The Onas are physically a fine race of people, the average height of
the men being a little over six feet; the women are also tall and
muscular. They have no system of tribal government, and are nomadic.
Their only occupation is hunting the guanaco, a fur-coated herbivorous
animal found in great numbers in the lower ranges of the Andes
Mountains in the south. The meat of the guanaco constitutes the chief
food supply of the Onas, and many of them subsist upon it entirely. The
skins of the animals are made into a sort of manta, which constitutes
the only costume worn by the men. They discard this costume when at
war, or in pursuit of the guanaco. The women wear only a small piece
of guanaco skin about their loins. The Onas live in families, one man
usually possessing several women. There is little regard for marriage
rites or usage, the more powerful and valiant of the men selecting
such women from the tribe as they may desire, and are able to maintain
against their rivals.
Their only weapons are bows and arrows, slings and harpoons, the
latter being pointed with barbed bone spikes. The number of Onas is now
estimated at three thousand five hundred, but like the other tribes in
Chile they are decreasing.