356 



The Portugueze of the Amazon cany small 

 quantities of Madeira wine, from time to time 7 

 to the Rio Negro ; and the word madera signi- 

 fying wood in the Castilian language, the poor 

 monks, who are not much versed in the study of 

 geography, had a scruple of celebrating mass 

 with Madeira wine, which they took for a fer- 

 mented liquor extracted from the trunk of some 

 tree, like the palm wine ; and requested the 

 guardian of the missions to decide, whether the 

 vino de madera were wine from grapes ( de uvas), 

 or the juice of a tree (vino de algun paloj. At 

 the beginning of the conquest, the question was 

 agitated, whether it were allowable for the 

 priests in celebrating mass, to use any fermented 

 liquor analogous to the wine of the grape. The 

 question, as might have been foreseen^ was de- 

 cided in the negative* 



We bought some provision at Davipe^ parti- 

 cularly fowls and a pig. This purchase inte- 

 rested our Indians much, who had been a long 

 while deprived of meat. They pressed us to de- 

 part, in order to reach the island of Dapa, where 

 the pig was to be killed, and roasted during the 

 night. We had scarcely time to examine in the 

 convent (convento) the great stores of mani 

 resin, and cordage of the chiquichiqui palm, 

 which deserves to be more known in Europe. 

 This cordage is extremely light, floats upon the 

 water, and is more durable in the navigation of 



