ON THE PARAGUAY TEA. 41 
leaves are considered to be obtained ; but even from the same 
magazine or Perchel, the quality greatly varies, which arises 
from the labourers working in all sorts of weather, and when 
this is wet, the leaf is consequently inferior. Each Peon can 
collect as much Yerba in a day, as will produce eight arrobas, 
or 800 lbs. in weight of the prepared Tea. The selling price 
of the article enables his employer to give the labourer 
about a shilling each Arroba, and as the poor fellows are 
generally very industrious, and capable of enduring great 
fatigue and privation, they commonly make as much as eight 
shillings a day during the six months of Yerba gathering. 
y the ruinous practice, however, of gambling, to which 
master and man in South America are alike addicted, it 
seldom happens that either the merchant who collects and 
prepares Paraguay Tea, or the Peons who work for him, are 
otherwise than in continual distress and difficulties.” 
Ever since the beginning of the 17th century, this plant 
has been in common use throughout Paraguay, and there can 
be no doubt but that the Indians of Monda taught the 
practice of imbibing the infusion to their conquerors, since 
they were the natives who lived in the vicinity of the forests 
of Maté. Many of the Creoles and Mestizos now assert that 
the Paraguayians have exterminated the poor Indians, by 
compelling them to work at collecting this plant. 
By the Jesuits, large plantations of the Zlew Paraguayensis 
were set in the vicinity of all their towns and settlements, 
aharmless method of gaining the good-will, by adding to the 
comforts and indulgences of their converts; but their prac- 
tice has been too little followed, nor has government adopted 
the requisite salutary precautions and regulations that are 
needful for the preservation and propagation of so valuable a 
ree. It would be desirable that its culture were extended, 
for only to carry the Paraguay Tea to Assumption, 150 miles, 
doubles, as before mentioned, its primary cost. At present, 
the Yerbals are situated in deserts, or surrounded with tribes 
of savages, who frequently attack and murder the labourers, 
already, through the nature of their employment, exposed to 
