, even though per
sonal conflicts and differences did develop. The chief
had the means and the power to eliminate those few
that could not control themselves and conform, and
the tribe realized this. A
demonstration of his con-

114
 IKDIAST CA TJ C H O

trol had been provided the day I was brought to the

village by my captors when the old woman went into
a frenzy of rage and tried to club me. I still won
dered why.
After two days and nights of dancing, there was
a day ofrest. Then the village went back to the usual

routine of food gathering from the forest, hunting

and gardening. Use of the new axes and machetes
made the preparation and tending of the family

garden plots much easier than when there had been

only stone tools. I had to show them how to sharpen
and use these tools and insist that they be kept in
good condition. Grinding stones were brought from
rock deposits I had seen along the river on our trip
to sell the first lot of rubber.
In addition to hunting, it was the work of the men
to clear patches in the forest for new planting areas
each year. This was done in the dry season so the
brush that was gathered up could dry and be burned.
These operations were all done at the direction of
the chief so as to be properly timed. The burning
and the planting had to be done at the very end of
the dry season, just before the rains started, for best
results. Xumu was an excellent weather prophet.
He would announce the beginning and end of the dry
season within a few days of its occurrence.
I vividly remember the people sitting around
Xumu in the village clearing under the clear dry-
season night sky, with the brilliant stars shining on
a black velvet backdrop. The tribe had many com
plicated legends and myths about the stars and their

115
 INDIAN CA tl C HO

meaning, but I cannot now, after these many years,

recall them in any detail.

The moon, they believed, was a man's head in the

sky. It got there this way. A man named Yobo, a
sorcerer, argued with the others until they were
furious. One grabbed his ax and cut off Yobo's head.
The body fell to the ground and the head went
rolling down the trail.
The people dug a hole and buried both the body
and the head, but the head found a way out and
rolled after them. They were surprised and ran
home and closed their houses. A great sky-blue buz
zard flew down and took the head up into the sky,
and shouted back, "Goodbye my people. I am
it

going up into the sky."

Up there high in the heavens the buzzard tore out
the eyes and they became stars. The blood that

spilled out became the colors in the rainbow. And the

head now is the shining moon.
The stars became many. Some formed the outline
of the body of txaxo the deer, others xoko the alli

gator. And now if you look closely you can see many
shapes in the skymade by the stars.
The village was located along the crest of a series
of hills, and the horizon off across the forest was
visible in clear weather. The chief used the progress
of the sun and moon in relation to the horizon to

judge the approximate beginning and ending of

each dry season. The behavior of the vegetation and
the animals was carefully observed for clues to more

specific timing of climatic events of each season.

116
 INDIAN CAUCHO
I remember especially one dark night during a

long tedious rainy spell that had made outside work

difficult, the chief predicted the beginning of the dry
season within days. This made everyone happy, but
the joy was short-lived. The call of a night bird
brought an immediate wave of consternation.
Around first one house and then another in the vil

lage sounded the ominous call of "chieu, chieu,

chieu." This I found out was the call of a small un
seen night bird of ill omen. The call, if it persisted,
was a sure sign of death in the village. The only
recourse was to build many fires outside and burn
hot peppers. The stinging fumes might drive the un
welcome visitor away.
Now there was a scramble to build fires around
each house and soon acrid smoke was billowing up.
However, the small bird was persistent. He seemed
to avoid the smoke, and his piercing call was heard
again and again. Gloom settled down over the village
and remained, even after the offending, omnious cry
finally faded into the night.
Not many days later, the "chieu, chieu" forgot
ten, a group of men were building hunting blinds
in

a tall fruit tree in the forest. The beginning of the

dry season was always a time of intense hunting

activity because many fruit trees ripened at this

time and attracted birds and animals.

For some unexplained reason a young man work
ing on the construction in the treetop slipped
and
fell a hundred feet to the ground. He died before his

companions could reach his side. When word

came

nr
 INDIAN CAtTCHO
back to the village there was a profound reaction of
sadness.
The body was brought back and placed in a sit

ting position on a small bench set against

a tree.
Huito extract was prepared, and men and women of
the whole village painted their bodies black, with

strange designs on their faces. The family of the

dead man, chanting a pathetic dirge and wailing, led
the tribe to the sitting figure. There, wailing and

weeping, they knelt and touched their foreheads

to

the ground before the silent figure.

Soon a large burial urn was brought and the body
was placed inside, together with all of the young
hunter's personal possessions. A top was securely
fastened, and the urn was buried deep in the ground
near the village, with great lamenting and mournful
chanting.
This death was not an event quickly forgotten,
especially within the young hunter's family. The
mother and brothers, each time they had occasion to
would go to the grave, sigh
recall the departed one,

ing and making personal requests almost as though

they considered him to be off on a trip, soon to re
turn. Others would also come and make requests,
then together they would return to the village,
all

talking about him and remembering events of his

life.

Food plants were started around the grave and

were well tended by the family, to supply his fancied
needs. Only little by little was the bereavement for

gotten, as the happenings of daily life obscured the

memory.

118
 INDIAN CAUCHO
If the death were not an accident, such as this
one, but occurred from illness, it was believed that
ithad been caused by witchcraft. In that case the
body was cremated with special chants to disperse
the evil spirits before the ashes and remains of the
bones were buried.

119
 Legends

ON RAKE occasions Xumu could be prevailed

upon to tell stories. The mood of the tribe had to be

relaxed and the atmosphere calm; then, sometimes,
subtle and cautious promptings might be successful.
I remember sitting one evening with a large group,
all of us comfortable on woven mats or skins, ad

miring the clear dry-season night. We were dis

cussing the stars and the probable beginning of the

coming rainy season.
The talk drifted to less immediate things and the
old chief was led into telling tribal history. This was
an old story all of the villagers knew well, and there
was a sigh of pleasure as he began:

In the dim and ancient past beyond recall, when

man could still talk with the animals, our people

120
had many villages and lived In peace with abundance
of everything. They lacked nothing and lived in

happiness on the sandy shore of the great river

where the water meets the sky.
One day there came a great storm, worse than
ever before. It rained day and night. Everything

stopped and the people went to their houses. Thun

der and lightning came with a terrible wind, destroy

ing the houses.

The sky broke and fell down. The earth went up
into the sky. Everything died except some crabs in
a hole. No other life remained. The land became sky ;
the sky, land. Then the sky returned to its place and
took the spirits of the dead with it up into the sky.
There the spirits lived happily, but on the earth
there was nothing but a few crabs.
Then after a long time, one day the lightning

opened up a crack in the sky and a woman fell out

on the land. But she was killed by the falL crab A
living in a hole nearby came out and found the
woman. With a knife he opened up her stomach and
found twins, a boy and a girl.
The crab raised them and he called the boy Xaka
(crab), the girl Maxi (good). They had a family
which grew and grew and became the Huni Kui
again. The animals came from the sky again, too,
but man found he could not talk with the animals
any more.
People did not die then as we do now. The spirit
just turned into a new body. Old men changed to
boys, old women into girls. No darkness existed, and
troublemakers like the wasps, stinging ants, mos-

121
 LEGENDS
quitoes, biting flies were found only on a small island
in the center of the great river.
Xaka had many sons, one named Poka. He in turn
had a son, Mana, along with many others. Now
Mana found life too much all the same, and he went
to the boa, who gave him a butterfly. A small alli

gator went to the island far out in the water and

brought him a wasp, a mosquito and a fly. The spi
der gave him a small flask with darkness inside. This
Mana opened up and that is when the night began.
It took the people a long time to understand the
darkness.They were afraid and they complained to
Poka. Then he called Mana and asked him why he
had caused the terrible thing the darkness.
Mana became troubled, then he became angry.
"I will show the people how to understand it," he
shouted.
Poka was very old then and Mana, because of the
trouble over the darkness, asked his father when
he would die.

The old man said, "Bring me poison and I will

die now."
Manawent to the forest and found a small poi
sonous toad which he took to his father. Poka swal
lowed the toad without washing it. He became
violently ill and at sunset called his son and said,
"You have killed me. I am going to die and go up
into the sky. As I go I will call back instructions as
tohow you should continue life."
That night the old man died. In the morning it
began to thunder and the wind came up as Poka

122
 XE GE KBS
went up into the sky. He kept calling back, "Change
change your skin," until he was gone. But with
the thunder and wind they heard him wrong and

thought he said, "Stay stay where you are."

They heard it wrong and it was a terrible mistake.
The snakes understood well, also the spider, the
wood tick, the locust and the pau mulato tree. These
all change their skin and never die.

Our people did not die before this. They lived

in happiness with no trouble or pain
argu until the
ment over the darkness. When the old man died from
poison they heard him wrong. If they had heard him
right as did some of the animals, we would not have
had to die. We
could change our skins like the
snakes. But now too late. Our bodies get tired
it is

with old skin and we die. If we could change our

skin, pain would not bother us and we could go on
living as we liked. It was a terrible mistake when
they heard wrong and sealed the fate of us all.
The first own people was Harucun. When
of our
he was born was not far from the great water that
it

touches the sky. There on the bank of the rough sea

he was born born and lived there.
After him, Apo, the Angry One, was born born
and they lived together.
The First, Harucun, was called Tiwa that was
his name; Apo, the Angry One, was called Xano,
and that was his name. And they lived together.
Tiwa, the First, took a woman and lived with his
woman. Xano lived without a woman with Tiwa, but
later Tiwa lived alone with his woman. They pro-

123
 LEGENDS
duced our people. Xano, the Angry One, produced
the others.

Tiwa, the First, when he was growing up, liked

the jacy palm nuts. And Xano preferred the seeds
of the xabo, the uricury palm. Tiwa liked his people,

kept them together and lived with them, made large

clearings and planted crops which they enjoyed,
and they lived together.
Their crops grew. They lived and ate well there,
and good villages were constructed where they lived.
Xano did the same with his people. They made
their own clearing for themselves and planted crops,
built houses. Thus the Angry One lived with his

people.
Tiwa, the First, with his people built their vil
lages well, not far from the great rough water, and
there on the sandy shore lived in happiness.
Tiwa's woman was very beautiful. And one day
Xano came and took her. Tiwa said he would kill

him for this. Xano, mean and angry, armed himself

with his lance, bow and arrows and his club.
Tiwa was at home seated and eating when the
Angry One returned and entered. He said, "Tiwa,
your woman is very beautiful and I like her. Why
do you threaten to kill me? 55
Tiwa replied, ccYou live with your people without
a woman. Among your people there are many many
women. They abound there. You take none of your
women. Why? To be free? Why do you come and
take my woman? For adventure? Among your
people women are abundant, but you are not mar-

124
 LEGENDS
you want my woman for adventure. You
ried, so
tookmy woman, so I will come and take all the
women from your people."
Xano, the Angry One, went into a rage and
shouted, "I will kill you !" In his rage he wanted to
kill Tiwa the First.

Tiwa ran for his bow and arrows, but Xano shot
twice and hit Tiwa in the heart. Thus Tiwa could
not shoot, but he shouted as he fell. Then Xano, the
Mean and Angry One, with his club finished Tiwa
the First.
Tiwa's people had gone to work. But his wife
became frightened. She shouted and shouted. Her
people heard the shouts and were upset.
Xano became frightened and ran away.
Tiwa was stretched out dead.
His people began to come.
His woman stood all alone and cried.

They asked, "Who killed him and went away?

How did it happen?"
She said, "Xano took me. Tiwa threatened to kill

him. Xano went and got his weapons and returned,

killed Tiwa and left."

Tiwa's people were grieved ; the women cried ; the

littlechildren cried; everyone shed tears.
The men got together and said, "Let us go kill
Xano. Without provocation he killed our great
chief. In return we will all get together and kill him.

Let us go."
This they did, all armed, together. They went.
The women stayed guarding the village. The men

125
 LEGENDS
went. All together they went.
Xano gathered his people, armed them and waited
for the others to come. Tiwa's people were very

many; Xano's not so many. Tiwa's men were

strong; they were not frightened; well armed they
went. Many, many they went, shouting and shout

ing shouting and shooting arrows. Then they

fought and fought, Tiwa's men against Xano's men.
Some were wounded; some died; some were not hurt.
The fight thus ended and they returned home, Tiwa's
men, to have a dance after battle.
Xano's people did the same.
Tiwa was dead, and his people lay out his body
They battled with grief in their hearts.
in his house.
The king vulture came as a messenger from the
sky. With a basket on his back he took the soul of
Harukun, our ancestor, to the dwelling place of
spirits in the sky. The sky thundered the entire day.
As the soul went into the sky, the thunder sounded
time after time.
Now the people buried Tiwa's body and it dis

integrated. His people came together and decided to

leave this place. They migrated up the rivers. With
grief they fought and then they migrated.
If Xano had not killed Tiwa without excuse,
there where our people were born we could still be

living happily inour good villages, there by the great

rough water that touches the sky. But Tiwa was
killed. We fought with grief and courage and were

scattered up many rivers. And so our ancestors came

to the river Honowa-ia.

