Hat-stkaw and Cotton. 533 



has a white bark. From the Tururi, garments four yards 

 long are made of a single piece, resembling a coarse wool- 

 en stuff with two layers of wavy fibre. 



A Wax Palm {Carnauba) furnishes a fibre for making 

 mats ; and ropes and other fabrics are made of the fine, 

 glossy fibre called " Cakaua " and " Palha " from a spe- 

 cies of Bromelia. 



The Screw Pine, Caiiudovica (Bombonaje), the unex- 

 panded leaves of which are so extensively used at Moyo- 

 bamba, as well as at Guayaquil, for the manufacture of 

 Panama hats, grows between the Huallaga and tlie An- 

 des, particularly about Moyobamba, Eioja, and Tarapoto. 

 It is probably a distinct sj^ecies from that used in Ecuador. 

 The tree is seven feet high, but the full-grown leaves are 

 ten or more. The longest straw obtainable is twenty- 

 seven and a half inches. It takes about sixteen bundles 

 {cogollos) for an ordinary hat, and twenty-four for the 

 finest. The straws of the latter are not more than one 

 fortieth of an inch wide. About 100,000 hats were annu- 

 ally sent down to Para ten years ago. Then they com- 

 manded $40 a dozen ; now they can be bought for $15. 



Cotton is grown mainly on the Huallaga (particularly 

 Tarapoto) and Ucayali. I noticed trees at Balsa Puerto 

 twelve feet high. The native cloth is called " tocuyo " 

 and " lienza," and that which is made into cushmas, or 

 long tunics, is stronger than the stoutest unbleached cotton 

 of England or the United States. The spinning-wheels 

 and looms are of the rudest construction. 

 • HuiMBA, the product of a tree {Bombax) growing on 

 the Peruvian slope, resembles cotton, but is much lighter, 

 and silky, and is used by the Indians to wrap around the 

 ends of the slender arrows blown through the cerbatana. 



Samauma-silk, f i-om the gigantic ' Eriodendron^ is used 

 for the same purpose. 



