An Account of the Abipones, an Equestrian People of Paraguay, (2 of 3)

It were to wrong the Paraguayrian ants, if, after having so minutely described all the mischief they commit, I were to be silent on their benefits. Some of the larger sort have a little ball in the hind part of their bodies full of very white fat, which, when collected, and melted like butter, is eaten with pleasure both by Indians and Spaniards. Other very small ants, in those shrubs which bear the quabyra-miri, deposit a wax naturally white, and consisting of small particles, which is used to make candles for the use of the altar, and when lighted exhales an odour sweeter than frankincense, but quickly melts, and though double the price of any other wax is sooner consumed. There are also ants that convey to their caves particles of fragrant rosin, which serve for frankincense. In certain parts of Asia small particles of gold are collected by the ants, from mountains which produce that metal. The inhabitants, in order to get possession of the gold, attack their caves, the repositories of this treasure, especially in the heat of the sun; but the ants stoutly defending their riches, they often return empty-handed, and sometimes are obliged to make a precipitate retreat. I have long wished that those Europeans who have to feed larks and nightingales would come to this country, and load their ships with ant-eggs: they would certainly return with great profit, and at the same time do a signal service to America.

There are also incredible numbers of very large toads, especially in deserted, or but lately inhabited places. In the town of Concepcion, removed to the banks of the Salado, about evening all the streets were so covered with toads, that they were rendered as slippery as ice. They filled the chapel, our house, every place. They not unfrequently fell from the roof on to the floor, bed, or table. They could creep along the wall, and ascend and descend like flies. When the kitchen fire is kindled on the ground toads sometimes creep into the pans and kettles. Once, as I was pouring boiling water from a brass vessel into a gourd, to mix with the herb of Paraguay, I perceived that the water was bad, and of a black colour; and, on inspecting the vessel, found a toad boiled with the water, which had given it that dark hue, and was so swelled that it entirely choked up the mouth of the vessel. In the colony of the Rosary, which I founded on the banks of a lake, there was the same abundance of toads. Whilst I performed divine service the chapel swarmed with them, and though many were slain every hour of the day, for two years, their numbers seemed rather to increase than diminish. A species of toad, called by the Spaniards escuerzos, and much larger than European ones, are not only troublesome, but, when provoked, dangerous: for by way of revenge they squirt their urine at those by whom they are offended, and if the least drop of this liquid enter the eye it will immediately produce blindness. It is moreover indubitable that not only their urine, but their saliva, blood, and gall possess a poisonous property. We learn from creditable authors that the Brazilian savages roast toads, and then reduce them to a powder, which they infuse into the meat or drink of their enemies to cause their death; for it occasions a dryness and inflammation of the throat, together with vomiting, hiccups, sudden fainting, delirium, severe pains in the joints and stomach, and sometimes dysentery. Persons afflicted in this manner, if the force of the poison admit of medicine, should immediately have recourse to purging and vomiting, with repeated walking, or the bath, to produce perspiration. For the same purpose the sick man is sometimes put into a tolerably hot oven, or placed inside a beast that has been newly slain. Various herbs and roots are also made use of to dissipate the poison, the chief of which is one called nhambi. If the juice of this herb be thrown on the back or head of the toad, after those parts have been rubbed a little on the ground, it will instantly kill the pestilent animal. This also is effected by means of tobacco. American toads are of a cinereous or light red colour, sometimes variegated, covered with warts, and bristly like a hedgehog. I have read that certain savages feed on a species of toad, but never witnessed it myself. European physicians say that toads, properly prepared by druggists, are useful as diuretics in dropsy, plague, and fevers, and they advise a bruised toad to be applied to the back, about the kidneys, by way of a cataplasm, in cases of dropsy. The oil of toads is useful for curing warts, according to Woytz. River crabs, hartshorn, the flowers of the vine, and other things, are recommended by the same authors as remedies for the poison of toads. There is also a great variety and abundance of frogs, which croak away in the mud, equally annoying to the inhabitants and to travellers. In other respects they are neither useful nor prejudicial, though in Europe they are employed both as medicine and food; but there is nothing to which you would not sooner persuade an American than to eat frogs, or make any other use of them.