126
 X.E G EN

And Xano's people went up other rivers.

And Tiwa's people all speak the same language,
from many rivers.
From the other rivers, Xano's people now speak
another language.
That is the story of what happened when our
great chief was killed. If Xano, the Angry One, had
not killed him, we could still be living happily in

our villages beside the great sea, where the water

touches the sky.

Xumu then added, "From our villages on the

river Honowa-ia we came to live here in the forest

many years ago. There, our people were killed and

children carried away by the rubber cutters that
invaded our river. The Ixabo and Xabo people
came earlier. We found them here in the forest and
came to join them. Now we are all one, the Donowan."
Then came another story at a hint from the at
tentive audience:

Long ago our ancestors when they

in the time of

were only just beginning to understand the uses of

honi, there was a man named Macari.
He said to his people, "Friends, I am going to
drink the extract of the vine honi to see the souls of
my departed ancestors." Thus spoke Macari to his
people.
This man had a woman; her name was Maxina.
Now Macari went to the forest, cut pieces of the
honi vine and brought them to his house. Maxina

127
 LEG-ENDS
mashed the pieces of vine and put them in a large
vessel with water and put it over the fire. She let it
boil and then she took it off to cool.

When the honi was cool, Macari took a big drink

and filled himself. Then his people became
fright
ened and went to hide. Soon Macari's drinking so
big caught up with him and he broke out in a run
ning sweat. He stamped and stamped his foot, then,

trembling, stood still.

Now the effect of the drink comes on Macari and

the visions begin.
He runs around from side to side in a phantom
house and there he sees many strange things.
The big boa he sees. A monstrous alligator tries
to eat him. Then many many big boas come out and
he sees them all.

Now the spirits of his ancestors he sees. The spirits

are coming and Macari shouts and shouts. The spir
its of his people see Macari. They want to take him

to their house. Macari does not want to go. The

spirits push him, but still he does not want to go.
Macari runs; the people throw their clubs. They
want to thrash him they try to thrash him. Macari
;

sees too many of them in the house of the

phantoms.
Now he is
running from side to side in the phantom
house. And then outside he is running down a phan
tom trail, shouting, shouting all the way.
On the trail, there is a great lupuna tree with a
tall trunk and many branches, huge branches. This
large lupuna Macari sees and climbs.
in the trail
Now the giant lupuna with many many large limbs

128
 iEGEND S

holds the man standing in its crown. He shouts and

shouts.
Macari shouting and shouting is heard by many
of the spirits and all the spirits come. They sit on
the branches, shouting and shouting at the man.
Macari is not afraid of the spirits now. He has all
the clubs of his people and he thinks he can kill the

spirits if he wantsThe spirits become afraid and

to.

scatter when our man Macari threatens them. In

the top of the big lupuna tree the spirits run on the
branches from one side to the other.
Now the visions change. Macari sees a giant coata

monkey shouting and shouting as it comes down the

trail. It sees Macari up in the tree and wants to kill

him. The man standing in the branches jumps from

one to the other. The coata sees him and wants to
catch him, but Macari jumps and swings a club,
trying to hit the coata. The coata hits his hand and
knocks away the club.
Now a large scorpion shows up and wants to eat
the coata, who shouts and runs around. The scor

pion tries to grab the coata but only pulls out some
fur.
The large lupuna tree is the home of the scorpion,

and now he sees Macari. "Man, why do you stomp

around here and disturb me? I will eat you." But
Macari pushes the scorpion, who tries to grab a
branch but fails. The scorpion falls clear to the

ground, breaks his head and dies.

Maxina, the man's wife, was very lonely for
Macari and cried the entire night. In the morning

129
 LEGENDS
she goes to look for him and finds him sitting on a
branch and singing, high up in the large lupuna
tree. He is still drunk, so she goes home and tells his

people.
Macari thinks of home and comes down. He goes
shouting and shouting along the trail. His people
hear him coming and close up the house. Macari
comes near, stands there, shouts and shouts.
He is still drunk and strange things. He runs
sees

around the house. His people are very suspicious.

His woman looks out. He calls her, "Maxina," he
calls. She is afraid and does not answer.
He is still The
big boas come back and
too drunk.
all try to bite him. Macari runs again and climbs the

big lupuna. There he is shouting and shouting, with

all the spirits scattered around.
There are many spirits scattered around. They
want to enchant him. They sing and sing and want
to catch him. In the top of the large lupuna among
the phantom branches, the calls echo back and forth.
One makes a beautiful hat out of new leaves of the
yarina palm to decorate Macari's head.
Then the spirits take him and show him many
things their fine houses, the children and their pets,
red macaws, green and yellow parrots, a young

spotted jaguar, a stretched-out boa, scorpions and

many snakes. They set Macari in a fine hammock
and show him things and more.
all these

Now they bring him foods of all kinds and he eats

his fill and rests. Then they ask, "Who are you?"
The man says, "I am Macari. I am married my ;

130
 LEGENDS
woman is Maxina," and the spirits are very pleased.
Then Macari sees colored visions. He breaks out
into a running sweat again; he shouts and shouts.
He finds himself hanging from a large branch up in
the giant lupuna tree. He wants to come down but
he cannot; he is too tired. At home his wife is crying
and lonely. She eats nothing all day.
The king vulture sees this man and feels sorry for
him and says, "Man, I will let you down. Climb on
my back and hold on." And Macari got on between
the great wings of the king vulture, largest of the
forest birds. Spreading his wings, the great bird
sailed out of the phantom branches of the lupuna
tree and took Macari home.
His wife sees them coining and, crying with joy,
she runs and throws her arms around him. She is

very happy. Macari is all right again.

His people come out and ask, "What did you see
on your adventures?"
He remembered and told them everything, and
they were amazed. But it was a very long time before
they really found out how to control the visions
produced by honi xuma*

And then Xumu explained. "There were two things

wrong with the way Macari took honi xuma. It was
made by a woman, which is wrong, and he took it
all by himself without someone to guide him. And

that is very dangerous. It can ruin a man's mind if

he does not know how to control the visions."

131
 ,flf
x^x w\~ wx~ xv\- fSf
m-fffm fffm fSS.
\AVm fSf+fSf.
Vv V Vx\ fSf*
^V
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; Marriage

/\
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THE FIRST initiative for a marriage usually

came from the young man's family. When Natakoa,
one of the best hunters of the village, and his wife,
Huaini, came to the chief to discuss the selection of
a girl for their eldest son, it was an event of interest
to all. A marriage provided the occasion for the
tribe's favorite dance celebration. Word came to
Xumu in advance through one of his old women, and
a meeting was arranged for a proper, unhurried dis
cussion.
Natakoa opened the conversation, saying, <cYou
may remember when my firstborn, a strong boy, was
given his first bath and was brushed by you with the
fragrant leaves that keep away the evil spirits, he
did not cry out, but waved his arms and legs with

132
 M A E El A G E

great vigor. Besides his secret name which no one

utters, we called him Nawatoto, the hawk. He
learned to walk sooner than most. When I gave him
his first small bow and blunt arrow the pet animals

around the village soon found it was wise to stay out

of his range.
"As soon as he was big enough to hunt in the edge
of the forest with the other small boys, he was usu
ally a leader and never came back without something
valuable from the forest. When he had the endur
ance to go with me into the forest, I found that he
learned quickly and remembered from one hunt to
the next whatever I had taught him.
"Now he has reached the age and has the expe
rience to go into the forest alone. With his hunting
and mine my family has more food than we need. I

notice that at times he is restless; at night he talks

in his sleep. These are signs that he now needs a
wife to start a family of his own."
Xumu glanced at Huaini and she said, "He has
been vigorous busy boy and we hope you can give
a
him a girl that will raise a good family for him. We
think he is ready."
The chief then spoke to Natakoa. "Send him to
your hunting territory tomorrow. In the afternoon
bring him with his game and his weapons to me for
an examination. We will see if he is ready to support
a woman by himself. After that we can discuss it
further, and then I will see which one of the young
if he is ready."
girls might make him a good wife,
The next afternoon Nawatoto came with his par-

133
 M ABRIAGE
ents to the chief's house. With him he brought the

game that he had killed that morning, a large coata

monkey and a partridge. He also brought his lance,

his bow and arrows and his bamboo knife,

First Xumu looked over the weapons and com

mented on several minor defects that he found. Then
he examined the animals. The partridge's legs were
broken and the young man's face was marked with
the blood, now dried and flaking off. The chief asked
Nawatoto for a detailed recounting of the circum
stances under which the monkey and partridge had
been killed. He then went into a long interrogation
of Nawatoto about the habits of each animal and
others of the forest also.
There was no decision at the end of the discussion.

This would come at a later meeting between the chief

and the father, Natakoa. But everyone present felt
satisfied that the young hunter had done well.

A day or two later Natakoa and Xumu met again,

and the Natakoa about the girl he was
chief told

considering as a wife for Nawatoto. Natakoa was

from the palm-tree people, the Xabo, and Xumu
suggested a girl named Irikina, who was a member
of the Donowan group, whose people had come from
the Tarauaca. After talking this over, but before

giving a final decision, the chief consulted with a

group of older men and women of the tribe, as well
on both sides. Actually when the
as with the families

young girls of the tribe reached marriageable age

(fourteen to sixteen) they were brought to the chief

for a period of training and preparation by him and

134
 MAEBIAGE
his oldwomen. In his younger days he perhaps often
had placed his offspring among the firstborn of the
tribal families. He clearly controlled and arranged
all marriages to his own satisfaction and the best

interest of the tribe.

Finally after all the consultations and when every

one was agreed that this would be a good marriage,
Xumu gave his final decision and set forth all the
conditions which must be met before the marriage
could take place. These preparations would take
several weeks, and Xumu kept a careful watch over

everything that was done.

The hunters of the tribe prepared a store of
smoked game for the days of the marriage festivities,
when no hunting would be done. The old women
started the preparation of the large jars of strong
chicha, adding sugar-cane juice to the boiling mix
ture of fruit juices. The jugs were then buried in
the ground, only the necks sticking out. The mix
ture they let ferment for several weeks and when

ready this strong liquor produced a slow but pro

found drunkenness when taken in large volume.
A select few of the men in the tribe had more than
one woman. This came about as a special favor from
the chief, and it depended on the man's ability to

provide plenty of game in addition to having

achieved some extraordinary accomplishment that
was recognized by the tribe. A
marriage festival such
as this one for Nawatoto was provided for the first

woman only. My own extraordinary position in the

tribe was marked by the fact that Xumu had given

135
 MABBIAGE
me three young women to take care of all my needs.
There had been a traditional dance ceremony for the
first the other two girls joined my small group at the
;

chief's instruction but without special ceremony.

Ten days before the time set for the marriage, the
women prepared a large quantity of Tiulto extract.
Men and women both had their entire bodies painted
with it and in a couple of days the skin turned blue-
black. Eight days later the black skin peeled off,

leaving the new skin free of blemishes. This was a

good base for decorative body paint, and the paint
ing began a couple of days before the marriage. The
black huito was used in combination with red achlote
to achieve spectacular results.
Xumu had sent word to all the houses, five days
before the marriage day, to make the final prepara
tions. Large baskets full of dried meat were brought

in. Feather headbands, arm and leg bands, were

made for the young couple. The whole village began

body painting along with the making of bead strands

and feather decorations during the final two days of
getting ready for their favorite celebration.
The ceremony started late in the afternoon on the
appointed day. At a signal from the chief, Nawa-
and Irikina's families brought the young bride
toto's

and groom before him and the assembled crowd.

