526 The Andes and the Amazons. 



are recognized by Brazilian botanists : Nicotiana tabacum, 

 JV^. 7' ustica, and JV. j^et'sica. 



Aya-huasca, or " Dead Man's Vine" {Banisteria caapi), 

 a woody twiner, cultivated on the upper parts of the Pas- 

 tassa, Napo, and Negro, contains in its stem one of the 

 most remarkable narcotics in America. The Napos and 

 Uaiipes drink an infusion at their feasts to get into a trance. 



Another narcotic, producing a like frenzy, first exciting 

 and then fuddling, and used by nearly all the Brazilian 

 tribes, is the celebrated Pakica, a snuff made from the 

 flat green seeds of the Pijjtadenia niopo (a tree fifty feet 

 high, with bipinnate leaves), which grows in the drier for- 

 ests of the Lower Amazons and its tributaries. It is blown 

 into the nose with a bent tube. The Indian, setting forth 

 on a chase, snuffs a pinch of parica, and gives another to 

 his dog, by which both become uncommonly alert. 



The celebrated poison Ukari, the most powerful sedative 

 in nature, is a compound prepared only by the Indians 

 living beyond the cataracts of the Nortliern tributaries, es- 

 pecially the Negro and Japura, and by the Ticiinas. Its 

 principal ingredient is derived from the Strychnos toxi- 

 fera. The extract is prepared by boiling the bark, and 

 then coagulating with the milk of another plant and to- 

 bacco-juice. The slightest portion of this poison diffused 

 in the blood produces excessive torpor ; but it is said that 

 the mind and involuntary muscles continue active. Death 

 ensues from palsy of the lungs. Salt is the only known 

 antidote ; and its effects on salt-eating men are therefore 

 not so manifest as on the wild animals. A monkey, which 

 I killed with a particle of urari, fell almost immediately 

 into convulsions. The tribes south of the Amazons do 

 not use it extensively. It is sold chiefly at Pebas, at $1 50 

 a cup of half a gill. It does not appear to be identical 

 with the Curare of the Orinoco Indians. 



