Timehri: Being the Journal of the Royal Agricultural and Commercial Society of British Guiana, Volume 5

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J. Thomson, 1886
 

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Page 228 - As soon as the new moon appears, they all run out of their huts and cry Look at the moon! . . . They take certain leaves, and after rolling them in the shape of a small funnel, they pass some drops of water through it into the eye, while looking at the moon. This is very good for the sight
Page 9 - When a man dies something goes, something is left. The survivors necessarily distinguish in thought between these two parts, and they call them respectively by some such names as spirit and body. A curious illustration of this is afforded by a saying of the Macusi Indians of Guiana...
Page 122 - Of the greatest use are, however, the fibres of the young leaves, which are manufactured into thread and ropes, and they are of such a tenacity that the greater number of Indian tribes fabricate their beds and hammocks from it.
Page 10 - Indians calculation of money, and consequently of wages, is made ; that to cut bits means to reduce the number of bits, or wages, given ; and to understand that Captain Sam, having dreamed that his subordinate George had spoken insolently to him, the former, with a fine sense of the dignity of his office, now insisted that the culprit should be punished in real life.
Page 122 - Guiana is not less than 50 feet; and next it is asserted that they are not to be found at a greater height than 800 feet, while the author has met them in numerous groups, and of a luxuriant growth, at a height of from 3,000 to 4,000 feet above the sea; but striftly to its nature it grows likewise here in groups and in swampy soil.
Page 121 - Indians call Aru* ; mixed as a pap it is considered to be an excellent remedy for dysentery. The fan-shaped leaves are used as a thatch for covering their houses, and the stump of one of these leaves serves as a broom to sweep it with.
Page 122 - Camilla, arbol de la vida, the tree of life ; and it is related at the Orinoco, that one of the kings of Spain, hearing of this wondrous tree, which at once furnished bed, bread, and wine, attempted its introduction into the mother country. The author wished to correft finally those who have written on this tree, in two points.
Page 122 - Q mid-ribs of the young branches are cut in thin slices, and after having been dried they are connected together with withes and bast, and serve as a sail for the Indian's canoe, or as a mat to sleep upon. They are used by the travelling entomologist as a substitute for cork to fix insefts upon, or by those who are provided with strong beards, as razor straps.
Page 122 - This useful tree, which extends from the Llanos of Cumana to the western tributaries of the Rio Negro and the mouth of the Amazon, or over an area of 550,000 square miles...

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