m. 
of the Southern parts of Brazil. 
buted to them, they would have an equal interest in concealing 
the remedies which might destroy the effect of their poisons. 
Piso, however, has revealed one of their recipes to us ; and we 
find it composed of a strange mixture of seeds of a leguminous 
plaint,, which he names Mucunaguagu , of those of Berber a Aho- 
vai and Thevetia , ( Ahovai guagu and miri ) ; the gall of a 
toad ; the worms which are produced in the juice of manihoc ; 
the leaves of certain sensitive plants, (Herba casta), and those of 
the species of Rubiacese, which he names Taugaraca , or Erf a 
de rato. If I add to the plants which I have just mentioned the 
Annonaa, named Araticu pan a, and the Sapindaceoe , which Pi- 
so calls Curuniape * and Timbo , we shall have with the manihoc 
all the poisonous plants mentioned by Piso. Now, we see, that, 
if some of these plants may, in certain cases, prove detrimental 
to health, they are very different from those terrible poisons of 
India, the very idea of which is enough to excite terror. Such 
vegetables as the Araticu pana, which, according to the avowal 
of the author himself, only causes accidents, when eaten to ex- 
cess ; and the Herb# castte, of which Marcgraff, although he 
has figured them, has not even indicated the poisonous quali- 
ties, are certainly not of a very formidable nature. 
Aruda and Coster, who have lived in the same country as Pi- 
so, since his time, do not take notice of any such plants as those 
which I have quoted ; and in general, they do not make mention 
of any poisonous vegetable. 
I do not doubt, that, in the warmest parts of the south of Bra- 
zil, there are found plants whose properties are highly deleteri- 
ous, of which a proof is afforded by the Oassacu , with an inebri- 
ating smell, cited by Martius -|\ But, although the Flora of 
Fernambucca has a great resemblance to that of the provinces of 
Santo Spirito, Rio de Janeiro, and Minas Geraes, I am, per- 
haps, already too far from my subject, in speaking of the vege- 
tation of a country in which I have not travelled ; and I shall 
therefore confine myself to that of the countries which I have 
actually traversed. 
No person was more capable of instructing us with regard to 
the antient traditions of the Indians, than the famous Father 
* Paullinia pinnata. L. 
f Fhys. Braz. 11. 
