I now had a remarkable opportunity to watch the war preparations
of these savage, cannibal people, my friends, the Mangeromas. Their
army consisted of twelve able-bodied men, all fine muscular fellows,
about five feet ten in height, and bearing an array of vicious-looking
weapons such as few white men have seen. First of all were three
club-men, armed with strong, slender clubs, of hard and extremely
tough Caripari wood. The handle, which was very slim, was provided
with a knob at the end to prevent the club from slipping out of the
hand when in action. The heavy end was furnished with six bicuspid
teeth of the black jaguar, embedded in the wood and projecting about
two inches beyond the surface. The club had a total length of five
feet and weighed about eight pounds. The second division of the
wild-looking band consisted of three spear-men, each provided with
the three-pronged spears, a horrible weapon which always proves fatal
in the hands of these savages. It is a long straight shaft of Caripari
wood, about one inch in thickness, divided into three parts at the end,
each division being tipped with a barbed bone of the sting-ray. These
bones, about three and a half inches long, were smeared with wourahli
poison, and thus rendered absolutely fatal even when inflicting only
a superficial wound.
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