160 



TOBACCO. 



from the high lands above it ; cattle thrive well ; and its coffee, tobacco, 

 sugar-cane, rice, and maize are of fine quality. It is true that vessel 

 cannot come up to Shapaja, the port of the town of Tarapoto ; but a 

 good road may be made from this town eighteen miles to Chasuta, to 

 which vessels of five feet draught may come at the lowest stage of the 

 river, and any draught at high water. Tarapoto is situated on an 

 elevated plain twenty miles in diameter ; is seventy miles from Moyo- 

 bamba, the capital of the province, a city of seven thousand inhabitants ; 

 and has close around it the villages of Lamas. Tabalosas, Juan Guerra, 

 and Shapaja. 



The Ucayali is navigable higher up than this point, and the quality 

 of cotton and coffee seems better, within certain limits, further from the 

 equator. But the settler at the head-waters of the Ucayali has to 

 place himself in a profound wilderness, with the forest and the savage 

 to subdue, and entirely dependent upon his own resources. I think he 

 would be better placed near where he can get provisions and assistance 

 whilst he is clearing the forest and planting his fields. I am told that 

 the governors of the districts in all the province of Mainas have 

 authority to give titles to land to any one who desires to cultivate it. 



I saw here very fine fields of Indian corn. The stalk grows quite as 

 high as on our best bottom-lands in Virginia, and the ears were full, and 

 of good grain. It may be planted at any time, and it yields in three 

 months, thus giving four crops a year. A considerable quantity of 

 tobacco is also cultivated in the neighborhood of Tarapoto. The 

 tobacco seed is planted in carefully-prepared ground in October. At 

 this time the forest is cleared to make the plantation. In January the 

 seedlings are ready to transplant, when the wood that has been cut 

 down is set fire to, and the plantation cleared up ready to receive the 

 plants. When the plant is about two feet high, the top is cut off, and 

 the lower leaves, which are generally injured by the dirt, pulled off, so 

 that the force of the plant may be thrown into the middle leaves. The 

 crop is gathered, as the leaves ripen, in July and August. They are 

 put under shelter for a few days to turn yellow, and are then exposed 

 for three or four days to the sun and dew. After this, they are some- 

 times sprinkled with a little molasses and water, and rolled out flat with 

 a wooden roller ; the larger stems are taken out, and they are then put 

 up in long masses of about one and a half pound weight, and wrapped 

 tightly and closely with some running vine ef the forest. This is the 

 common method ; and the common tobacco of Tarapoto is worth twelve 

 and a half cents (money) the mass there. A superior kind, made with 

 more care, and put up in short, thick masses, called anclullo, is also 