Xumu was dressed in a brilliant feathered robe and
headdress and held a ceremonial bow and arrow in
one hand. He motioned the young couple to stand in
front of him and join hands. Then he gave a short
lecture to them pn how they should conduct their

136
 M A EEI AGE
lives. When this was concluded, Irikina brought the
chief a drink from the first jug of chicha and a shout

went up from the villagers. The second cup she took

to her new husband, Nawatoto; then drinks were
passed to everyone, and the celebration was under
way.
Chanting started right away and dancing was
soon added.Xumu chanted and joined in the danc
ing, actively engaging in the celebration until the
young couple were both thoroughly intoxicated,
then he went to his hammock nearby. About this time
several of the old crones of the tribe loudly offered
their drunken and ribald advice on how the new
couple should conduct themselves off in the forest

together.
Owa luxabo (Old Mother), with a leering grin on
her face, stepped forward and shouted at Nawatoto,
"When you roll that dolly on the ground under the
bushes look out you don't roll on a scorpion under
the leaves I"
A roar of laughter went up, and Nawakano
(Mother of the Moon) offered her advice. "When
your cock string becomes too tight untie it, but be
careful of those big stinging ants in the dirt. One
sting and you'll be in a fever!"
Other old crones added their ribaldries in like vein,
amusing everyone but the young couple.
The festivities continued day and night as long as
food and liquor held out, always for several days.
Toward the end came the expected arguments, ac
cusations, fights, which Xumu controlled, and after

137
 MARRIAGE
long discussions lie fixed the penalties.
Many of the arguments originated in real or
imagined unsanctioned sexual freedom outside the
family relationship. There was always a lot of clan
destine discussion going on about this question.
Xumu heard about it from his old women as soon as
it got serious enough to require his attention.
When Buca (Night Hunter) thought he heard al
lusions to what was going on in the forest near his
wife'sgarden when he sometimes rested during the
day, he became furious but didn't let it show. One
day he took his wife Bakuhua (Flower) to the
stream for their daily bath. He began to accuse
Bakuhua of making him the butt of too many snide
remarks.Her reply was a smile that infuriated Buca.
He had built a fire nearby, and now he grabbed a
burning stick from itand beat her until she was
covered with blisters and nearly unconscious. Then
he burned off the hair that covered her forehead and

disappeared. It was learned later that he went to a

forest hunting camp. Meanwhile, the chief heard
about Bakuhua's condition immediately and had her
brought to him. He kept her nearby and treated her
until her burns healed.

Buca, after several weeks when he thought the

affair would have quieted down and Bakuhua's burns
healed, returned from the forest with a big pack of
smoked meat. Xumu was expecting him and im
mediately called a council of several of the older men
and women. With them and the estranged couple, he
went into every angle of the innuendoes and accusa-

138
 MAEBIAGE
tions. When everyone agreed that Bakuhua had been
punished by fire without justification, Xumu or
dered that Buca be given the treatment that he gave
his wife. Then they returned to their life together

likenewlyweds. However, years later in a drunken

brawl after some celebration, this would all come up
and be worked over again. If anything new had
developed in the meantime a new judgment might be
made by Xumu.

139
 ''' ''' ''' ''' ?''
?'/ x x xxx v

/v
/v

j Jaguars
/v
XX

/v

/v

IT wAs customary for the families to continue to

provide for the young married couple, and it was
not until the first child was born that regular re

sponsibilities in the tribal life were undertaken. Then

the young men went back to regular hunting, with a

hunting territory being assigned to him. The wife

began going out to work in her assigned plot in the
village gardens.
Birth took place in the forest, with the mother
being by herself or possibly assisted by another
woman. If the first baby was a boy, special care was
taken and the ceremonies included several herb baths
prepared from leaves and tree bark. Each bath had
its special chant, sung as the leaves were gathered

and prepared as well as while the child was being

140
 JAG U ASS
bathed. These chants were thought to increase the
of the treatment, designed to give the
effectiveness
new child fearlessness, good hunting ability, physical
strength and stamina.
On one occasion, I remember, Chief Xumu ordered
a special treatment for a firstborn boy using the
blood of a jaguar. The jaguar is the largest and
most dangerous animal in the forest, and these
Indians had many stories and legends of disastrous
encounters with the beast. They also greatly admired
its powers as a hunter, able to dominate all the other
animals of the forest. This admiration accounted for
the ceremonial use of its blood.
The best hunters were called together to determine
where the most recent signs of the spotted jaguar had
been seen, and then to decide on the best location for
the hunt.
I was included in the group of six that left, well
armed with bows and arrows, one morning before
dawn. It was cold and dark, with a silent mist on the
forest that left every leaf dripping with cold drops
of dew. Now I was at home in the forest at any time.
We had spent the night chanting and taking special
herbal baths to eliminate all body odors that might
alert our prey.
We traveled in single file off to the south of a
familiar hunting area of long low hills and valleys.
Just before sunrise we stopped and carefully chose
our hunting ground. We needed a group of medium-
sized trees with branches just above the reach of a
jaguar and a large tree nearby with its crown well

141
 J AGTTAHS
above the forest canopy. The ground vegetation had
to be open enough so we could see the jaguar when
he arrived within range.
The men chose their vantage points in the low
branches with care and cut some leafy boughs to help
obscure their presence. The chosen caller was then
sent up the large tree to a point in its crown above
the forest. With him he took a small earthenware

jug. Bird signals were arranged

between the men to

signal the critical stages of

the hunt no sign of the

jaguar yet; signs of his coming; direction of ap

it was nearly
proach; jaguar in sight. By this time
sunup and the forest was coming alive with sound
and activity of the birds and animals of the day.
It was necessary for the caller to get above the
forest canopy if his calls were to reach any distance.
The thick leafy vegetation of the forest floor absorbs
sounds from down there and they do not carry far.
Soon a wavering, wailing call of a wild cat floated
out over the forest from our treetop caller with his

jug. This weird sound made one's spine tingle and

stopped every other sound in the forest nearby. A
bird trill came from one of the Indians,
of approval
but there was no other sound for some minutes. The
call was repeated intermittently for an hour or more,

and as time passed the tension built up in our bodies

as we perched in the low trees.
The first signal of the approach of a jaguar was
given by a group of the smallest jungle partridges.
I had learned that these small birds never fly up ex

cept when a jaguar is approaching. Otherwise they

142
 3 AGTJ A B-S

prefer to run. Now, off out of sight, we all heard the

sound of the explosive take-off of a group of these
birds. Birdcalls were exchanged in the trees to indi
cate the direction from which the cat was approach
ing us. In the treetop the caller changed his tone to
soft grunts, and these were soon answered from a
short distance away, still out of our sight. Then we
heard the repeated call, "cheee, cheee," from the
little chee-chee bird that is nearly always following
any jaguar.
Suddenly from nowhere a tremendous spotted ani
mal was in an open spot just below us, looking up
into the trees and growling. Almost in unison the

bowstrings twanged from different directions, and

as soon as the arrows struck we were slithering down
our trees to the ground.
Upon being hit, the jaguar jumped straight up
in the air andback, writhing, on the ground. One
fell

Indian immediately put a vine loop around the hind

feet and stretched them backward to a tree tie.

Another did the same with the front feet, and a hitch
went around the head to stretch out the neck. By this
time the caller had come slithering down a vine from
the treetops, his calling jug in one hand. The jug
was then filled with blood from an incision made in
the jaguar's jugular vein. A top was put on the jug,
and the hunting party broke up. Two of the hunters
and I rushed back to the village to deliver the jaguar
blood before it had time to coagulate. The others
stayed behind to remove the prized trophies of the
jaguar's teeth and claws.

143
 JAG ABS
TJ

The villagers were anxiously awaiting us, and a

shout went up when we appeared. At once the jaguar
chant was begun, and the chief anointed the newborn

boy with the blood of the valiant jaguar. The chief

gave him the name Iria (Leader) and predicted
hunting prowess and leadership ability for him in
the future.

Jaguars were not abundant in our forest, but an

occasional encounter kept the hunters alert to recog
nize the signs and be prepared. The accumulated

knowledge of the tribe about the jaguar was re

counted frequently around the fire at night for the
education of the young men. The important tactic of
an encounter was to keep the animal off balance and
unready to attack. This could be done by throwing
things, making unexpected sounds, dropping a piece
of game and dodging out of sight. In combat on the
ground the lance was the best weapon. If one could
get up a tree out of reach, then the bow and arrow
could be used. But it was extremely dangerous to be
on the ground with a jaguar that had been wounded
with an arrow.
One evening at dusk a faint wailing was heard in
the distance, and the chief sent several men out from
the village to investigate. Soon one of them rushed
back with word that one of our hunters was drag
ging himself home with his body terribly ripped
apart.
The chief gave a flurry of orders and there was a
rush to carry them out. Various types of green herbs
were gathered and were already being prepared

144
 JAG IT AB S

when the men arrived carrying the half-dead hunter,

obviously mangled by a jaguar. His scalp was hang
ing loose, his back and shoulder were covered with
terrible bleeding rips and gashes.
He was barely conscious, but was able to drink a
portion of the water and ground herbs that the chief
held to his lips. Then he was laid on a mat on the
floor in the chief's house, and here the long job of re
pair and restoration began.
The chief, after carefully examining the wounds,
ordered one of his old women to polish black palm
thorns. With these he pinned together the gaping
wounds. As this was done a poultice of crushed herbs
was applied. The process took several hours, during
which the victim showed but few signs of life.
I sat up all night with the chief, chanting and
watching the patient for favorable signs. In the
morning the chief sent out a party of the best track
ers to backtrack the wounded hunter's trail and if
possible learn what had happened. The hunter him
self remained unconscious.
At midday the trackers came back with the body
of a deer and the and claws of a jaguar. The
teeth

bloody trail over which the mauled hunter had

dragged himself had not been difficult to follow. The

men had found the deer hanging up in a small tree
and, off in the bushes, the jaguar's body, killed by a
deep knife gash in his shoulder that had penetrated
to the heart. Going farther back in the forest, the
men found signs that the jaguar had been following
the hunter since he had killed the deer.

145
 JAGTJABS
The recovery was long and painful. As he came
slowly back to life, the Indians gave him a new name,
Ino Doto Jaguar Killer. When Ino was able to
talk he told us this story.
"The deer I killed about sunset and started back
home. On way a large band of monkeys went by
the

high overhead in the treetops. My

attempt to stop
them and call them down did not work, and I could
not follow them with the deer hanging on my shoul
der. So I threw a vine over a limb and pulled the

deer up into a small tree. Then I tried to follow the

monkeys, but they soon scattered and were lost in the

treetops before I could get a shot.
"It was getting dark as I returned, disappointed,
to my deer. When I came to the tree where I had
pulled it up for protection, there was a movement.
Too close and too late to draw an arrow to my bow, I
realized that there was a large jaguar standing on
his hind feet, reaching for my deer. He turned with
a growl and came spitting at me,
terrible snarling

standing on his two back feet. As he put up one

front paw on my shoulder and the claws dug in, I

just barely managed to maneuver a small tree be

tween us. Thus he was not able to bite me, but his
breath was in my face and it had a hideous stink. As
he reached for me with his other set of claws, I man
aged to free the bamboo knife on the string around
my neck. I struck with this on his shoulder as he
ripped my head and shoulders with his claws. Once
or twice my knife went in deep and I turned it be
fore striking agairu

146
 J AGU ABS
4c
With a terrible scream lie broke free, taking my
knife with him, and went thrashing and wailing into
the bushes. Blood from my head wounds blinded my

eyes, but I knew that if I was to survive I had to get

back quickly to the chief for his medicine. The trip
back was worse than a nightmare of pain and con
fusion. As my strength gave out from loss of blood I

began shouting with the hope of getting help be

fore I fell and died on the trail. If you had not heard
me calling I would have died there. I knew if I could
get back to the chief he would not let me die."
The jaguar slayer went through a long period of
recovery. He
remained a semi-invalid, and because
of the damage to his shoulder and arm muscles he
was never able to pull a bowstring and hunt again.
Nevertheless he made himself useful around the vil

lage, and his sons helped provide game, while his wife
and daughters worked to produce other food.

147
 VW \XV \\ VVX YVV YVV VVV VVV VVX YVV YXV
*

/v
/x
Assassin
/v

/y

>v

/\

^\

Xv

THE HTJNI Kui,as they called themselves,

known by Amahuacas and many other
others as

names, were true forest dwellers. The villages that I

knew were in a series of small forest clearings sur
rounded by a vast expanse of unbroken forest* Their
primitive agriculture was adapted to small jungle
clearings that were shifted to new locations as the
soil became exhausted after two or three years of
cultivation.

Hunting and other food-gathering activities

actually resulted in their spending more of their time
in the forest than in their villages and gardens. The
forest in its undisturbed state there was made up, as
I came gradually to see, of several distinct though

partly mixed layers of vegetation. There were scat-

148
 ASS ASSIH
tered forest giants overtopping the rest of the

jungle; under the tops of those great trees was a

thick, dense layer of themedium to large trees. Be
low, there was a section of small trees and shrubs,
and the low ground plants. The Huni Kui
finally
were perfectly at home in and gathered food in every
part of this varied environment including animals,
birds, eggs, reptiles, insects, honey, leaves, flowers,

fruits, tubers and roots.

With my intensive training I was soon as much at

home in the forest as my captors. I could go off with

my group to gather fruit and spend the whole

little

day or several days and nights in the forest, covering

great distances and finding my way back to the vil
lage or to any other place I wanted to go, without
assistance. The chief observed all this with satis
faction and I am sure said to himself, "He will stay
with us always now and he will make my people a

good chief."

