194 REPORT ON THE PLANTS 
notes on the use and properties of the Guaranà appear to have been 
misunderstood (for it is used either medicinally or as furnishing a re- 
freshing drink, not as a bread or article of food) I here. extract the 
greater portion of the passage from that distinguished traveller’s re- 
lation. — 
* From the Mauhés (Indians of the Rio Mauhé) the Brazilians, as 
well as the civilized Indians of the same race, receive cloves, sarsa- 
parilla, cacao, and especially the Guaranà, a drug whose preparation 
most especially occupies the Mauhés. The Guaranà is a very hard 
paste, of a chocolate-brown colour, and with little odour. For use, it is 
reduced to a fine powder and mixed with sugar and water as a cooling 
stomachic draught, to be taken like lemonade merely for its flavour, or, 
medicinally, against diarrhoea. Its use is so widely diffused that it is 
sent from Topinambarana through the whole empire and even beyond 
the limits of Brazil to the provinces of Mochos and Chiquitos. A good- 
natured Indian, of the race of the Mauhés, presented me with several 
sticks of Guaranà which he had himself prepared, and allowed me to 
witness the operation, of which I now give an account, together with 
some other data relating to this remarkable product." dein vol. ii. 
p. 1061.) 
“The Guaranà (which must not be confounded with the Caranna 
gum) was originally prepared by the Mauhés alone. But since its use 
has been so widely spread as to become an object of no inconsiderable 
commerce, it is made also by other settlers, particularly at Villa Boa, 
and here and there on the Rio Tapajoz. The genuine article is dis- 
tinguished from the adulterations by its greater hardness and density, 
and in that, when powdered, it does not assume a white colour, but a 
greyish-red tint. The preparation showed me by the Indian in Topi- 
nambarana was as follows:—The Guaranà plant (Paullinia sorbilis, 
Mart., glabra, caule erecto angulato, foliis pinnatis bijugis, foliolis ob- 
9 longis remote sinuato-obtuse-dentatis, lateralibus basi rotundatis, ex- 
timo basi cuneato, petiolo nudo angulato, racemis pubescentibus erectis, 
capsulis pyriformibus apteris rostratis, valvulis intus villosis) ripens its 
seeds in the months of October and November. These are taken out 
of their capsules and exposed to the sun. When they are sufficiently 
dried to allow of the white arillus, in which they are half enveloped, 
being rubbed off with the fingers, they are emptied into a stone mortar, 
or deep dish of hard sandstone, which is heated over a charcoal fire, 
