OF THE AMAZON. 19 



the spot, but it is now taken down in long conical bun- 

 dles for exportation from Para to England, where it is 

 generally used for street sweeping and house brooms, 

 and will probably soon be applied to many other pur- 

 poses. It is cut with knives by men, women and 

 children, from the upper part of the younger trees, so 

 as to secure the freshest fibres, the taller trees which have 

 only the old and half-rotten portion within reach, being 

 left untouched. It is said to grow again in five or six 

 years, the fibres being produced at the bases of the new 

 leaves. The trees are much infested by venomous snakes, 

 a species of Craspedocephalus, and the Indians are not 

 unfrequently bitten by them when at work, and some- 

 times with fatal consequences. 



The distribution of this tree is very peculiar. It 

 grows in swampy or partially flooded lands on the 

 banks of black-water rivers. It is first found on the 

 river Padauari, a tributary of the Rio Negro on its 

 northern side, about 400 miles above Barra, but whose 

 waters are not so black as those of the Rio Negro. 

 The Piassaba is found from near the mouth to more 

 than a hundred miles up, where it ceases. On the 

 banks of the Rio Negro itself not a tree is to be seen. 

 The next river, the Daraha, also contains some. The 

 next two, the Maraviha and Cababuris, are white-water 

 rivers, and have no Piassaba. On the S. bank, though 

 all the rivers are black water, there is no Piassaba till 

 we reach the Marie, not far below St. Gabriel. Here it 

 is extensively cut for about a hundred miles up, but there 

 is still none immediately at the mouth or on the banks 