On one occasion I was off several hours from our

village with two of my young girl companions. We
had separated from a small group who were cutting
caucho for our next trading trip. It was time for a
certain well-known caimito tree to be in full fruit and
we expected to gather some. We had found the tree
and I was up in the lower branches when a tre
mendous arrow struck and held ina tree limb, just
at my shoulder. Immediately I swung around to the
other side of the tree trunk and, with a warning

shout, slid down a vine to the ground. There I

grabbed my rifle and sent a couple of shots off in the

149
 ASSASSIN
direction from which the arrow had come. There was
no one to be seen in the dense vegetation.
With the shots and commotion, the rubber cutters
were soon with us. The arrow was brought down and
examined. It was of unknown fabrication, a type
never seen by our men. Trackers were sent to investi

gate and the rest of us hurried back to the village.

Our arrival and announcement caused a panic.
The chief called all the men together and organ
ized several search parties to try to determine the
source of this attempt to kill me. However, our best
trackers were unable to find and follow any kind of
track. As the days passed and the search parties
returned, tension and frustration mounted. Nothing
could be found, but something had to be done.
The chief then called for a tobacco talk. The
women prepared shallow dishes of the liquid tobacco
extract and the men gathered around. Each in turn

dipped a finger in the liquid, then licked his finger.

The talk built up slowly with the tobacco intoxica
tion, under Xumu's guidance. He reminded the men
that it was their obligation to protect the tribe, espe
from attacks by the hated Guacamayos, who
cially
had often killed their men and carried off their
women. Each man, he told them, carried a family
obligation to avenge past attacks on their relatives.
He then went around the group, reminding each one
of specific deaths in his family history that still had
not been properly and fully vindicated. Every man
was implicated in some way.
Then he harangued them with a tale that revealed

150
 ASSASSIN
to me for the first time the whole story of my pres
ence among them.
"I am an old man. Without a strong chief you will
live likeanimals in the forest, fighting among your
selves. Remember this is not the first time that a

young man whom I have carefully prepared to be

your chief after I am gone has been attacked in the

forest. Recall that my only surviving son was assas
when he was ready to be your
sinated in the forest
This was not so long ago and you should
leader.
remember it well. My sorrow at the loss was beyond
and I have not forgotten."
description
An angry muttering went through the crowd, but
Xumu went on. "I am an old man. My flesh and
bones grow tired. I cannot change this skin. Our
ancestors heard wrong and we lost the secret.
"Remember that among yourselves after my son's
death we decided to bring in a young man from out
side to be the chief, a young man who could get us
arms for our defense, get them for us and teach our
men how to use them. This has now been accom

plished better than ever we expected.

"If you cannot protect him, soon you will be

living like a band of pigs in the forest, led by an old

sow. I do not have the time to train another chief for

you.
cc
Last night I had a vision in my sleep. I saw the
Guacamayos village off toward the setting sun. It is
there the attack came from. Tomorrow I will start

giving the instructions for our attack. Now

go pre
pare yourselves and your fighting equipment."

151
 ASSASSIN
The crowd of men broke tip into small groups,
each demonstrating the terrible things he would do
to the enemy-
After a few days of preparation, a group was
ready to make the raid on the Tillage believed to be
the home of my would-be assassin. They did not want
me to go because it was so far away, and niy protec
tion would be difficult. I was eager to be a part of this
raid, but it was clear that Xumu supported the
leaders of the party in their veto of my name. Two
of the Indians I had trained to use the rifles went in

my place.
Actually, the Indians found the rifle a disappoint
ing weapon in the forest, because of the limited
visibility. The noise was useful to frighten the
enemy, but if he dodged behind a tree he could es
cape. In a village clearing it was more effective. But
for hunting the noise was a disadvantage, because
itfrightened and scattered the game.
We waited in the village
for many days after the

raiding party went out. Finally the chief said they

would return on the next day. Women had been pre
paring large pots of fermented drink for the cele
bration of their return, but the general routine of
the village had been totally upset, and tension was

getting unbearable.
Theraiding party arrived as Xuma had pre
dicted, but the raid had been a complete failure.
When they arrived at the village they found it
easily from the directions Xumu had given them
they found that it was empty. It had clearly been

152
 ASSASSIN
abandoned some months earlier and the houses were
falling down and rotting away. There had been no
indication as to where the enemy had gone. The
raiders could only come back.
This was a terrible letdown for everyone. Now
there was no excuse for a big victory dance. The
chief did consent toa drinking bout, to use up the
liquor that had been fermenting. Even the women
and young people participated, and the final result
was an unruly mob. During the second day of drink
ing, long involved discussions started in which past
unpleasant incidents within the tribe and between
families were aired. Occurrences dating back even to
the childhood of some of the older people were wran
gled over as though they had happened within
months. Accusations and lengthy arguments in which
all participated went on for hours as the drinking

continued. Sometimes things would get out of hand

and the chief would have to act to calm them down-
In the end, when the fermented drink was gone, the
arguments were settled until the next time.
Shortly after the affair of the abortive raid, or
perhaps because of it, a group went out on a raid
without my knowledge. When they came back two
or three weeks later, I was aware of it when smoked
human was being passed around among the
flesh

men, and some of the women were protesting because

they were not getting their share.
I knew the language well by this time and had
only to listen carefully to learn that a raid had been
made on a distant rubber cutter?s camp. I went to

153
 ASSASSIN
the chief with a protest of my own and told him this

would bring armed bands of rubber cutters against

us. They would have superior arms and organization

and we could be wiped out by such a group.

Chief Xumu replied, "Our people suffered in
numerable raids and atrocities at the hands of the
rubber cutters when we lived on the Tarauaca River.
Men were murdered, women raped and killed, chil
dren carried off. Why would they carry off our chil

dren, except to eat them?"

"You remember the old woman who wanted to kill
you when you first arrived?" he asked me. "She lost
her whole family in the last raid before we moved
here to the center of the forest. I knew you would
never be safe as long as she was alive.
"Most of the atrocities have not been avenged in
any way. The only way we can avenge ourselves for
the past horrors of the loss of our children is by what
these men have done. To stop it will mean waiting
until all the old people who have lost part of their

families are gone, or at least have forgotten. You

know by now that they do not forget easily or soon."
I was in no position to argue with the chief and
said no more about it.

By my improvised calendar, it had been more than

a year since we had gone on our first trading trip to
sell caucho. Production had continued off and on
among the groups I had trained, and enough blocks
for a trip had accumulated. The chief suggested that
we needed more rifles, ammunition, machetes and
other trade goods, so we began the preparations for

154
 ASSASSIN
the long trip to the trading post.
The trip was much the same as the previous one
except that on the river we had an encounter with
a party of Bolanxos. One evening as we were bring

ing the rafts out of hiding under the riverbank

vegetation, a warning animal call came from
our

guards on land. I was still on shore and I grabbed

a we had brought along. Soon there was violent
rifle

shouting and combat. I brought the rifle into play

and the surprise this gave our enemies caused them
to disappear. We had killed three of them and re
ceived only light wounds ourselves.
Soon the flotilla of rafts was silently launched

again for the night with everyone on board before a

counterattack could occur. My men said that they
were from the hooded Bolanxos and that we had been
lucky, for they were violent people.
This was not a leisurely night of floating down the
river. We used the poles as much as possible against
the river bottom to hasten our progress and lengthen
the distance between us and the enemy. In the early
dawn we tied up on the opposite side of the river
and took every precaution to protect ourselves.
Guards were posted and scouts sent out to check the
river below. As soon as they were back, in the early
afternoon, with the word that the area was clear, we
were off
again.
the trading post our timing and strategy were
At
the same as before. The price of rubber had gone
down. was enough rubber to buy all the
Still there

things we needed and to double the sum I had

on

155
 ASSASSIK

deposit. I ate nothing this time at the post and thus

avoided the intestinal trouble of the first trip. My
usually unresponsive companions were jubilant at
the take of trade goods we made this time, and my

position among them was further strengthened.

When we returned to the village there was a big
celebration.
Xumu was relieved at our safe return and showed
it to me more than usual. He was a very reserved old

man. I remember my feeling, on returning from this

man was becoming quite frail.
trip, that the old
Soon after our return the chief ordered the diets
and purges preparatory to a vision session. It had
been many months since we had participated in a

group There
session. were hints from the intensity
of the preparations and a few overheard remarks
that Xumu was planning something special.
It was a select group of twelve that went to the
secluded glade in the forest. It included some of the
older men and several of the best hunters. The
and chants were similar to previous occasions,
rituals

perhaps a little more elaborate. Prom the prepara

tory chants of the fragrant smoke and evocation of
the spirit of the honi xuma it was evident that Chief
Xumu was attempting in this session to fix in my
consciousness all the important or essential circum
stances of their tribal life. There seemed to be an
intense feeling of rapport among the group, all

dedicated to the purpose of the old man.

I was aware of the fragile hand that poured the

magic fluid and passed the cups around to each. We

156
 ASSASSIN
drank in unison and settled into a quiet reverie of

joint communion, savoring the fragrant smoke in

the stillness of the silent forest. A
quiet chant held
our conscious thoughts together as the potion took
effect. A
second cup was passed to intensify the
reaction*
Color visions, indefinite in form, began to evolve
into immense vistasof enchanting beauty. Soon
subtle but evocative chants led by the chief took con
trol of the progression of our visions. Embellish
ments to both the chants and the visions came from
the participants.
Soon the procession of animals began, starting
with the jungle cats. Some of these I had not seen
before. There was a tawny puma, several varieties of
the smaller spotted ocelot, then a giant rosetta-

spotted jaguar. A
murmur from the assembly indi
cated recognition. This tremendous animal shuffled

along with head hanging down, mouth open and

tongue lolling out. Hideous, large teeth filled the
open mouth. An instant change of demeanor to
vicious alertness caused a tremor through the circle
of phantom-viewers.
From a memory recess in my brain there emerged
with the stimulation of the cats an experience from
my past. On a trip to the Rio Putumayo a year be
fore coming to the Jurua to cut caucho, I had come
face to face on a forest path with a rare black
jaguar. It had been a terrifying experience, but I
had dominated the flashing eyes of the beast and we
had gone our separate ways without violence.

157
 ASSASSIN
This mighty animal now intruded on our visions
and a shudder passed through us all. As before, the
demon of the forest went on his way. Other animals,
snakes, birds passed in review, each with some signifi
cant characteristic important to the Huni Kui in

dominating the forest.

Then came scenes of combat with the hated
enemy,
the Guacamayos (Kana Taxi), a procession of the
feared white-robed and hooded Bolanxos, and en
counters with Kariwa and Kiruana, the hated in

vading rubber cutters. In one vision a village was in

flames, the people scattering in panic into the forest.
Here Xumu, then a much younger man, killed a
rubber cutter in violent hand-to-hand fighting.
Scenes in the new village, where we now lived,

gradually brought the visions to an end. We awoke

to shafting sunlight and morning bird song pene
trating both to pur consciousness and to the place of
our visions.