Leeches are always to be found in pools supplied solely with rain water; but I never saw any so large as ours. In the town of the Rosary, after a heavy shower the streets seemed full of leeches, and the Abipones, who always go barefoot, complained that they clung to their feet wherever they went; but in the space of an hour these troublesome guests all disappeared, having betaken themselves, most probably, to the adjoining lake. Of bats I have spoken in a former part of my history.

Paraguay may be called the Paradise of mice and dormice. From the number of oxen daily slain, such abundance of offal is every where to be had, that dormice, which in our country can hardly find anything to eat, here feast day and night, which, of course, must wonderfully increase their numbers. At Buenos-Ayres, to my astonishment, I beheld dormice, larger than our squirrels, issue by crowds out of the old walls into the court, about sun-set. At Cordoba in Tucuman, an ox, stripped of its hide and entrails, but entire in every other respect, was suspended from a beam in the clerk's office. The lay-brothers, on entering the office, beheld the ox entirely covered with dormice, and drew near to see how much they had devoured in the night. On handling the flesh, they found it completely hollowed, and three hundred dormice lurking within. Upon hearing this, I conceived such a disgust of meat gnawed by these animals, that for two days I carefully avoided the eating-room, and contented myself with bread alone. The fruit of my abstinence was, that the meat was thenceforward kept cleaner, and in a more appropriate place. An innumerable host of dormice not unfrequently came thronging from the southern parts of Buenos-Ayres, filled the fields, garners, and houses of Tucuman, and laid waste every thing. They swam across rivers without fear. They left the immense tract of plain country through which they took their way beaten and pressed as if by waggons. The Paraguayrian countrymen, frightened by their multitudes, chose rather to quit their huts, which were exposed on all sides, than take up arms against the foe. Nor should you imagine the Paraguayrian dormice are fond of nothing but beef; they delight in human flesh, for they frequently bite you when you are sound asleep, and that with no sluggish tooth. Moreover, there is no kind of trash which they will not steal and hide in their store-houses, to serve either for food or bed. They tear the silken markers out of the prayer-books to make their nests. They run off with aprons, bandages, stockings, linen and woollen articles of every kind, carrying them to their holes for bed-clothes and cushions. These troublesome pilferers not only commit daily thefts upon the inhabitants, but frequently set fire to the houses themselves. For they carry away burning tallow candles in their mouths, and in hastening to their caves, often set fire to the cottages of the Spanish peasants. They occasioned us much trouble in the colony of the Rosary. A light was forced to be kept up at night there on several accounts. When tallow was not to be had, I used oil expressed from cows' feet for this purpose. Almost every night the dormice snatched up the iron plate with the burning wick, in order to suck the oil when it cooled. To restrain their audacity, it was found necessary to bind the plate of the match to the lamp with a little brass chain, a weight of iron being added.

A most frequent, and almost annual calamity to Paraguay are the locusts, which are horrible to the sight and of immense size, being longer than a man's middle finger. When an infinite swarm of them approaches, a terrible darkness breaks from the farthest horizon, and you would swear that a black cloud pregnant with rain, wind, and lightning was drawing nigh. My Abipones, on such occasions, often snatched up arms, and placed themselves in battle array; for the locusts, beheld from a distance, looked like a cloud of dust stirred up by a troop of hostile savages. Wherever the locusts settle, they deprive the fields of their productions, the trees of their leaves, the plain of grass, and men and cattle of food; while the numerous offspring which they leave behind continue the devastation to another year, and create further misery. The army of locusts is prevented from flying to the ground, and feeding in the fields sowed with various kinds of grain, by the sound of drums, the shouting of voices, the firing of guns, and continual rustling of boughs in the air; if these methods fail of driving them away, all the men in the Guarany towns are employed in collecting and killing them. In one day we have often with pleasure beheld many bushels full of these insects, and have condemned them either to the fire or the water. The Abipones had rather eat locusts than drown or burn them; on which account, as they are flying, they knock them down to the ground with long sticks, roast them at the fire on the same, or on spits, and devour them with as much avidity as we do partridges or beccaficos, rejecting however the males. It has been my intention to treat here of all the noxious insects that occasion death, disease, or damage: but what a field should I have, were I also to describe the harmless ones both of the land and water. Good Heavens! what an abundance is there of flies, worms, bees, hornets, drones, and grasshoppers! What an immense diversity of glow-worms, shining here and there by night like stars! Some, which are about the size of a grass-worm, by moving their wings, others from their eyes alone, emit a light strong enough for one to read by. Some glow only behind, others in every part of their bodies. Wood, reeds, leaves, and roots of plants, when putrefied, scatter at night, particularly in moist places, a green, red, yellow, or blue radiance, resembling diamonds, emeralds, chrysolites, rubies, &c. This was a nightly spectacle to us in the woods between the rivers Acaray̆ and Monday̆. I carried some rubbish which I had observed to glitter in this manner, to my town, where it shone as long as it continued moist; when wetted, it regained its former splendour, which, however, ceased at last, in spite of fresh supplies of water. I never perceived phosphoric lights of this nature in any other part of Paraguay. Innumerable butterflies, of a beautiful variety of colours, adorn the sides of the rivers and woods, as flowers the meadows; but of these and other insects, many and accurate accounts have been already written, which are now in the hands of all. We must return to the Abipones, more destructive to Paraguay than any insect, who, though looked upon by the Spaniards in the light of robbers and murderers, do nevertheless profess themselves warriors and heroes; whether justly or no, I leave to the arbitration of my readers, to whom I shall proceed to describe their military discipline and method of warfare.

