RESIDENCE AT TARAPOTO 



/ O 



ammonia or rather to my abuse of it --and to 

 the subsequent chill from exposure to wet ; for 

 had I not ibeen impatient of the pain of the sting, 

 I have little doubt it might soon have subsided of 

 itself. 



[A few more passages from the letter to Mr. 

 Bentham, illustrating the difficulties a collector has 

 to encounter, are now given. It is probable that 

 the same condition of things still exists there.] 



TARAPOTO, Dec. 1855. 



I have been most put about here for materials 

 of which to make boxes, as such things as boards 

 are not to be had. The only use the inhabitants 

 have for a board is to make a door, and this is 

 either cut out of some old canoe or they cut down 

 a tree in the forest, roughly carve out a door from 

 it on the spot, and bring it home on their backs. 

 For other purposes, such as benches, shelves, 

 bedsteads, etc., the never- failing Cana brava (Gync- 

 nuiu saccharoides] is all they require. After trying 

 in vain to buy boards, I went to two ports on the 

 Huallaga and in each of them bought an old canoe. 

 I had then to go again with a carpenter to cut 

 them up into pieces of convenient size, which had 

 to be conveyed to Tarapoto on Indians' backs, and 

 afterwards laboriously adxed down into something 

 like boards. All this, with the trouble of looking 

 up Indians, the making of two boxes and prepar- 

 ing boards for other two, left me little leisure for 

 anything else for the space of near a month. 



I propose extending my stay at Tarapoto 

 little over the twelvemonth say to some 



in 



