io6 



THE TOCANTINS 



a new rope. We stayed a day and night on the island. 

 The house was of a similar description to those I have 

 already described as common on the low islands of the 

 Tocantins. The cacaoal which surrounded it consisted 

 of about 10,000 trees, which I was astonished to hear 

 produced altogether only 100 arrobas or 3200 pounds 

 of the chocolate nut per annum. I had seen trees on the 

 main land, which having been properly attended to, pro- 

 duced yearly thirty- two pounds each, or 100 times as 

 much as those of Dona Paulina's cacaoal ; the average 

 yield in plantations on the Amazons near Santarem is 

 700 arrobas to 10,000 trees. Agriculture was evidently 

 in a very low condition hereabout ; the value of a cacao 

 estate was very trifling, each tree being worth only forty 

 reis or one penny, this including the land on which the 

 plantation stands. A square league of country planted 

 with cacao could thus be bought for 40/. or 50/, sterling. 

 The selling price of cacao is very fluctuating ; 3500 

 reis, or about eight shillings the arroba of 32lbs., may 

 be taken as the average. The management of a plantation 

 requires very few hands ; the tree yields three crops a- 

 year, namely, one each in March, June, and September ; 

 but the June crop often fails, and those of the other months 

 are very precarious. In the intervals between harvest- 

 times the plantations require weeding ; the principal 

 difficulty is to keep the trees free from woody creepers 

 and epiphytes, but especially from parasitic plants of the 

 Loranthaceae group, the same family to which our miseltoe 

 belongs, and which are called * pes de passarinho ', or 

 ' little birds' feet from their pretty orange and red 

 flowers resembling in shape and arrangement the three 

 toes of birds. When the fruit is ready for gathering, 

 neighbours help each other, and so each family is able 

 to manage its own little plantation without requiring 

 slaves. It appeared to me that cacao-growing would be 

 an employment well suited to the habits and constitutions 

 of European immigrants. All the work is done under 

 shade ; but it would yield a poor livelihood unless a 

 better style of cultivation and preparation were intro- 

 duced than that now prevailing here. The fruit is of 

 oblong shape, and six to eight inches in length ; the 

 seeds are enveloped in a mass of white pulp which makes 

 a delicious lemonade when mixed with water, and when 

 boiled down produces an excellent jelly. 