CHAPTER XXXIII.

OF THE MILITARY DISPOSITIONS OF THE ABIPONES

I am at a loss in what colours to paint the military dispositions of the Abipones; no word corresponds to the idea which long acquaintance with these savages has impressed on my mind. That the Abipones are warlike, prompt, and active, none even of the Spaniards ever doubted, but I should hesitate to call them valiant and intrepid. Cicero himself distinguishes an active from a brave man, in these words, 2. Philipp. Ut cognosceret te, si minus fortem, attamen strenuum. It is my purpose to write the history not the panegyric of the Abipones: I must therefore be sincere, and declare my real opinion, whatever it be.

Military fame is the principal object of the ambition of the Abipones. Their whole souls are bent upon arms. They can manage a spear, bow, and every kind of weapon with great dexterity, and ride on horseback with peculiar swiftness. No people with greater fortitude endures the hardships of war, the inclemencies of the sky, want of food, and the fatigues of travelling. They fearlessly swim across rivers formidable to sailors and ships. They look upon their wounds without a groan, and with as much indifference as they would upon those of another person. They are acquainted with all those arts which every European soldier admires, but which so very few practise. This alone is unknown to the Abipones, to despise death, and gain glory by encountering danger. They boast of martial souls, but are too unwilling to resign their lives. They are active, but can by no means be called brave, for a brave man would remain unterrified were the globe itself to fall in ruins, and would choose either to conquer or die. The Abipones always desire to conquer, but are never willing to die. They will curse a victory obtained at the expense of one of their countrymen's lives. They abhor triumphal hymns if mingled with funeral lamentations, and would reject a victory accompanied by the sighs of one mourning widow or orphan.

