IN THE VALLEY OF CARACAS. 23 
Caracas at the rate of threepence or fourpence apiece. It is well 
known that linguistic reasons point to Brazil as the probable native 
country of this delicious fruit. Even the name Ana-curua, used by 
the Indians of the Upper Orinoco, where Humboldt believed to have 
found the wild plant (see ‘ Travels,’ Bohn’s edit. ii. 433, and Nouv. 
Esp. (edit. 1811) iii. 142, note), is nothing but the somewhat changed 
Guarani name Nana-caraguatá (Ant. Ruiz, ‘Tesoro de la Lengua 
Guarani,’ Madrid, 1639, fol. 233, retro). The plant must have spread 
over the warmer parts of America long before the arrival of the 
Spaniards, who found it first in Guadeloupe in 1493. Columbus met 
with it on his first landing in Northern Veraguas, and Seemann (Bot. 
Herald, p. 215) contends that it was truly wild in the Isthmus of 
Panama. 
The ‘Flora Caracasana' contains three other species of Bromelia, 
which appear to be indigenous,— 2. Karatas, L. (Nidularium Ka- 
ratas, Lem.), the Curujujul of the inhabitants; B. Pinguin, L., or 
Maya, and B. chrysantha, Jacq., called Chigüechigüe. The first is 
the Caraguata-acanga of Piso (teste Roem. and Schult. vii. 1274), 
called thus on account of the head-like clusters of the fruits. (* Acanga' 
in Guarani means head, Ant. Ruiz, loc. cit. fol. 12, retro.) 
Bunchosia glandulifera, Roth. * Ciruelo de fraile.'— Uncommon. 
Melicocca bijuga, L. * Mamon,' and M. oliveformis, H. B. and K. 
* Cotopriz.’—Father Caulin mentions (Hist. Nueva Andal. 15) for the 
first the Indian (?) name “ Muco,” for the latter * Cuspiritu.” 
Hooker and Bentham (‘Genera Plantarum,’ p. 401) consider the 
second species as “ valde dubia.” Having myself examined a consi- 
derable number of specimens of both forms, I am convinced that they 
are not two well-distinguished species. The rhachis of the leaves of 
M. bijuga is by no means always winged,—a fact already mentioned 
by Jacquin (Amer. 108 ; “costis compresso-planis, nunc alatis, nunc 
nudis"). The leaflets are either slightly oblique (principally in leaves 
with winged rhachis, where the inner half of the leaflets appear com- 
monly somewhat reduced in size) or perfectly symmetrical. The fruit 
of the Cotopriz is constantly more elliptical than that of the Mamon, 
the ratio of the two axes in the former being 3: 5, and in the latter 
3:4. This is the only constant difference I have found ; but I think 
it is certainly not sufficient for establishing a new species. The Coto- 
priz may, nevertheless, be considered as a distinct variety under the 
name Melicocca bijuga and oliveformis. 