As I have explained before, it is impossible to

describe satisfactorily the content
and depth of feel
ing that captures the mind. During the visions I was
aware within myself of a great feeling of empathy
for these people in their struggle to dominate the
forces of nature for their daily living and to defend
themselves against their enemies.
A calabash of thick fruit gruel passed around by
one of the guards restored our bodily sensations to
the daily world of our existence, and in a subdued
mood we returned to the village. Everyone seemed
aware of the source of the black jaguar
sequence of

158
 ASSASSIN
visions. It left a strong impression on them and re
sulted in my being given the name Ino Moxo, Black
Panther.
These people had a strong suspicion against the
use of proper names for individuals. Everyone had
a name, but it was not used, for they felt that to

speak a person's real name made him vulnerable to

Therefore, they used nicknames. Many
evil spirits.

of the men went by names of the animals they hunted

or names derived from unusual incidents in their
lives. The women were often addressed simply as
little sister, cousin, aunt, old mother, or were given
nicknames from things they did especially welL

159
/v
X V

/v
/V

Transition

/v
i5
/x

As I BEGAN to hear an occasional, apprehensive

word or remark pass among the old women who took
care of Chief Xumu's daily needs, my attention was
drawn to the fact that he was eating practically
nothing, a mouthful or two of fruit gruel a day. Nor
was he sleeping. Any time of the night I roused from
sleep he would be sitting in his hammock, peering
into the fire. The old women took turns sitting up
with him.
He was fragile and ancient. The people showed no
special emotion, but there was a feeling of constant
watchfulness from those near the chief.
One afternoon I was walking with him between the
houses when his left leg crumpled and he fell to the
ground. The old women were there in an instant at

160
 TRANSITION
my shout. There was a wail and the old man shut
them up with a sharp command. They carried him
gently to his hammock in the house and tried to
make him comfortable. Their examination of his leg
showed nothing wrong below the hip, but the hip
bone must have broken*
The people gathered around, grim-faced and
He sent them all away with a command, allow
silent.

ing only the old women to remain near to do what

they could for him. The village, ordinarily bustling
with sound and activity, settled into a gloomy quiet.
That night a chieu-chieu bird flew around the house.
The men halfheartedly lit fires and burned chili pep
pers to drive away the carrier of ill omens. The next
day the chief would eat nothing and he turned his

face away without response when anyone spoke tp

him.
In the middle of the night a mournful wafl broke
out when the old women became aware that Chief
Xumu's spirit had departed from his earthly body.
Soon the whole village took up a low, mournful
chant, which continued through the night.
The next morning the men constructed a low plat
form just off the floor. The chief was laid out on this
in the dark house. A small torch of burning tree
resin was placed at one corner of the platform and
the men and women whom he had led for so many
many years gathered to mourn his death.
The mourning alternated between chants and
stories about the life and exploits of the chief. The

older men and women told stories of his fighting and

161
 TRANSITION
hunting abilities and incidents of his life as a young
man. The arrival of the rubber cutters with firearms
and their disastrous attempts to make the Indians
work at rubber production formed the theme of
many tales. The story of the final massacres that
destroyed their villages on the Rio Tarauaca and the
move of the remnants to the center of the forest,

organized and led by the old man, took hours to re

count. Many different men, and women too, had their
individual episodes to add.
As the mourning went on, several women were pre
paring wide strips of thin bast fiber from the inner
bark of the entnra tree. These were hung to dry over
the fire. And on the second day after Xumu died, the
old women began wrap the body. Beginning with
to
his feet, they carefully wound these dried strips of
about his body, covering it completely.
bast fiber
The body was then drawn high up into the smoke-
filled rafters of the house. There it hung for many
months, out of sight.
Village life was at a standstill for days. The men
and women wandered about aimlessly, or gathered in
small groups to talk. The children reflected the gen
eral feeling in the village and were quiet and sub
dued. The chief had managed the people in many
subtle ways; awareness of his presence had been
enough to keep the village operating efficiently.
Now there was a terrible hole in the fabric of village
life. I myself felt a great aching loss. Xumu had

been like a second father to me, and now added to

the pain of loss was the knowledge that the tribe ex-

162
 TKANSITION
pected me to fill the void he had left.

Not until the food was all gone in the village did
forest gathering start, and then only gradually.
The women began, go to their gardens,
first, to
directed by the chief's old women. They brought
back bananas, peanuts, corn and yams from which
gruel was made. Soon hunters were coming back
again with game. Gradually, some semblance of the
old village routine developed.
This was a time of confusion, a difficult time. The
Indians had not yet begun to look to me for the
direction the chief had given. And it turned out that

they were waiting until the old man was buried be

fore reorganizing life under a new chief.
When all the natural signs were right, the chiefs
old women molded and fired several large clay urns.
The clay came from a nearby deposit of gray plastic
earth that made excellent pots when mixed and fired.
When these urns were ready, the old women lowered
the body from the rafters where it had become mum
mified in the smoke and hot dry air. It was as stiff as
a tree trunk.
With mournful chants and great reverence, the
women unwrapped the mummy. With a specially
prepared mixture of animal fats and palm-kernel
oil, they began to rub the joints. Soon they were

softened sufficiently so that they could double up

the hard shriveled body into a sitting position, the
knees drawn up under the chin. Then the body was

placed in one of the large urns. With the body went

all of Xumu's possessions his ceremonial bow and
 TRANSITION
arrow, his dance baton, the feather-decorated shirt
and many other things. Food was also placed in the
urn. A second large urn was then placed over the
burial urn, and the joint was sealed with melted tree
resin.

Men, women and children joined in the wailing

songs and the chants as the urn was carried to a deep
prepared at the edge of the village clearing.
hole,
Here the urn was buried, and food plants were
started around the grave. These were carefully
tended and replanted when necessary during all the
time I was with the Huni Kui in the village. Thus
the departed spirit of the chief never lacked for food.
After the burial the villagers certainly did not
forget Chief Xumu, but the mood of the tribe

changed. There was a certain briskness in taking up

the tribal activities that had been missing during
the months since his death. Within a few days of the
burial several of the men came to me and said it was
time I led them in a vision session so their hunting
skillwould come back to normal. This provided a
new departure, a challenge and a test.

I prepared the medicinal purges that Xumu had

taught me to make and supervised the preparation
of honi xuma, the vision extract. Then I prescribed
and administered the purges along with the ap
propriate diet. When all had been properly done,
we went late one afternoon to our forest glade to
commune with the spirits.
On the way the traditional chants came to me
naturally and thus I was able to dispel any appre-

164
 TRANSITION"
hension my companions may have felt. The ceremony
around the with the fragrant smoke went well
fire

and created the appropriate mood of calm, en

chanted expectation. The potions we drank soon had
the desired effect, and I found the evocative chants
came easily to me and controlled the progress of the
visions. The black panther appeared again and I for
the time had the feeling of actually leaving my
first

body and being the panther. Many strange and

marvelous visions passed before us, and in the morn
ing there was a strong feeling of satisfaction among
us that events would take a favorable course.
This euphoria was soon apparent in the village
after we returned, and it created the impression that
life would continue to flow smoothly as it had before.
It had been over a year now since we had been out
to sell caucho and I was getting many requests for
machetes and axes. We did not have enough of these
tools to go around, but all of the people wanted
them, for they made the work so much easier.
Organizing the production of caucho was a good
activity to keepmany men occupied. They began
towork with enthusiasm, speculating on what they
would get in return when the rubber went to the
trading post.
It took many weeks to produce a caravan load of
rubber blocks the right size and shape for back pack
ing. When the blocks were ready I began picking the
crew to go with me to the Brazilian border to trade.
Also I had to organize the village to protect itself
while we were gone. I left instructions with the old

165
 TEA25TSITIO K

women to make a good batch of fermented liquor for

our return, and early one morning we were off to the

north with our packs.
The was without special incident. I was care
trip
ful to organize advance scouting to avoid any pos
sible points of danger. When I arrived at the trading

post they expressed surprise that I had been away

so long, Mr. Rodrigues said the rubber price had

dropped nearly in half while I had been away.

I had brought in a good lot of rubber, but with
the price reduction there was little cash balance left
to deposit to my account after my purchases were
tallied. Rodrigues assured me thatmy balance with
him was secure as long as I wanted to leave it.

By sunset I was back at the landing in the forest

with the merchandise, and we were soon moving to
ward home. Two days out from the village I sent
a runner ahead to announce our arrival. The cele
bration of our return was a wild dance that lasted
two days and nights. Toward the end the long
standing feuds and conflicts began to manifest
among the men. I found that my understanding of
the background of these fights was not really good

enough to enable me to settle them to the satisfaction

of concerned. Serious fights were stopped, never
all

theless, before irreparable damage was done to com

munity relationships. I needed more experience with

the subleties of intergroup connections and
family
backgrounds. It would take me a long time to de
velop the control that had seemed so easy when old
Xumu was exercising it.

166
 TRANSIT IO
Further use of the vision-producing extract
brought awareness of the complex relationships
within the tribe. Observing carefully all the neces

sary preparations of purges and diets, I started with

a select group a series of sessions in our small se
cluded forest clearing. These were spaced three days

apart to prevent a build-up of intensity by accumu

lation in the system.
For the first we had taken a strong dose to
session
stimulate a deep and vivid reaction. With the call
of a sad and eerie chant I had learned from Xumu,
the visions began but the intensity kept building up
as the hours passed until we were all nearly uncon
scious. Then I recalled a chant the chief had taught
me for decreasing the intensity of reaction, and im

mediately the feeling of the group eased and the

visions took a more desirable course.
From this experience I learned that the visions

obeyed the songs and chants, or perhaps it would be

better to say that by means of the chants it was pos
sible to influence the course of the visions. To test
this in a following session I chanted what I wanted
to see and found that each time with greater tran

quillity, no matter how involved or strange the

visions, they obeyed my wishes as I expressed them
in song.

Once the men realized that I had obtained domina

tion over the visions, they all considered my position
superior to theirs. I developed at the same
definitely
time a more acute awareness of my surroundings
and of the people about me a sense of clairvoyance

167
 TRANSITION
that enabled me to anticipate any difficult situation
that might develop and to be alert to handle it.
Toward the end of this series of sessions, I began
to form in my mind the ideas of what we should see.

Expressed by means of the chants, they then ap

peared as desired. Once I had dominated the secret
of this powerful plant, I began to examine innumer
able other plants of the forest to divine their best
use in our daily life.
At this time I greatly increased my knowledge
and understanding of the tribal lore in methods of
preparing cures from plant materials and in devel
oping uses for these herb medicines. To do this I be

gan taking honi alone in the forest shelter with only

Old Mother, Owa luxabo, to guard me. As I devel
oped new insight I was able to improve both on the
preparation of these medicinal extracts and their
use. This was soon recognized by the men and women
of the tribe and it, too, strengthened my position in
the village.

Bycustomary preventive use of herbal prepara

tions the Huni Kui remained a healthy and vigorous

people. Sickness was unusual, but when someone in

the tribe did become seriously ill everyone became

preoccupied and worried until they saw him well

again. Sickness, they believed, came from luxibo,
an evil spirit, entering the body through witchcraft.
A cure stronger than the offending witchcraft was

required to remove the offending spirit.

"The moon, sun and stars never kill us, young or
old," they told me. "Only the evil spirits have it in

168
 TRANSITION
their power to make us die and disappear. The gods
are the heavenly bodies that illuminate us. They con
trol the evil spirits and can send them to castigate

us."
It was my part, then, when someone became ill,

to dissipate the offending spirit. Chief Xumu had

prepared me for this, and I adapted his method to

my purpose.
The Huni Kui believed that the most powerful
force coming from any being was its breath and
live

that words emanating from the breath were a crea

tive force. Thus, with evocative chants and fragrant

smoke from my smoking pipe filled with a mixture

of tobacco and other herbs, I would create a trance-
like atmosphere around the sick one. At the climax
of the ceremony I would forcefully blow the fragrant
smoke over the body of the patient. If symptoms of
pain were present, I would by sleight-of-hand suck
offending thorns from the painful areas and show
them to the patient. Such intense psychological
treatment with the patient in an hypnotic trance
would initiate the desired cure. Herbal baths and
potions taken internally would complete the treat
ment. By the same means, of course, it was possible
for the chief to do away with undesirable elements
in the tribe. In this state they could easily be poi
soned or hexed.

169
 x, vvx vvx
, .
vvv xw~ vw wx~ w
$
t^

I Frustration
/\
(

/N

As NEARI^T from the maps of

as I can determine

today, the Huni Kui that came under my leadership

controlled an area between the headwaters of the

Jurua, Purus, Madre de Dios, Michagua and Inuya

Rivers.Our extended village was scattered along a
range of hills at the headwaters of the Rio de las

Piedras, a tributary of the Madre de Dies. They

named the location Xanada when they withdrew to
this most isolated area away from navigable streams
to avoid contact with the invading rubber cutters.
From this refuge they made forays to avenge attacks
that had been made on them in the past, both by
rubber cutters and by other Indian tribes.
Some of the men were violent in nature and seemed
to live only to fight and make trouble. It became

170
 FRUSTRATION
evident to me after Chief Xumu died that they would
not be easy to manage, but it was necessary for me
to do the best I could to control them.
I noticed that some of them preferred to do as they

pleased and organize things among themselves. I

became aware that a small group from some of the
nearby houses had been absent for many days and
had come back with a good load of smoked meat.
One of the old women came to me with a complaint.
These men, she said, had brought back cured human
meat from an attack on a distant rubber cutter's
camp. She said they hid it and refused to give her
any. She rather slyly reminded me that I had once
objected to this practice, and she intimated that if
I were to control the tribe I would have to make the
men follow my orders.
That same day I asked some of the old women to

prepare the liquid tobacco extract and I sent out an

invitation to the men for a tobacco conference the
next day.
By midday the group had gathered and the shal
low vessel of tobacco was placed in the center of the
floor of the chiefs house. As before, when this kind
of discussion had occurred under Chief Xumu, the
men sat in a circle and the dish passed around the
that each could dip a finger in the liquid
circle so

and pass a few drops to his tongue. The conversa

tion started quietly. In the calmest manner possible,
displaying absolutely no emotion, I reviewed what
Xumu had taught me and what I had done in getting
arms and trade goods for the tribe.

