A SLIGHT ACCIDENT. 
77 
1848.] 
and size, and displaying little of the skill of our bees at 
home. The next night, rather late, we arrived at Jam- 
bouassu, the sitio of Senhor Seixus, where we were 
kindly received, and, about nine o’clock, turned into our 
redes in his verandah. 
The next morning I walked out, to examine the pre- 
mises. The whole of the forest, for some miles round 
the house, is a cacao plantation, there being about sixty 
thousand trees, which have all been planted; the small 
trees and brush having been cleared from the forest, but 
all the seringa and other large forest-trees left for shade, 
which the cacao requhes. The milk from the seringa- 
trees is collected every morning in large univalve shells, 
which are stuck with clay to the tree, and a small incision 
made in the bark above. It is formed into shoes or 
bottles, on moulds of clay, or into flat cakes. It hardens 
in a few hours, and is blackened with a smoke produced 
by burning the nuts of the Urucuri palm, and is then 
India-rubber. Just before leaving this place I met with 
an accident, which might have been very serious. My 
gun was lying loaded on the top of the canoe, and wish- 
ing to shoot some small birds near the house, I drew it 
towards me by the muzzle, which, standing on the steps 
of the landing-place, was the only part I could reach. 
The hammer however lay in a joint of the boards, and 
as I drew the gun towards me it was raised up, and let 
fall on the cap, firing off the gun, the charge carrying 
off a small piece of the under-side of my hand, near the 
wrist, and, passing under my arm within a few inches of 
my body, luckily missed a number of people who were 
behind me. I felt my hand violently blown away, and 
