ME. R. SPEUCE ON LEOPOLDINIA PIASSABA. 61 



the Canton del Rio Negro. Whether this were true, or whether 

 the Portuguese at an earlier date extended this branch of industry 

 beyond the limits of their own territory, it is certain that, in so 

 much as I have yet seen of the Peruvian and Quitenian Andes, 

 rope of every kind, whether of Agave, Yucca, or palm fibre, or of 

 cotton, is made purely by hand. 



To Mr. Wallace's interesting account of the mode of collecting 

 the Piassaba-fibre I have nothing to add, save that, as in the young 

 plants, from which it is solely obtained, the beard is not always 

 completely separated into fibres, but hangs down in riband-like 

 strips, it is necessary before cutting it off to comb it out by means 

 of a rude comb of two or three pointed sticks or long palm- 

 prickles. 



Besides the use which is made of the beard of the Piassaba, the 

 pulpy envelope of the sarcocarp in the ripe fruit is said to yield 

 the most delicious of all palm drinks, bearing great resemblance 

 to cream both in colour and taste. I have not had the good 

 fortune to taste it, or even to see the ripe fruit, which comes into 

 season at midsummer, but, like the fruit of most other trees, is 

 subject to seasons or periods of intermittence, when little or no 

 fruit is matured. In 1853, the fruits all fell ofl* when green. In 

 the summer of 1854, I was prostrated by remittent fever at San 

 Fernando de Atabapo. In the month of October of the same 

 year I made an excursion of three days from San Carlos into the 

 forest at the back of Solano, on the Casiquiare, with the express 

 object of gathering flowers of the Piassaba, for which I was ex- 

 actly in the season ; but, singularly enough, on four trees I caused 

 to be cut down there were only male flowers ; and the heavy rain, 

 with the sloppy state of the forest, compelled me to desist from 

 further search. In the following November, a few days previous 

 to my final departure from Venezuela, I visited another locality 

 for the palm, on the Guainia, where I collected the fruit, which 

 was almost fully formed externally, though the nucleus was still 

 in a liquid state. In this place nearly all the Piassabas seen were 

 monoicous. It seems, therefore, that the fruit takes from October 

 to June (both inclusive), or nine months, to ripen. Some palms 

 require a whole year, so that I have not seldom gathered ripe fruit 

 and flowers on the same tree. 



The other species of Leopoldinia have a thickish fleshy rind to 

 the fruit, but it is so bitter as not to be eatable. 



Another bearded palm is known to me, which has a consider- 



