BRAZIL NUTS. 



307 



Brazil Nuts. 



MRS. F. 



It has been already observed by an eminent naturalist,* 

 that the wood of fruits generally attains a degree of hardness 

 not to be met with in the wood of the trunk of trees; but I 

 interrupt you. 



ESTHER. 



This pericarp is spherical, and from twelve to thirteen 

 inches in diameter. The weight of these fruits is so enor- 

 mous that one traveller asserts, that the natives dare not 

 venture into the forests without covering their head and 

 shoulders with a shield of very hard wood. De Humboldt 

 says that these shields were not known on the Esmeralda, 

 where he saw the trees, but that the natives spoke of the 

 danger which they incurred when these fruits, which are 

 of the size of a child's head, began to ripen, and fell from 

 a height of fifty or sixty feet to the ground, when they make 

 an enormous noise by their fall. The nuts detach themselves 

 in time, and move freely within their shell, and the rattling 

 noise they then make when dropping from the tree, excites 

 the greediness of the Capuchin monkies (Simia chtropotes), 

 who are singularly fond of the Brazil nuts.f 



Richard. 



Humboldt, Voyages, t. viii. 



