27 



The cuspa, a common tree in the environs 

 of Cumana and of Bordones, is yet unknown 

 to the botanist of Europe. It was long used 

 only for the building of houses, and has become 

 celebrated since 1797, under the name of the 

 cascarilla or bark tree (cinchona) of New Anda- 

 lusia. Its trunk rises scarcely above fifteen or 

 twenty feet. Its alternate leaves * are smooth, 

 entire, and oval. It's bark, very thin, and of a 

 pale yellow, is eminently febrifuge. It is even 

 more bitter than the bark of the real cinchona, 

 but it's bitterness is less disagreeable. The 

 cuspa is administered with the greatest success, 

 in a spirituous tincture, and in aqueous infusion, 

 both in intermittent and in malignant fevers. 

 The Governor of Cumana, Mr. d'Emparan, sent 

 a considerable quantity of it to the physicians of 

 Cadiz ; and, according to the information lately 

 received from Don Pedro Franco, apothecary 

 to the military hospital at Cumana, the cuspa 

 has been acknowledged in Europe to be almost 

 as good as the quinquina of Santa Fe. It is 

 asserted, that, taken in powder, it has the ad- 

 vantage over the latter of causing less irritation 

 to the stomach of those patients whose gastric 

 system is much debilitated. 



On the coasts of New Andelusia, the cuspa 



* At the summit of the boughs, the leaves are sometimes 

 opposite to each other, but constantly without stipulce. 



