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If we would not share the coming darkness we must shake off the murderer's hold, before murderer and victim fall together. That fall is close at hand. A brave hand may yet cut the "Sipo Matador," and the slayer be slain before he has quite stifled his victim. If that hand be not a European one, then may it come, bronzed, keen, and supple from the tropic calm!
They soon seemed to be agreed as to what we wanted, and signing to us to remain quiet, one of them again crept cautiously towards the monkeys, still frisking about within sight, while the other sat down with Arthur and me. We eagerly watched the Indian. He first selected an arrow, the point of which he scraped slightly and wetted. Presently he placed his blow-pipe within the loop of a sipo.
In the great swamps at the mouth of the Amazon the naturalist Bates describes a monstrous liana, the "Sipo Matador" or Murdering Creeper, that far more fitly than the oak tree of the north typifies John Bull and the place he has won in the sunlight by the once strong limbs of Ireland.
If one happened for an instant to be sitting quietly on a sipo, or gently winging backwards and forwards, another was sure to come behind him and pull his tail, or give him a twitch on the ear, and then throw himself off the sipo out of the other's reach, holding on, however, firmly enough by his long appendage.
Live and let live is clearly not the maxim taught in these wildernesses. There is one kind of parasitic tree very common near Para which exhibits this feature in a very prominent manner. It is called the "Sipo Matador," or Murderer Liana. It belongs to the fig order, and has been described and figured by Von Martius as the Atlas to Spix and Martius' Travels. I observed many specimens.
Its fundamental belief must be precisely that society is NOT allowed to exist for its own sake, but only as a foundation and scaffolding, by means of which a select class of beings may be able to elevate themselves to their higher duties, and in general to a higher EXISTENCE: like those sun-seeking climbing plants in Java they are called Sipo Matador, which encircle an oak so long and so often with their arms, until at last, high above it, but supported by it, they can unfold their tops in the open light, and exhibit their happiness.
Jim Travers had told the wondering people that he saw Tom capture Sipo Tahib, as he called him, by jumping on his back and bending his forepaws over his neck. So it was that Tom found himself the hero of the hour. The boys and all his acquaintances gathered round him, and he had to tell the story over and over, until he became tired.
I followed with True in my arms, for I had taken him up for fear of his being carried away by the current. Ellen's bearer same next. John walked close behind her, to render her assistance should it be required. With one hand I grasped the long sipo, with the other I kept tight hold of True. The rest had the advantage of being able to steady themselves with their poles. Domingos assisted Maria.
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