The Ant-tjieI; of Guiana. 
35Ö 
lalli juiictioiis with the AV'aiiii, while the navama, Avhich we uow follow- 
ed, flows into it here from the west. The width of the Barama mouth 
amounted to 150 feet. During its eourse, the Barama divides the 
isthmus between the Barima and 'W'aini into two almost equal parts. 
The water Jiad now lost its salty taste, the curida bush gradually dis- 
appeared and again made room for a varied vegetation which also ex- 
tended along the l>anks of the ^^'aiwa flowing here from the H.W. into 
the Barama. The \yaini is occupied by Warraus, the Waiwa by Akawai. 
Tlie banks of the Barama soon reached a height of six feet. A large 
number of the interesting Triplaris amcvicana Linn., the dangers of 
which I was soon to be made ijainfully acquainted with, were always to 
be found on the sandbanks which the Barama usually formed in its many 
bends. In many respects this tree resembles Cecropia peltata a good 
deal, and often attains a height of from GO to SO feet : it has never yet had 
an exhaustive description given of it, because neither Aublet nor Jacquin 
mention its interesting bracts. The calyx of the male flower is six- 
sepalled, and not 8-sepalled as those botanists say, whence I must con- 
clude that both never saw the male flowers and without waiting des- 
cribed it from the female ones. Strange to say they mention equally 
as little about the intense pubescence within the calyx in both sexes. 
The male blossoms wither already by the second day : the same is also 
the case with the corolla of the female, while the segments of the calyx 
continue to grow, and in their growth pass from green into red. The 
fruits, Avhich tlie funnel-like calyx ])rotects, overtop their size at least 
four times, and on that account give them quite the appearance of a 
shuttle-cock. I thought it was covered with Avhite, green, and red 
flowers, in between which the green leaves of the tree were hardly 
noticeable. The peculiar internal structure of the trunk and branches 
makes the tree one of the most dangerous. These are completely hollow 
and divided throughout by equidistantly-placed horizontal partition- 
walls, in which it also resembles Cecropia peltata. The intervening 
Bpaces are chosen as a dwelling by one of the worst kinds of ants 
(Cnjpfocenis) of a yellow-brown colour, with a lanky body, and having 
the antennae situate in the middle of the ]»rojecting portion of the head. 
The mandibles are three-cornered and like the whole genus of Crypto- 
crrus, are only nsed for holding fast onto the object which the insect 
then wounds with the ix'culiar sting on its liairy posterior. 
876. Ignorant of the inner structure of the tree as well as of its 
dangerous occupants, and in s]nte of the warning siestures of mv Warraus, 
I was trying to break off one of the branches when thousands of these 
insects tumbled out of the small rounded openings which they always 
eat away between every two of the partition walls. They regularly 
covered me, and in the greatest exasperation seized my skin in their 
mandibles, vomited a whitish fluid, and dug their dangerous weapons 
into my muscles. We now had in our corial not only the ants occupying 
tlie piece removed, but also the thousands tumbling into it from the 
1. Cf. Robert Schomburgk : '■ On the Ant Tree of Guiaii.i (Triplaris nmericar.a) " A..nalsj 
of Natural History. Vol. I. p. •2iU, 
