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THE NATURALIST ON THE RIVER AMAZQNE 



the pleasant effects which I once experienced 

 from a dit of fresh tapir meat for a few 

 days, after having been brought to a painful 

 state of bodily and mental depression by a 

 month's scanty rations of fish and farinha. 



We sometimes had fresh bread at Ega, 

 made from American flour brought from 

 Para, but it was sold at ninepeuee a pound. 

 I was once two years without tasting wheaten 

 bread, and attribute partly to this the gradual 

 deterioration of health which I suffered on 

 the Upper Amazons. Mandioca meal is a 

 poor, weak substitute for bread ,; it is defi- 

 cient in gluten, and consequently cannot be 

 formed into a leavened mass or loaf, but is 

 obliged to be roasted in hard grains in order 

 to keep any length of time. Cakes are made 

 of the half -roasted meal, but Uiey become 

 sour in a very few hours. A superior kind 

 of meal is manufactured ;at -Ega of the sweet 

 mandioca (Manihot Aypi),; it is generally 

 made with a mixture <of .the starch of the 

 root, and is therefore ,a much more whole- 

 some article of food .than the ordinary sort 

 which, on the Amazons, is made of the pulp 

 after the starch has .been extracted by soak- 

 ing in water. When we could get neither 

 bread nor biscuit, I found tapioca soaked in 

 coffee the oest native ;substitu>te. We were 

 seldom without butter, as every canoe 

 brought one or two casks on each return 

 voyage from Para, where it is imported in 

 considerable quantity from Liverpool. We 

 obtained tea in the same way, it being served 

 ! as a fashionable luxury at wedding and 

 christening parties ; the people were at first 

 strangers to this article, for they used to stew 

 it in a saucepan, mixing it up with coarse 

 raw sugar, and stirring: it with a spoon. 

 Sometimes we had milk, .but this was only 

 when a cow calved ; the yield from each cort 

 was very small, and lasted only for a few 

 weeks in each case, although the pasture is 

 good, and the animals are sleek and fat. 



Fruit of the ordinary tropical sorts could 

 generally be had. I w.as quite .surprised at 

 the variety of the wild kinds, and of the de- 

 Hcious flavor of some of them. Many of 

 these are utterly unknown in the regions 

 nearer the Atlantic, being the peculiar pro- 

 ductions of this highly favored, and little 

 known, interior country. Sume have been 

 planted by the natives in their clearings. 

 The best was the Jabuti-puhe, or tortoise- 

 foot ; a scaled fruit probably of the Anona- 

 ceous order. It is about the size of an or- 

 dinary apple ; when ripe, the rind is moder- 

 ately thin, and incloses, with the seeds, a 

 quantity of custardy pulp of a very ricn 

 flavor. Next to this stands the uma (Collo- 

 phorasp.) of which there are two species, 

 not unlike, in appearance, small round pears ; 

 but the rind is rather hard, ,and contains a 

 gummy milk, and the pulpy part is almost 

 as delicious as that of the Jiibuti-piibe The 

 Cuma tree is of moderate heighx, and 

 grows rather plentifully in the more elevated 

 and drier situations A third kind is the 

 Pama, which is a stone fruit, similar in color 

 and appearance to the cherrj-, bu f w oblot^ 



shape. The tree is one of the loiciest m tne- 

 forest, and has never, I believe, been selected, 

 for cultivation. To get at the fruit the Da- 

 tives are obliged to climb to the height of" 

 ubout a hundred fet, and cut off the heavily 

 iaden branches. I have already mentioned 

 the Umari and the Wishv ;. both these a, rii 

 now cultivated. The fatty, bitter pulp 

 which surrounds the Jarge stony seeds of 

 these fruits is eaten mixed with farinha, and 

 is very nourishing. Another cultivated fruit - 

 is the Puruma (Purunia cecropiaefolia, Mar- 

 tius), a round juicy berry, growing in large 

 bunches and resembling grapes in taste. 

 Another smaller .kind, called Puruma-i, 

 grows wild in the forest close to Ega, and 

 has not yet been planted. The most singu- 

 lar of all these fruits is the Uikiy which is of 

 oblong shape, and grows apparently cross- 

 wise on the end of its stalk. When ripe, >* 

 the thick green rind opons by a natural cleft | 

 across the middle, and discloses. an oval seed', 

 the size of a Damascene plum, but of u vivid 

 crimson color. This bright hue belongs to 

 a thin coating of pulp, which, when the 

 seeds are mixed in a plate of stewed bananas, 

 gives to the mess a pleasant rosy tint, and 

 a rich creamy taste and consistence. Mingau 

 (porridge) of bananas flavored and colored 

 with Uiki is a favorite dish, at Ega. The * 

 fruit, like most of the others here men- 

 tioned, ripens in January. Many smaller 

 fruits, such as VVajuru (probably a species . 

 of Achras), the size of a gooseberry, which 

 grows singly and contains a sweet gelatinous - 

 pulp, inclosing two large shining black 

 seeds ; Cashipari-arapaa, an oblong scarlet 

 berry ; two kinds of Bacuci, the Bacuri- 

 siuma and the B. curua, sour fruits of a . 

 bright lemon color when ripe,, and a great 

 number of others, are of less- importance as . 

 articles of food. 



The celebrated "Peach palm," Pupunha 

 of the Tupi nations (Guilielma speciosa), is a . 

 common tree at Ega. The name, I suppose, 

 is in allusion to the color. of the fruit, and 

 not to its flavor, for it is dry and mealy, and 

 in taste may be compared to a mixture of 

 chestnuts and cheese. Vultures devour it 

 eagerly, and come in quarrelsome flocks to 

 the trees when it is ripe. Dogs will also eat 

 it ; I do not recollect seeing cats do the same, 

 although they go voluntarily to the woods to > 

 eat Tucuma, another kind of palm fruit, l' 

 The tree, as it grows in clusters beside the 

 palm-thatched huts, is a noble ornament,^ 

 being, when full grown, from fifty to sixty 

 feet in height and often as straight, as a 

 scaffold-pole. A bunch, of fruit when ripe 

 is a load for a strong man, and each tree - 

 bears several of them. The Pupunha grows 

 wild nowhere on the Amazons. It is one of 

 those few vegetable productions (including 

 three kinds of mandioca and the American 

 species of banana) which the Indians have- 

 cullivated from time immemorial, and 

 brought with them in their original migration , 

 to Brazil. It is only, however, the mote a'J- 

 * r inced tribes who have kept up the cultiva . 