171
 ffBTJSTRATION

Gradually the others entered Into the discussion,

with related and unrelated comments. After several
hours of conversation I told them I was aware some
were going off on distant hunting expeditions with
out instructions and coordination with the activities
of the rest of the tribe. By means of indirect allu
sions to the subject I gradually made them aware
that I knew the kind of game they had killed. Then
I said that if they continued going out without in
structions evil spirits and disastrous times would
destroy the tribe.
In a long harangue I explained that if we con
tinued killing rubber cutters, they would soon come
with an expedition possessing better arms and su
perior organization to our own. They would seek us
out and destroy our own village. The response from
the men was that the rubber cutters were withdraw

ing from some of the areas they had previously oc

cupied and that the tribe still lacked revenge for
many attacks, murdered relatives and stolen children.
After an involved and wandering discussion, one
of the old men suggested I go with a group of them
on an expedition back to Honowa-ia, the far-off
place from which they had come many years ago
on their move into the isolated forest with Chief
Xumu. By making this symbolic trek in reverse they
expected me to reach an understanding of their at
titude toward the rubber cutters. This seemed im
portant to them and provided an exit from our
impasse.
I knew I could not expect these people to change

172
 PR tr S TEAT ION

quickly an attitude based on such deep emotional

involvements. The expedition they proposed would

provide a unifying experience for the tribe, so I

consented and took the initiative in ordering the

preparations and selecting the party to make the

trip.

Purposely I chose a mixed group made up of some

of the older men who had made the original migra
tion, some from the two Indian groups they had
joined with here to found the present tribe, and some
of the young hunters born since the founding of the
village. I organized and instructed a guard group
which would stay behind and protect the village.
The old women were told to prepare the liquor for
the celebration of our return.
It took most of a week to prepare provisions for
the trip smoked meat, yucca boiled and then
roasted or smoked, dry cakes made of ground corn
and ground peanuts. During this time of prepara
tion, members of the tribe, in the evening conversa
tions around the fire, went over every detail they
could remember of events that caused their migra
tionand what took place on the trip.
At dawn on a cool morning with mist drifting
among our houses at Xanada, our party of twenty-
five men departed toward the north. That first day

we traveled rapidly through familiar territory. In

late afternoon we arrived at a place they said had

been their last camp before coining to the site chosen

by Xumu for their village.
Here we made camp and around the fire the men

173
 PE TJSTEATI02T
told me that Xumu himself had come here with a
small group of men to find an isolated location where

they could live in peace, after he had gathered the

remnants of the tribe together in the forest follow
ing a series of disastrous battles with rubber cutters.
Nisi was the only one left who had come with Xumu
to locate the village site. He was too old now to make
our long trek and had been left behind in the village.
The next day when we came to another of their
campsites we stopped early for the night, and an
other episode of their trip was described. Finally
after several days we arrived at the place where
they
said Xumu had gathered them together in the forest
to heal the wounded and to organize their migration.
When he had found out about the raids the rubber
cutters were making on the Huni Kui with firearms,
killing the men and carrying off the women and
children, he went alone to help them. Prom the for
est around their destroyed villages on the Honowa-ia
he gathered the stragglers who had escaped and
helped the wounded. He encouraged the women and
children who had lost their families and wandered
alone in the forest.
While they were camped in this place, so long ago,
one of the hunters came upon a tremendous boa
(donowan owapaxoni) while hunting in the forest
nearby. This was considered a sign of great good
luck, because they venerated the boa. This heartened
the small band of refugees and around
they gathered
him to sing and to dance. Then they killed the
boa,
eating its flesh to capture its spirit. Headbands were

174
 FETJSTEATIOK
made of its skin to give them continuing good luck.
The Indian refugees were from various villages
of the Contanawas and Kaxinawas that had been
attacked. Xumu was one of the Tusinawas, a small

group of violent people with reddish hair that had

retired to the forest away from the rivers when the
rubber cutters first came into the area. After the boa

dance, the homeless ones decided to take for them

selves the name Donowan from the boa.
It was from here that Xumu had gone out with a
small band of surviving hunters to find a safe place
to start a new village. They had named it Xanada,
place to begin again, and had made friends with the
Indians nearby, who spoke their language. Xumu
with great eloquence had convinced these people
the Xabo and Ixabo, the palm-tree people that the
group of stragglers he was bringing would cause no
trouble. As it turned out there was, in the beginning,
plenty of trouble and misunderstanding, but Xumu
had finally brought them all together as a tribe at
Xanada the boa and the palm-tree clans.
At the boa camp we made shelters and with small
groups I went to visit the sites of the various villages
on the River Tarauaca (Honowa-ia) that had been
destroyed by the rubber cutters. They said attacks
had come at dawn from the river. Large groups of
attackers, all well armed with rifles, had routed the
villagers, killing many of them as they fled to the
forest. The Indians had no defense but flight, for

the bow and arrow is no match for a repeating rifle

in any cleared area. A few of the white men followed

175
 PETJSTEATION
the Indians into the forest, and they were killed by
swift silent arrows. Many stories were told to me of
the atrocities these caucho cutters committed.

My companions knew the locations of the garden

clearings of the destroyed villages, and we went out

to see these also. Each one was now grown back up
to forest trees, but we were able to find signs indi
cating they had once been clearings. There had been
in the general area several villages of rubber cutters,

established after the Indians had fled. We found

these nearly all abandoned now and falling apart,
the clearings being taken over again by forest

growth. The Indians speculated about this and ques

tioned me. My response was vague and noncommit
tal. I correlated it in my own mind with the news I
had heard about falling rubber prices, the last time
I visited the trading post, but I said nothing of this
to the Indians.
We did find one location still occupied by rubber
cutters. My companions tried to persuade me to at

tack it and kill the hated invaders. In the end I was

able to convince them that this would only bring
trouble on us, while we had trouble enough from in
vasion by the Guacamayos and other Indians into
our territory.
One night at the boa
camp I had visions in my
sleep of trouble back at Xanada. The next morning
we broke camp and started home by forced march,
and in a few days we were back at our refuge on the
hills inthe center of the forest. There was great

rejoicing at our return, because signs had been found

176
 FUTTSTEATION

again indicating that our enemies were trespassing.

One of the young hunters had disappeared in the
forest and had been neither seen nor heard from
again.
Nisi,who had been left in charge while we were
away, assured me that there was no immediate dan
ger. No one would openly attack our village as long
as we had firearms. He had put out patrols and the
invaders had apparently retreated. Vigilance was

necessary, but there was no reason to cancel our

return celebration. Body painting soon got under
way, and when that was completed the first drinks
were passed around. Chanting and dancing followed.
It was a wild celebration and on the second day

many fights broke out. By this time I understood

better the family backgrounds, rivalries and past
affronts and could settle the disputes better than
before.
A few days later I began talks with Nixi and sev
eral of the oldermen about trying to discover where
the invasion of our forest was coming from. Tension
was building up in the village because the young man
who had disappeared had not yet been found, nor his
lossavenged. We all felt that the invasion was com

ing from the southeast, and several patrols were

sent out in that direction. They all came back with
no evidence of any target for an attack of retaliation.
To occupy their minds we started caucho produc
tion again and several months later took a good load
of blocks to the trading post* The price had dropped

again, and Rodrigues mentioned that rubber cutters

177
 US TE ATION

were leaving theforest. The caucho we brought just

barely covered the things I wanted to buy. nag A

ging doubt entered my mind about the future of

trading rubber for goods. My

Indians to a certain,
if only small, extent were becoming accustomed to

having some of the things they could get only

through me at the trading post, especially arms,
ammunition and metal tools. This was an important
part of my power over them.
Back at the village when we returned I found the
wild drinking and dancing distasteful for the first
time, but dared not show it. I had learned from
Xumu that it was the place of the chief to show no
personal reaction to any situation except in very
special circumstances when he wanted to create a
counterreaction from the people.
Now I found myself spending more time than
usual in the forest to use up my excess energy and to

help relieve a feeling of tension. In this way I be

came more familiar with the details of our hunting

territory and I was able to organize the hunting

activities of the men more effectively. One day I had

descended the bank of a small creek and was climbing

up the other side when a large arrow buried itself in
the earth atmy side. Immediately I dodged behind
a and blew a high-pitched whistle that I always
tree
wore on a string around my neck. This had been
given me as a danger signal to call for help after my
last ambushattack. I could see nothing to shoot at
in the dense forest undergrowth but let go with some
rifle shots. In a few minutes some of my hunters were
178
 Ffc ITS TEATION
at my side and we organized a search while one man
went back for reinforcements.
When these men arrived, I was escorted with great
care back to the village, while the rest of the men
began an intensive search for my attacker*
At sundown they came in, chanting, carrying be
tween them a man bound to a pole. They bound him
very carefully to the owl tree between the houses and
kindled a small fire nearby. The entire village came
to taunt him and screech their rage. Nixi had asked
that I hold him until the following day. He wanted
to work on the prisoner in daylight to obtain the
maximum amount of information about our enemies.
We set up an all-night guard to watch and protect
our prisoner.
In the morning a shout rang out To everyone's
!

surprise, the prisoner hung dead in his bonds. There

was no mark of violence nor wounds. The guards
perhaps had dozed off, but they had heard nothing
happen. The Indians assured me he had died of his
own will during the night. They said it could be
done, but seldom in such a very short time.
Now the question was what to do with the body.
They all said we should take it out far enough so
the smell would not come back, and there let the buz
zards eat This they considered the worst fate one
it.

could have. So I organized a group to carry it away

toa point Nixi and I agreed on. When we went back
a week later not a sign remained, not even a bone,
This was a very bad omen. It meant that someone
had carried the remains away. Who was it? Who

179
 FBtJSTRATION
was watching us so closely here in the depths of our
own territory?
We organized scouting parties to try to determine
where these assassination attempts were coming
from, but results were inconclusive. Tension mounted
and I had to invent special projects to divert atten
tion from the trouble.
We started to produce another load of caucho.
Several weeks later I was out with the caucho cutters
in the forest, checking on how much rubber we had
in blocks. I had gone off them
quite a distance from
to check on a fruit tree Iknew was nearly ready to
draw game. When I turned to go back an arrow
came flying at me from a distant clump of under
growth. It had been a very long shot and I grabbed
the arrow out of the air as it floated by, most of its

force spent. At
the same time I shot into the vegeta
tion from which the arrow seemed to come and then

signaled an alarm with my whistle.

We organized a search, this time with no results
at all not a single sign to go by. The entire village
was now grim-faced, frustrated, ready to fight but
with nothing to attack,
A group of the old men led by Nixi came to me
and asked that I stay in the village, except when
carefully escorted. They said if I went off alone in
the forest they could not protect me. To be armed
with a rifle was not enough; one could not see far

enough. All the attacks had been on me. The enemy

was now aware of our fire power and was trying to
eliminate our source of arms, they said. If I could

180
 PETJSTBATION
tell them where the enemy was, they would destroy
him. Nisi suggested that perhaps by taking honi
xuma alone I could locate the source of our trouble
in a vision,
I tried staying in the village for a few weeks and
became desperate. It was well enough for an old chief
like ancient Xumu to stay in the village. But I was
now barely twenty-one years old and in the peak of
good health and vigor. Some way had to be found
to use up my energy. As I said before, the tribe lived
more in the forest than in the village, and to be con
fined to the village at my age was
being in jaiL
like

It was at this time that I began to notice again the

smell of these people, a strange, persistent musky
odor that I began to dislike.

181
 Tfi

I Release
/\
yv

/\
/v
/v
/v

IK DESPERATION, finally, I decided to try to

locate my enemy by visions and asked Nixi to make
for me a jug of honi xuma. I began the preparation
of the usual diet and purges. For some reason these
I had to
preliminaries made me irritable, although
repress every sign of it. In spite of my irritation and
some physical discomfort I got through the prepara
tions and ordered the small shelter at the edge of the
forest made ready.
Late one afternoon about an hour before sundown,
Owa luxabo, Old Mother, went with me into the for
est to watch over me during my vision session. Pre

viously I had sent guards into the forest, out of

sight, to guard against intrusion. The trilling notes
of a birdcall in reply to my own calls told me these

182
 ASE
men were in their places.
I lit the small fire and put on the fragrant leaves,
chanting softly to myself, All was in readiness and
I poured out a cup full of honi xuma to start the
visions. It tasted strangely bitter to me as I gulped

it down, and I had the feeling it must be too strong.

As I sat quietly in my small hammock awaiting the

beginning of the visions, a flight of large blue and
red macaws went by just over the treetops. Their
raucous, strident calls echoed through the forest,
shattering the calm peace of the late afternoon in
my secluded glen. The atmosphere seemed heavy,

menacing, as the pulsating hum started in my ears.

