Chap. I. BACABA PALM. 39 



and bearing little clusters of round fruit not larger 

 than a good bunch of currants. A few of the forest 

 trees had the size and strongly-branched figures of our 

 oaks, and a similar bark. One noble palm grew here 

 in great abundance, and gave a distinctive character to 

 the district. This was the CEnocarpus distichus, one 

 of the kinds called Bacaba by the natives. It grows 

 to a height of forty to fifty feet. The crown is of a 

 lustrous dark-green colour, and of a singularly flattened 

 or compressed shape ; the leaves being arranged on each 

 side in nearly the same plane. When I first saw this 

 tree on the campos, where the east wind blows with 

 great force night and day for several months, I 

 thought the shape of the crown was due to the leaves 

 being prevented from radiating equally by the constant 

 action of the breezes. But the plane of growth is not 

 always in the direction of the wind, and the crown 

 has the same shape when the tree grows in the shel- 

 tered woods. The fruit of this fine palm ripens towards 

 the end of the year, and is much esteemed by the 

 natives, who manufacture a pleasant drink from it 

 similar to the assai described in a former chapter, by 

 rubbing off the coat of pulp from the nuts, and mixing 

 it with water. A bunch of fruit weighs thirty or forty 

 pounds. The beverage has a milky appearance, and 

 an agreeable nutty flavour. The tree is very difficult 

 to climb, on account of the smoothness of its stem ; 

 consequently the natives, whenever they want a bunch 

 of fruit for a bowl of Bacaba, cut down and thus destroy 

 a tree which has taken a score or two of years to grow, 

 in order to get at it. 