Certainly no one can accuse the Abipones of rashness in venturing their lives. Their chief adorations are paid to the goddess Security, the arbitress of their battles, without whose approving sanction they will never risk an engagement. They carefully avoid a contest of uncertain issue. They always threaten others, always fear for themselves, and trust nothing to chance. Before they undertake a warlike expedition, they carefully consider the nature of the place, the numbers of their enemies, and the opportunity of the time. Any danger, or the least suspicion of it, will strike the spear from their hands, and extinguish all their ardour. Agis, King of Sparta, boasted that his soldiers, in the heat of war, did not enquire the number and strength of their antagonists, but where they were, that they might attack and put them to flight. The Abipones are never hurried into a combat with such blind impetuosity as this. They proceed cautiously, nor do the trumpets sound till all things have been diligently examined. When assured of their safety, they rush on like thunder, imitating now the cunning of Hannibal, now the delays of Fabius. They know that the daring are favoured by fortune, but not unless they exercise a sagacious foresight with regard to dangers. As persons about to cross a threatening river, try the ford that they may not be carried away by the current; so they never approach their enemies till after mature deliberation, that they may secure an unimperilled victory. The timidity of the Americans gives the name of rashness to what Europeans call courage. They think long and often upon what is to be done once. They never strike a blow which they have not previously contemplated, and then it is with a hand trembling at every noise. They seldom attack openly, but do it in general unawares. They dare little against the bold who front assailants, and are accustomed to keep strict watch. They never fear less than when they perceive themselves the objects of fear. Craft, and the swiftness of their horses, more than strength, were what gave them the power to commit so many slaughters. Though you may object to their cowardice, yet that method of warfare is surely admirable, and agreeable to military tactics, which enabled them, with no loss, or a very trifling one of their own soldiers, to return home victorious, laden with the heads of the Spaniards, and triumphantly displaying crowds of captives, cattle, and other spoils taken from the enemy. Hæc ars, says Vegetius, dimicaturis est necessaria, per quam vitam retineant, et victoriam consequantur. For this purpose, heroes themselves have used a sword, and a shield, with the one to offend the enemy, with the other to defend themselves. Cunning, agility, and the swiftness of their horses, were a shield, nay, better than any shield, to the Abipones. If they see one or two of their fellow-soldiers fall, they immediately fly. When straitened, and deprived of all means of escape, fear is converted into rage, and they fight with the utmost obstinacy. I shall now proceed to treat of their arms, scouts, councils of war, military provisions, hostile expeditions, various modes of fighting, customs on obtaining a victory, and lastly, of the slaughters committed by them in every part of the province.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

OF THE ARMS OF THE ABIPONES

No man can obtain celebrity amongst the Abipones except by warlike prowess. Hence to have their arms properly made, in good order, and ready when needed, is their chief care. To defend themselves, and offend their enemies, they principally make use of the bow and spear. Their native soil produces a kind of wood not to be met with in any other part of Paraguay, called neterge, which is of a red colour while fresh, and as hard as steel. They cleave this tree, cut out an oblong piece of wood, and shape it with a knife or a sharp stone. You would think it had been made by a turner. To straighten it they heat it every now and then by fire, and twirl it about between two logs of wood. By this method the Abipones make spears scarce smaller than the Macedonian pikes; for they are more than five or six ells in length, pointed at both ends, that if one end gets blunt, the other may still be of service, and also for the convenience of sticking the spear into the ground when they pass the night in the plain. Formerly when they were unacquainted with the very name of iron, they fought with wooden spears, fixing a cow's or stag's horn to the end of them by way of a point. But when the Abipones obtained iron points from the Spaniards, they dexterously inserted them into their spears, and used them to slaughter those from whom they had received them. When going to fight they grease the point of the spear with tallow, that it may enter more readily and deeper into the flesh. We have sometimes seen spears four palms deep in hostile blood, with such force had the Abipones driven them into the sides of the savages who attacked our colony. As their tents and huts are in general rather low, they fix their spears at the threshold of the door to have them always in readiness. By the number of spears you may know the number of warriors which the horde contains. As European generals, to conceal the scanty number of their forces, and to supply the want of warlike instruments, have sometimes placed machines of painted wood, on mounds, to frighten their more numerous adversary; we, in like manner, availing ourselves of the same species of cunning, fixed spears hastily made of reeds or wood, in the houses of the absent Abipones; deluded by which the enemies' scouts reported to their countrymen that the town was full of defenders. The Abipones are commendable not only for their skill in making their weapons, but also for their assiduity, in cleaning and polishing them. The points of their spears always shine like silver. I was often ashamed for the Spaniards, when I saw them furnished with mean, dirty, and incommodious arms, in the presence of the Abipones, who ridiculed their poverty and laziness. Most of them make use of a reed, a rude stake, a knotty club, the bough of a tree, or a twisted piece of wood, with a broken sword or knife tied to the end of it. The richer sort have guns, but generally bad ones, fitter to terrify than to slay the enemy; and moreover, you will find few able to handle them properly. Remember that I am speaking of the Spanish husbandmen who are ordered to fight against the savages; for you never see the regular troops without the cities of Buenos-Ayres and Monte-Video.