A leathery, rubberlike feeling came to my skin as
I touched it with then a trembling in my
my fingers,

legs. Instantaneous sensation of alternating hot and

cold flashed through my body. I broke out in a

dripping, running sweat, and a terrible nausea

coupled with deep abdominal convulsions blotted out
all other sensation. I remember groping for some
control mechanism, but they all escaped me.
I closed my eyes and the color visions began, bril
liant greens and blues with billowing, undulating
configurations of great plasticity. From these, sinis
ter menacing tentacles
began to form and extend
toward me. Each became a hideous viper with flash
ing eyes and tongue. I was incapable of moving and
found myself writhing on the ground enveloped in
their undulating coils.
All feeling of time and spatial orientation stopped
as the colors faded. The snakes gradually uncoiled

183
 BE LEASE

and disappeared as wisps of vapor. But involvements

of greater depth and import took over.
I became aware of my heartbeat and could follow
in great detail the coursing of blood through my
body. The source of impulses in the depth of my
brain that controlled my body became evident to my
understanding. It seemed that I left my body and
was observing all this from outside. Then I floated
off into a boundless, hideous void without spatial
orientation. A feeling of uncontrollable rhythmic
acceleration toward some impending disaster plunged
me, helplessly, into an indescribably agonizing
purgatory of the mind.
Distorted faces began to appear and hold my at
tention. Visions of my family back in Iquitos ap
peared and I realized there was sickness my mother
was dying. Unendurable anguish at being away, at
the flooding awareness that I would never see her

again, blocked out every other perception for a

while. Then a jungle scene appeared and I saw my

former cauchero companions ambushed in the forest

by naked savages with painted faces.
I found myself wandering alone in a forest of
tremendous trees. Rough misshapen boulders and
other hideous defilements lurked everywhere on the
uneven slippery ground. The sound of a strange
birdcall held my attention. Suddenly there was the

twang of a plucked bowstring. A tremendous feath

ered arrow came floating through the air. I stood

transfixed, unable to move. It struck me down and

a hideous grimacing savage stepped from behind a

184
 E EL E A SE

tree. He was much taller than I, great strength ap

parent in his body, which was vivid with red body
paint. Deliberately he put a naked foot on my chest
as my life's blood ebbed out onto the ground and I
watched my own death.
I must have lost consciousness for a while. The
next thing I recall was seeing the calm, almost sub
lime, face of Chief Xumu, and with this moving
vision I regained control of the visions. The black

panther appeared. He and I became one and

prowled the forest, afraid of nothing.
There in the clearing in the gray dawn, the fire
was glowing, attended by Old Mother. She was star
ing at me with a troubled look only half hidden on
her face. I felt exhausted, drained. I could not move.
She approached my hammock and gave me
a large
calabash of fruit gruel to drink, and she had to hold

my head up so that I could swallow it. As I strug

gled to a sitting position with her help, she grumbled

some disapproving remark but made no direct com
ment on the night of visions just past.
The final visions I had had of Xumta and the
black panther were all that gave me strength of
mind to return to the village. And it was noon, even
so,before I had the strength and composure that I
needed to face the villagers. There were many bird
calls back and forth during the morning, but the
guards did not intrude. I had to appear to the people
in the village, outwardly at least, the same when I
came from the forest as when I had gone into it the

previous afternoon. Inwardly my state was chaotic

185
 BELE ASE
from the shock of the visions. This I could share with
no one. Old Mother had seen only my outward physi
cal reactions. She could have no idea of what had
occurred in the visions.
And so, finally, we walked slowly and calmly from
the forest, my face the mask I had learned to make
it. The visions were not discussed, and I entered the
village routine of directing again the daily activities
of the tribe.
As
the days passed, the residual feeling of pro
found depression from the visions that I dared not
show eased somewhat. But at night the visions re
turned as terrible nightmares. When I talked or
shouted in my disturbed sleep, some one of the
women near me would light a torch and waken me to
chase away the iusibo, the evil spirits. To avoid
disturbing the others in the large chief's house with
my wild dreams, I forced myself to sleep only fitfully
and to awaken when the dreams started. Of course
this only increased my nervous tension, and now the
overpowering musky smell of the closed house at

night nauseated me.

In desperation I organized a group to cut caucho
again and went with them to the forest. They took
elaborate precautions to protect me but did not ob
ject as long as I stayed within this group protection.
I put forth great physical effort to ease my inner
tension.

Soon after we had a load ready, I organized a

trip to the trading post. There I learned the de
pressing news that the rubber prices had continued

186
 RELEASE
to decline and rubber cutters were still leaving the
forest. I found a very low stock of merchandise and
some of the things I wanted were not available.

Rodrigues me he was expecting a shipment of

told

goods from Manaus in about three months, when the

river rose with the coming rainy season. I tried to
establish this point of time in my mind*
The money from the rubber was barely enough to

buy a few knicknacks. I drew from my balance on

deposit to make
the purchases large enough to seem
worthwhile to my Indians. Firearms had been re
quested, but I was developing a reason in my mind
for not buying any at this time.
Back at our staging camp in the depths of the

forest I explained that new arms were on the way but

still not available at the trading post. I told them

that when the new rifles came we would defend

ourselves better from our enemies.
In the forest our except for the awesome
rifles,

noise, were not much more effective than a bow and

arrow. Any branch or tree trunk would deflect or
absorb a bullet the same as an arrow, and visibility
was always limited, so the idea of improved guns was
great news to the Indians,
We went home to Xanada and had the usual big
celebration. This relieved the strain and tension for
The rainy
the tribe to some extent, but not for me.
season was coming on, when it would be difficult to

produce caucho. Some blocks we had left behind in

the forest at the time of our last trip. Urgently now

by alternating work groups I managed to get

187
 BE LEA S E

enough loads together for a trip before the worst

rains started.
This time our trip was a nightmare. Sporadic
rainshad started before we left the village. Two days
out on the trail to the northeast we were caught in
a deluge. At mid-morning we heard distant thunder
off to the east of us. This continued off and on until

midday, when a strong breeze hit the forest and

made even the large trees sway. It even penetrated
to the forest floor and cooled our bodies, which felt
pleasant. The
Indians, however, were apprehensive
and muttered to themselves.
All of a sudden was deathly quiet with not a
it

sign of air movement, and it began to turn darker

on the already shaded jungle floor. The muttering
continued, and I noticed an occasional apprehensive
glance between Indians. Soon a steady far-off roar
started and grew louder in a crescendo as a down

pour of rain moved toward us across the forest

canopy. Before the rain actually reached us it

turned dark ; the darkness broken by indistinct blue
flashes of lightning that penetrated the vegetation.
The forest filtered out the actual lightning flashes
so that all we could see was the flickering bright
blue light of indistinct origin. The wind began again
and explosions of thunder sounded over the roar of
the approaching rain.
As if by command, a great deluge of water came
cascading down through the treetops. The wind,
rain, thunder and flashes of blue light combined to
create great confusion. Suddenly the wind increased

188
 RELEASE
and the huge trees began to sway and groan. Nearby
we could hear the tremendous, awesome sound of
rending, crashing tree trunks.
My companions had moved instinctively to a small
rise in thetopography that was covered mostly with
small trees. Large trees were crashing down all
around us and water was rising rapidly in the swale
below our small hill. We huddled together in fear.
The shattering wind was gone as fast as it came,
but the rain diminished only gradually.
We stayed where we were for the night, to let the
water drain off. The next morning the daylight re
vealed forest chaos. Off to our left was a strip of

jungle completely blown down, with large twisted

and broken trees lying on top of one another.
Luckily we had been only on the edge of it. The men
were shaken and muttered about evil spirits. We
skirted the strip of blown-down forest because it
was impossible to penetrate it.
Traveling with a pack through the forest after
such a heavy rain was nearly impossible. The ground
underfoot was a quagmire. As we delayed on the
trail my tension mounted. At night I had night

mares and visions during my fitful, troubled sleep.

I kept seeing a small launch navigating up a swift
meandering stream, coming into sight and then fad
ing again into the thick green overhanging vegeta
tion, then as I strained to catch another sight of it
I would waken, cramped and sore, sitting in my tiny
leafed shelter with the rain dripping through.

Finally after a brutal struggle through the sod-

189
 RELEASE
den jungle with our loads, we arrived at night at our
usual staging area in the forest above the trading

post, I feltworn out, exhausted and apprehensive,

but we made a small raft and at daylight I started
poling a vine-tied string of caucho blocks downriver
to the cluster of houses on the point below the bend
of the river. I told my companions I would be back
before sundown, as always.
At the trading post Rodrigues greeted me with
surprise. "You used to come only once a year, or even
less often. Now you show up again in a few weeks !"
He was just finishing checking the cargo from a
launch that was in port. I asked him when it would
leave.

"When the fuel wood is loaded, probably about

midnight tonight," he replied. "Why?"
My answer was to ask him to tally my caucho.
"It's not worth much," he said. "If prices con
tinue as they are, Iam going to shut the place down
and return to Manaus."
To Manaus to Manaus The word echoed
! in my
brain Manaus, an enchanting faraway place that
I had heard about in Iquitos. To Manaus to
Manaus . . .

We weighed in the blocks of rubber, and as we

worked a wild idea was forming in my mind, or
perhaps it had been there, latent, for some time and
was only now surfacing. The money for this load of
rubber was only a pittance. I took some from my
balance on deposit and bought the things I knew
would be most attractive to my Indians in the forest,

190
 RELEASE
but no arms or ammunition.
When these items were packaged up, I asked
permission to use a canoe to take the purchases up
stream. In reply, Rodrigues asked if I wanted a man
to go with me to bring the canoe back.
I had been struggling with a wild thought; the

question decided my point.

"No," I said, "I will bring back myself. Is there
it

space for a passenger on the launch?"

"It is yours if you wish. Why? Where
empty all

are you going?" asked Rodrigues.

"I will be back before dark. Prepare my balance
on deposit. I will take it with me to Manaus," I
replied.
Paddling the canoe upriver with the things for
the Indians seemed to take an eternity. I had to

struggle to shut off my mind. They noticed that I

came alone and they helped me unload the canoe in
silence. As we prepared the carrying loads I showed

them the items. Then I said to them, "New rifles are

being unloaded now at the trading post. They are

the guns I told you about ; they will shoot through
trees. The trees will not be able to stop our bullets.

They will kill our enemies who hide behind the

trees. They be unpacked tonight. There are
will

many people waiting now to buy these guns. If I

am not there to buy them for us, our enemies the
rubber cutters will buy them all.**

There was a grumble through the small group.

"I going back tonight," I continued. "I wfll
am
buy us the new guns that will shoot through trees

191
 BE Ii A S E

and kill the enemies that hide from us. Tomorrow

aftermidday I will bring them here. You will see.

To be safe from discovery until I come you must

take all this to our camp in the forest tonight and
return tomorrow."

They grumbled, but a small canoe appeared on

the river below us. This brought them into action
and stopped discussion as they hurriedly evacuated
the riverbank.
After reassuring them calmly once more, I de
parted in the canoe. As I slowly drifted downriver
the plaintive call of a tinamou floated on the evening
air out of the forest where my men had disappeared.
How could I fathom its intent? It was a signal we
had used on occasion as a warning.
At the trading post I purchased some clothing, a

hammock, received the statement of my account

balance from Mr. Rodrigues and boarded the
launch. Both on shore and on the launch I was of
fered food, but refused it because of past upsets.

I had a feeling of total numbness and I searched

out a corner of the deck where I could be alone. It
seemed the launch would never leave a thousand
last-minute details and instructions. Rodrigues came
on board and tried to engage me in conversation by
asking me question after question. These I put off
somehow, and finally he left me alone.
The launch was wood-burning, and the hiss of
escaping steam as boiler pressure increased pointed
to impending departure. At last, in a shower of

sparks, hissing steam, several hoots on the steam

192
 RELEASE
whistle, with a throbbing of the engine we eased out
into a swift current in the flooded river.

My body and mind were numb from weeks of

consuming physical effort and suppressed tension.
Even so, a tumult of thoughts about the past and the
future came flooding into my mind, until from utter
exhaustion I slept. My hammock swayed with the
motion of the launch. On either side of the river the
thick green jungle vegetation hung down over the
swift muddy brown water. And if a small tinarnou
woke in the night and called from the depths of the
jungle I did not hear it. I slept, swaying there in
the hammock in a secluded corner of the deck while
the impulse of both the launch and the current of the
Rio Purus carried me downriver, carried me away
from the depths of the forest toward that fabled
capital of the Amazon, Manaus.

