WONDERS OF THE FOREST. 



571 



milk, and wax as pure as that obtained from bees. By dip- 

 ping cotton in the liquid, too, candles can be made. 



In the hotter 

 regions grows, the 

 bajuco d'agua, which 

 supplies the place of 

 wells and fountains, 

 each yard of it 

 affording a pint 

 water. High up 

 on the mountain- 

 side, in the regions of icy wastes, 

 called the paramos, grows the 

 frailejou, which yields a pure tur- 

 pentine, and assists to warm the 

 human body. Of the palms, a 

 few only can be described. There 

 is the cocoa-nut palm, with its 

 swollen bulb-like stem when 

 young, its tall straight trunk 

 when full-grown, its cluster of 

 heavy fruit, its long plume-like 

 drooping flower; the coccoeiro, 

 with its slighter trunk and pen- 

 dent branches of small berry- 

 like fruit ; the palmetto, with its 

 tender succulent bud on the sum- 

 mit of the stem, used as a vege- 

 table, and proving an excellent 

 substitute for cabbage ; the thorny icari, or cari a variety of 

 fan-palm. Its spiny stems and leaves, which cut like razors, 







THE COCOA-NUI PALM. 



