THE PALO DE VACA, OB COW-rBEB, 47 



w clothed with trees of thick foliage that project their vast 

 shadows upon the brown and rocky ground. On going out 

 f the town we visited an aqueduct that had been just 

 finished. It is five thousand varas long, and conveys the 

 waters of the Kio Estevan bv a trench to the town. Thia 

 work has cost more than thirty thousand piastres ; but its 

 waters gush out in every street. 



We returned from Porto Cabello to the valleys of Aragua, 

 and stopped at the Farm of Barbula, near which, a new 

 road to Valencia is in the course of construction. We had 

 heard, several weeks before, of a tree, the sap of which is 

 a nourishing milk. It is called ' the cow-tree' ; and we were 

 assured that the negroes of the farm, who drink plentifully 

 of this vegetable milk, consider it a wholesome aliment. 

 All the nnlky juices of plants being acrid, bitter, and more 

 or less poisonous, this account appeared to us very extraor- 

 dinary ; but we found by experience during our stay at 

 Barbula, that the virtues of this tree had not been exag- 

 gerated. This fine tree rises like the broad-leaved star- 

 apple.* Its oblong and pointed leaves, rough and alternate, 

 are marked by lateral ribs, prominent at the lower surface, 

 and parallel. Some of them are ten inches long. We 

 did not see the flower : the fruit is somewhat fleshy, and 

 contains one and sometimes two nuts. When incisions are 

 made in the trunk of this tree, it yields abundance of a 

 glutinous milk, tolerably thick, devoid of all acridity, and 

 of an agreeable and balmy smell. It was offered to us in 

 the shell of a calabash. We drank considerable quantities 

 of it in the evening before we went to bed, and very early 

 in the morning, without ieemig the least injurious effect. 

 I ne viscosity of this milk alone renders it a little disagree- 

 able. The negroes and the free people who work in the 

 plantations drink it, dipping into it their bread of maize or 

 cassava. The overseer of the farm told us that the negroes 

 grow sensibly fatter during the season when the polo de 

 vaca furnishes them with most milk. This juice, exposed to 

 the air, presents at its surface (perhaps in consequence of 

 the absorption of the atmospheric oxygen) membranes of & 

 strongly animalized substance, yellowish, stringy, and resem- 

 bling cheese. These membranes, separated from the rest oj 

 * Chrysophylluin calnito. 



