12 NOTES OF A BOTANIST 
Farinha secca is made entirely from the fresh 
grated roots. The former contains nearly all the 
starch in combination with the other nutritive con- 
stituents ; but the latter has parted with most of 
the starch in the repeated washings and squeezings 
the pulp undergoes to free it from the poisonous 
juice. When the main object is to have the tapioca 
or mandiocca starch separate, the pulp of the grated 
root is alone employed. 
I was then shown the Caraipe pottery, which 
comprised almost every kind of cooking utensil. 
It was made of equal parts of a fine clay, found in 
the beds of igarapes, and of calcined Caraipe bark ; 
but in other places where I have seen the manu- 
facture carried on (and there is no Indian's house 
in the Amazon valley where it is not familiar) a 
much smaller proportion of the bark was used. 
The property which renders the bark available for 
this purpose is the great quantity of silex contained 
in it. In the best sorts — such as I afterwards saw 
on the river Uaupes — the crystals of silex may be 
observed with a lens even in the fresh bark ; and 
the burnt bark turns out a flinty mass (with a very 
slight residuum of light ash, which may be blown 
away), so that for mixing with clay it requires to be 
reduced to powder with a pestle and mortar. The 
bark I saw at Caripi is, however, much less siliceous, 
and when burnt may be broken up with the fingers. 
Having satisfied my curiosity as to the pottery, 
we started into the wood to see the Caraipe tree, 
and after much searching found one — a straight 
slender tree, whose height I estimated at lOO 
feet ; and it was branched only near the summit. 
