.352 TUB ARAJ>OEE8. 



detained us some fcime at the mouth of the Tuamini. The 

 noise of the blowers had frightened our monkeys, and one 

 of them fell into the water. Animals of this species, per- 

 haps on account of their extreme meagreness, swim badly ; 

 and consequently it was saved with some difficulty. 



At Javita we had the pleasure of finding a very intelligent 

 and obliging monk, at whose mission we were forced to 

 remain four or five days, the time required for transporting 

 our boat across the portage of Pimichin. This delay enabled 

 us to visit the surrounding country, as also to relieve our- 

 selves from an annoyance which we had suffered for two 

 days. We felt an extraordinary irritation on the joints of 

 our fingers, and on the backs of our hands. The missionary 

 told us it was caused by the aradores* which get under the 

 skin. We could distinguish with a lens nothing but streaks, 

 or parallel and whitish furrows. It is the form of these 

 furrows, that has obtained for the insect the name of * plough- 

 man.' A mulatto woman was sent for, who professed to be 

 thoroughly acquainted with all the little insects that burrow 

 in the human skin ; the chego, the nuche, the coy a, and the 

 arador ; she was the cwrandera, or surgeon of the place. 

 She promised to extirpate, one by one, the insects which 

 caused this smarting irritation, Having heated at a lamp 

 the point a little bit of hard wood, she dug with it into 

 the furrows that marked the skin. After long examina- 

 tion, she announced with the pedantic gravity peculiar to the 

 mulatto race, that an arador was found. I saw a little 

 round bag, which I suspected to be the egg of an acarus. I 

 was to find relief when the mulatto woman had succeeded in 

 taking out three or four of these aradores. Having the skin 

 of both hands filled with acari, I had not the patience to wait 

 the end of an operation, which had already lasted till late at 

 night. The next day an Indian of Javita cured us radically, 

 and with surprising promptitude. He brought us the 

 branch of a shrub, called uzao, with small leaves like those 

 of cassia, very coriaceous and glossy. He made a cold 

 infusion of the bark of this shrub, which had a bluish colour, 

 and the taste of liquorice. When beaten, it yields a great 

 deal of froth. The irritation of the aradores ceased by using 

 simple lotions of this uzao-water. We could not find thii 

 * Literally, ' the plcughers.' 