193
 xxx, xxx,. /-xx^ xxx xxx> fSf- f^f* fff* ^<xxy xxx.^ xxx.xxx*
V
XXX XX XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX t
xVv XV\ XXx XXX XVx J^g

Return

\/
v"

THE Kio PTTRFS was a meandering stream,

doubling back on itself a thousand times before
reaching the Amazon River near Manaus. For me
the trip was a time of great difficulty. I found the
enforced confinement of the launch now even worse
than that of the Indian village. The wearing of
clothing was an irritating necessity. Remembering
how had been after eating once at the trading
sick I

post, I was afraid of the food, but by eating mostly

bananas and plantains at first I was able to ease
slowly into the Brazilian diet of highly seasoned
dishes.

Communication with the boatmen and the pas

sengers we picked up at other trading posts on the
river was almost impossible at first. My own Ian-
 EETUBJT

guage, Peruvian Spanish, unused for these past

years, seemed almost foreign and came back but
slowly. It had some similarities to the Portuguese of
the Brazilians, and in this border area both lan

guages were understood to a certain extent. By the

time we reached Manaus, two weeks of downriver
travel, I could make myself understood fairly well
tosome of the men. They were all curious about me,
but I told them nothing.
Traveling down the river toward Manaus, I had
time to think about the past and wonder about the
future. The reality of the events of those seven years
in the forest must seem incredible to a person with
no exposure to the complexities of the tropical-forest
environment. But as I thought back, I realized that
from the very moment of my capture I had instinc
tivelysought to understand and gain control over
the elements of the strange world into which I was
thrust. As understanding and control developed, I
had naturally tried to shape events to my advantage.
Every trip from the isolated forest dwelling out to
the trading post had increased the cumulative ten
sions and conflicts between my new and my former
life. Myearly family ties and loyalties had been
strong, and I believe that subconsciously I never

relinquished the thought that I would someday es

cape. It was inevitable that I should have seized the
first real chance that developed in all those years to

get away and return to my own people.

Now I had indeed escaped, but as I thought ahead
to the long journey still to be made, I wondered

195
 EET HE N
what I should find when I did get to my home in

Iquitos. I wondered would even recognize my

if I

family and if they would know me after all these

years when they surely must have thought me dead.
How would I fit into that other life?
The day came when we did reach, early in the

morning, the city of Manaus. I was totally unpre

pared for the confusion of the rush and bustle of
this busy seaport a thousand miles up the Amazon

River. Fortunately, I had made friends of a sort

with the mechanic's helper, Jose, during the trip. He
agreed to go ashore with me when he was free and
take me of Luzero-Rodrigues da Costa
to the office
& Companhia, where the balance on my rubber de
liveries upriver was to be paid.
My first trip through the busy streets of Manaus
with Jose was completely confusing to me. This was
worse than being lost in the jungle! There were so
many strange sights and sounds and happenings,
all going on at such a fast pace, that I was, indeed,
lost.

At the office, which was in the front of a big ware

house, I met Antonio's uncle, Paulo Rodrigues. He
had heard of my arrival from the captain of the
FU6, the company launch that had brought me
downriver. When I gave Sr. Rodrigues the statement
of my account he asked me to return the next day
and said that I could stay on the launch if I liked.
Jose insisted, however, that I go home with him. His
mother would put me up. So we went back to the
launch for our baggage, mine consisting only of a

199
 BE T U
hammock and change of clothes that I had bought
at the trading post, nothing more.
Sra. Silva, Jose's mother, was very nice to me but
she asked too many questions. I answered
vaguely,
my mind now focused ongetting away from Manaus
and back to Iquitos and home, hoping there still
was such a place.
The next day at the office Don Paulo asked,
**What are your plans? Do you expect to buy sup
and return upriver?"
plies
"No," I replied, "I am returning to Iquitos."
cr
What isyour connection there?"
To this I replied that I had been outfitted by my
brother-in-law, Lino Vela of Iberia. The balance on
record from their post on the upper Purus that I
had brought to Manaus with me was the gain on
Lino's grubstake, I said the others of my group had
gone back overland. It was up to me to return home
with our earnings. Don Paulo found Lino listed in
his record of rubber shippers in Peru. Lino had

bought supplies from Luzero-Rodrigues in Manaus

and his credit was good.
Don Paulo then asked what he could do for me,
and I answered, "Arrange for my passage upriver to
Iquitos as soon as possible and give me the balance
of the account in pound sterling notes." These note
were the accepted means of exchange at that time.
Within a couple of days I was on board a large
steam launch on its way to Iquitos. There were a
few Peruvians on board, and hesitatingly I tried to
find out something about my family but without re-

197
 SET tTBN
suits. The time passed slowly ; many stops were made
to unload cargo at trading centers along the upper
Amazon Teffe, lea, Tabatinga, Caballo Cocha and
others. Before my capture by the Huni Kui I had
made down the Amazon from Iquitos as far
trips
as the mouth of the Rio Putumayo on the Brazilian
border. Thus as we approached Iquitos I recognized
the landmarks, and my anticipation grew as we
rounded each bend in the river. Below Iquitos the
approach by river is fairly straight, and I could see
the town for more than an hour before we arrived.

My thoughts were in a turmoil as the launch

docked. My one sack of luggage had long since been
ready, and I jumped for the dock and headed for
where our house had been. The town had changed,
but I barely noticed.
There was the house! Pounding on the door
brought a response from within. The door opened
and I was swept into the abrafo of my father's
arms.

There no need here to go into the recounting of

is

my explanations of the story we have just been

through. Along with my excitement and joy at being
home there came a great wave of sadness as I
learned that my mother and a sister had died in an
influenza epidemic. This was, as nearly as I could
tell, at about the time I had seen in the forest the
visions of my mother's death.

Strange as may seem to you, at least two other

it

important events in my life I have foreseen in ad-

198
 BE TT K27
vance. Explain how you will, my feeling is that it
it

came from Xumu's training. All that I learned from

him the insight I developed of the inner workings
of the mind and the human psyche, as well as the

knowledge of the natural medicinal plants of the

forest and how to use them all this has remained

a part of me in the years that have passed since I

left the Huni Kui, years that have brought both

joys and sorrows to me. My use of all that Xumu

taught me, in a much wider world than he envisioned,
has brought me to this point where men and women
come in sickness and pain. I am able, sometimes with
out knowing exactly how, to help them. Also, there is
frustration in knowing that I have not been able to

impart my knowledge to someone who could continue

to use it.

Naturally, many times now, as in all the years

that have passed, I wonder about the life of the
Huni Kui and what has happened to them since I

departed. Pressure on them from the rubber cutters

must have disappeared with the collapse of the mar
ket for wild rubber caused by plantation rubber

production. However, they would still have had

their natural enemies in the forest.
I know that the Amahuaca are still active. Re
cently I had word from a friend who
traveled the

region of the Rio Tahuamanu that they still attack

unwary intruders in their territory. A peripheral
outside
group living in intermittent contact with the
world on the Rio Inuya have told visitors of an iso
lated interior village of their people far to the south-

199
 BET TT EN
west of them. The chief of this village, they say, is

called Iriya, and reported that he occasionally

it is

trades with outsiders. It may be that it is Iriya who

leads the group of Huni Kui who were for a time

my people, there in that strange, isolated, primitive

world.

200
 xVxT \W VxV
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<sSV SW \W\xVYvV \VV VvV VxV \\\*
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>&t

Appendix
THE RELATIONSHIP OF VARIOUS
VISION-CAUSING EXTRACTS
/v

Nixi Jtoni swma in the Amalmaca idiom means

from which the vision extract made." Ayahuazca in
is

Qnechua means "skull of an old man" or "spirit of the

dead."
Botanical investigation of the Amazon flora by vari-
ons authorities has shown that Ayahuasca extracts
come from a jungle vine of the genus Banisteriopsis.
Several species of this genus have been identified.
Which species the Huni Kui used is uncertain, but
there doubt that the vine was Bamsteriopni.
is little

The leaves added to the mashed stem of the vine

during the boiling down
and extraction process were
as Prettonia amazonica, &
probably yajt, identified
to
forest shrub, and by some authorities are thought
add a hypnotic effect to the extract and to cause the
bluish aureole of the visions.

201
 APPENDIX
The from the Tine B artist eriop sis Caapi
Infusion
contains harmine, harmaline and d-tetrahy&rokarmine,
the latter two thought to have substantial psycho-
tomimetic activity.
is reported to contain
Yaje (Prestonia amazonica)
an alkaloid called telepathine and the alkaloids yajelne
and yajemlne.
The question naturally
comes to mind, What is the

Tionl xuma or ayahuasca and

relationship hetween
other well-known hallucinogenic chemicals?
the
LSD-25 (LSD) (d-lysergic acid diethylamide) ,
in the forefront of the
hallucinogen that has been
discussions of recent years, was first syn
psychedelic
thesized from ergot in 1943 by Dr. Albert Hofmann,
a Swiss chemist. This compound in turn comes
from a fungus Claviceps that grows on rye and wheat
in medieval Europe of
grain. Ergot has a long history
disorders when the
causing nervous and circulatory
products of affected grain were eaten.
Most hallucinogens, including LSD-25,
have what
is called, in chemistry, an indole structure, (C 8 H 7 N)
or

or have the same CH2 CH2 N/ "tail."

X CH8

Included are harmine from Banisteriopsis Qionl

the mushroom (or fungus)
scuma), bufotenine from
Amanita muscarina, DMTfrom Piptadenia snuff,
from the Aztec magic mush
psilocin and psilocybin
room (fungus) Psilocybe mexicana, ibogaine from the

202
 APPENDIX
Congolese jungle plant Iboga tabernanthea shown to
me by forest guides near Libenge, Congo Kinshasa.

However, there are various hallucinogens, some

synthetics, that do not have the indole structure, in
cluding mescaline from the peyote cactus Lophophora
Williamsii. Therefore, the formerly held theory that

hallucinogens had to have the indole structure is un

tenable. And agreat deal of scientific investigation
still remains to be done to explain satisfactorily the
chemistry and mechanisms of the psychedelic sub
stances and indicate their legitimate uses.
F. B. L.

SOURCES

Cohen, Sidney, 1965. Drugs of Ha&ucinatwn. Sci

entificBook Club, London. 256 pp.
DeRopp, R. S., 1961. Drugs and the Mind. Grove
Press, New York. 310 pp.
Schultes, R. E., 1963. "Botanical Sources of the
New World Narcotics," Psychedelic Review, 1 (2) :145-

166.
, 1963. hallucinogenic Plants of the New
World," The Harvard Review, 1(4) :18-32.

203
Manuel Cordova-Rios was bom in ISST m
Iquitos, Peru, where he now lives. Married and the fa
ther of 10, he has 50 grandchildren and 18 great
In addition to the journeys described
grandchildren.
in Wizard of the Upper Amazon, he has traveled in
Colombia and Brazil as well as Peru. Sr. C<5rdova-Rios
has been employed by J. Borda and Company, or
has
ganizing rubber-cutting on the Rio Tapiche,
and worked
developed a farm on the Rio Ucayali,
has
for Compania Astoria Peruana gathering pharma
ceutical products from the forests. Ever since the
events of this book, he has functioned as a "curandero**
or healer, to which practice he has devoted full time
since 1968.

F. BrUCe Lamb
was born in Colorado in 1913
and holds B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from the Uni
versity of Michigan. He has traveled widely, in North,
South and Central America, as well as Africa and
Asia, and has held many posts and consultancies in
the field of forest engineering, specialising in tropical

forestry. has published two books and numerous

He
both Spanish and English; and
articles in this field, in
his Mahogany of Tropical America has been called a

major contribution. Dr. Lamb has presented papers

and participated in many international conferences
on tropical forestry including the Tropical Section
of the SixthWorld Forestry Congress, Madrid, 1968.
Married and the father of one daughter, he lives in
New York City and since 1960 has been Technical
Director, Forest Resources, for U.S. Plywood-
Champion Papers, Inc. His interest in primitive
tribesmen began with the Apiaca Indians in Mato
Gro&so, Brazil, during World War EL
moi**~ ! venture.

Primitive though t* ,'ui proved

highly sophisticated in i , ;e of the

curative properties of plants of trie ., r _al forest.

The lore that Manuel Cordova-Rios gathered dur

ing his seven years with the Huni Kui he brought

with him to the outside world/ where in the years

since his captivity he has become famous as a

healer, credited with thousands of cures. Among

those he has treated successfully are a Belgian

ambassador to Peru and a former Peruvian Pres

ident.

F. Bruce Lamb) an American expert in tropical for

estry and the author of many articles and books

in this field, has rendered into English, starkly

and beautifully, the amazing experiences told to

him in Spanish by his friend C6rdova-Rios- It is

an enthralling tale of high drama that reads like

an adventure-fantasy scenario. And it is all die

more astonishing for being true.