THE AMAZON VALLEY. 
437 
nut trees are not altogether exceptions to this rule, and 
the produce from them is collected over an immense 
extent of country, to which the innumerable lakes and 
streams offer a ready access. 
The chief district from which India-rubber is pro- 
cured, is in the country between Para and the Xingu. 
On the Upper Amazon and Pio Negro it is also found, 
but is not yet collected. 
The Brazil-nuts, from the Beriliolletia excelsa, are 
brought chiefly from the interior; the greater part from 
the country around the junction of the Rio Negro and 
Madeira with the Amazon rivers. This tree takes more 
than a whole year to produce and ripen its fruits. In 
the month of January I observed the trees loaded at 
the same time with flowers and ripe fruits, both of which 
were falling from the tree ; from these flowers would 
be formed the nuts of the following year ; so that they 
probably require eighteen months for their complete de- 
velopment from the bud. The fruits, which are nearly 
as hard and heavy as cannon-balls, fall with tremendous 
force from the height of a hundred feet, crashing through 
the branches and undergrowth, and snapping off large 
boughs which they happen to strike against. Persons 
are sometimes killed by them, and accidents are not un- 
frequent among the Indians engaged in gathering them. 
The fruits are all procured as they fall from the tree. 
They are collected together in small heaps, where they 
are opened with an axe, an operation that requires some 
practice and skill, and the triangular nuts are taken out 
and carried to the canoes in baskets. Other trees of the 
same family {Lecythidece) are very abundant, and are 
