108 A NATURALIST IN THE GUIANAS 



came into existence. The store was built by Mr. Aurelio 

 Battistini, a merchant of Ciudad-Bohvar, who named it 

 in honour of his father-in-law, Don Antonio Liccioni, for 

 a long time chairman of the famous Callao mine. A 

 steam rice-mill is attached to the store, the inhabitants 

 of the Caura being now largely engaged in the cultivation 

 of this grain. Before the erection of the mill, the waste- 

 ful and tedious process of pounding the rice in a wooden 

 mortar was the method employed for removing the husk 

 from the grain. The winnowing was done by slowly 

 pouring the mixed husk and grain from baskets held high 

 up on to mats placed on the ground, the wind doing the 

 winnowing. Now most of the growers bring their rice 

 to the mill for preparation. Puerto Antonio Liccioni is 

 cursed with sand-flies, so is the lower part of the Caura 

 from Suapure to its mouth ; but it is a singular fact that 

 this small sand-fly, the sting of which causes so painful 

 an itching, is not met with above Suapure, although it is 

 a perfect plague lower dovni, and on the banks of the 

 Orinoco. Manj- different species of mosquitos and other 

 flies are plentiful in the forest region beyond the village 

 of Suapure, but this terrible little pest is fortunately 

 never met with. The natives use the word mosquito for 

 both gnats or sand-flies and mosquitos without distinc- 

 tion, but in designating the mosquito specifically they 

 never employ any other word but pullon. 



The myriad of flies of different kinds which infest the 

 whole forest region, especially during the rainy season, 

 are simply called jpZat/a — the plague. Moscais generally 

 applied to the house-fly alone. Whenever we spoke about 

 mosquitos, I tried to explain to the people of the place 

 the theory of malarial fever in connection with these 

 insects as propagators of the disease. Of course, it would 



