GUINEA PEPPER. 125 



called bell pepper, picked while green, is 

 an excellent relishing pickle or sauce for 

 meat ; the other small red peppers, when ripe, 

 taken and dried in the sun, and then ground 

 with salt and pepper, close stopped in a bottle, 

 are an excellent relisher to sauces for fish or 

 flesh, and commonly called Cayenne butter. 

 All these sorts of pepper are of a much more 

 burning nature than white or black pepper. 

 Some punish their slaves by putting the juice 

 of these peppers into their eyes, which is 

 an unspeakable pain for a little while ; and 

 yet it is said that some Indians will put it 

 into their eyes before they go to strike fish, 

 to make them see clear.* 



Near St. Michael de Sopa, in the vale of 

 Aricia, they cultivate the agi, that is, Guinea 

 pepper ; where there are several farms which 

 have no other product but this pepper. 

 The Spaniards of Peru are so generally ad- 

 dicted to that sort of spice, that they can 

 dress no meat without it, though it is so 

 very hot, that it can only be endured by 

 those who are well used to it.-f 



* Lunan. t Barham, p. 30. 



