530 



vages in the monopoly of the piaches, who are at 

 once priests, jugglers, and physicians ; it is only 

 from the natives transplanted to the missions, 

 that any certain notions can be acquired on 

 matters so problematical. Ages had elapsed 

 before the Europeans were taught to know, from 

 the investigations of Mr. Mutis, the hejuco del 

 guaco (mikania guaco *), which is the most 

 powerful of all antidotes against the bite of 

 serpents, and of which we were fortunate enough 

 to give the first botanical description. 



The opinion is very general in the missions, 

 that no cure is possible, if the curare be fresh, 

 well concentrated, and have staid long in the 

 wound, so as to have entered abundantly into 

 the circulation. Among the specifics employed 

 on the banks of the Oroonoko, and, according 

 to Mr. Leschenault, in the Indian Archipelago, 

 the most celebrated is muriat of soda-}\ The 



* See pi. 105 of the Plantes Equinoxiales, which I published 

 conjointly with Mr. Bonpland, vol. ii, p. 84. 



f Oviedo (Sommario delle Indie Orientali) boasts of sea 

 water as an antidote against vegetable poisons. The people 

 in the missions never fail to relate to European travellers, 

 that they have no more to fear from arrows dipped in curare, 

 if they have a little salt in their mouth, than from the electric 

 shocks of the gymnoti, when chewing tobacco. (See chap. 

 17, vol. iv, p. 347.) Raleigh recommends as an antidote to 

 the curari (curare) the juice of garlick. (Caijley, vol. i, p. 

 196.) 



