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obliged to remain four or five days at his mis- 

 sion. This delay was inevitable for transport- 

 ing our boat across the portage of Pimichin ; 

 and we availed oursel ves of it, not only to visit 

 the surrounding country, but also to cure our- 

 selves of an evil; which we had suffered for two 

 days. We felt an extraordinary irritation on 

 the joints of the fingers, and on the back of our 

 hands. The missionary told us it was caused 

 by the aradores (ploughman insects), which get 

 under the skin. We could distinguish with a 

 lens nothing but streaks, or parallel and whitish 

 furrows. It is the form of these furrows,, that 

 has obtained this insect the name of 'ploughman. 

 A mulatto woman was sent for, who boasted 

 of being thoroughly acquainted with all the 

 little insects that burrow in the human skin ; 

 the chego, the nuche, the coy a, and the arador ; 

 she was the curandera, the physician of the 

 place. She promised to extirpate the insects, 

 that caused this smarting irritation, one by one. 

 She heated at a lamp the point of a little bit of 

 very hard wood, and dug with this point the 

 furrows that marked the skin. After long re- 

 searches, she announced with the pedantic gra- 

 vity peculiar to the mulatto race, that an arador 

 was found. I saw a little round bag, which I sus- 

 pected to be the egg of an acarus. I was to find 

 relief, when the mulatto woman had succeeded 

 in taking out three or four of these aradores. 