Bows as well as spears are made of the neterge. They are equal to a man's stature in length. When unbent, they are like a very straight stick, not being curved like the bows of the Turks and Tartars. The string of the bow is generally made of the entrails of foxes, or of very strong threads supplied by a species of palm. When about to shoot off their arrows, that they may be able to bend the cord forcibly without hurting their hands, they wear a kind of wooden gauntlet. The quiver is made of rushes, and adorned with woollen threads of various colours. The arrows, which are an ell and a palm in length, consist of a reed, to which a sharp point of bone, very hard wood, or iron is prefixed. Wooden points are more formidable than iron ones, but those of bone, which are made of a fox's leg, are the most to be dreaded of all; for they break in being extracted, and the part remaining in the body causes a swelling, and a very virulent ulcer, which leaves the wounded person no rest. Any wood, from being imbued with a kind of native poison, causes more pain and tumour than iron. The Abipones never poison their arrows, as is usual amongst many other people of America. The Chiquitos are dreaded by the neighbouring savages on this account, that if an arrow of theirs wound the outermost skin, and bring the least drop of blood, all the limbs will swell, and in the course of a few hours death will ensue. The deadly poison in which they dip their arrows, the Chiquitos, alone know how to prepare from the bark of an unknown tree, and to this day they reserve to themselves the knowledge of the cruel mystery. In hunting too they kill wild animals with arrows dipped in the same poison, and cutting out the wounded part of the body, eat them with safety, like the Guaranies, who fear not to feed on oxen stung to death by serpents, rejecting that part only which has been infected by the animal's tooth. Father Gumilla relates that the savages of the Orinoco prepare a most fatal poison to dip their arrows in.

The feathers which expedite the flight of the arrows are taken from the wings of crows, so that when the Abipones went out to shoot these birds we guessed that war was at hand. Each feather is tied on both sides, to the extremity of the reed, by a fibre of very slender thread. The Vilelas excite the admiration of all Paraguay by their skill in archery. They dexterously fasten the feathers to the arrow with a glue made from the bladder of the fish vagre, inserting the point very lightly into the reed; an artifice which renders their arrows extremely dangerous, because whilst the reed is extracted the point remains sticking in the flesh. The Guaranies, less curious in these matters, apply the feathers of parrots, or other birds, to their arrows. When more than four hundred shoot at a mark, at the same moment, and they go to gather them up, each knows his own by the colour of the feathers. Every nation, in short, has a peculiar fashion in forming bows and arrows. The shorter are more dangerous than the longer ones, inasmuch as they are more difficult to be seen and avoided; but the longer have the advantage of going to a greater distance, and striking with more force. It is certain that the Abipones are very skilful archers: they are accustomed to the bow from children, and even in infancy can shoot little birds on the wing. In sportive contests, when a reward was proposed to each of the winners, a citron placed at a considerable distance served for a mark. Considering the number of archers, very few missed their aim, to the astonishment of the Spaniards who witnessed such dexterity. The Guaranies are also reckoned very expert in this art.

The Abipones have a great variety of arrows. Some are longer and thicker, as being intended to kill larger beasts. The form of the points is also various. Some are plain and have a straight point; some are barbed either on one or both sides, and others armed with a double row of barbs. You can never extract an arrow of this kind from the flesh, unless you turn it about with both hands, by which means you will open a way to extricate the barbs, but with what pain! When the Abipones see the remains of an arrow occupying any fleshy part of the body, as the thigh, or arm, they cut out the piece of flesh with the inherent particle themselves. The Cacique Ychoalay, in a sharp contest with his rival Oaherkaikin, was dangerously wounded with a bone arrow, which stuck in the back part of his head, and breaking in being extracted, remained fixed there as firm as a nail. At our advice he visited Sta. Fè, to obtain the aid of a surgeon, who found it necessary to make an incision before he could lay hold of the bony arrow point with his forceps. The operation was successfully performed, but not without severe pain, which the Indian bore with the utmost fortitude, not allowing a single expression of pain to escape him; he even exhorted the surgeon, who, unwilling to inflict so much torture, was hesitating in his task, to proceed; "Do you see me shrink?" said he: "fear nothing, I beseech you; cut, pierce, do what ever you like with confidence. I have long been accustomed to pain, wounded as I have so often been with different weapons." At length when the bony point was extracted, such a quantity of blood gushed out, you would have thought an artery had been opened. The Indian beheld this with a calm countenance, and thanked his deliverer in the best terms he was master of.