352 
THE ARADORES. 
detained us some time at tlie mouth of the Tuamini. The 
noise of the blowers had frightened our monkeys, and one 
of them fell into the water. Animals of this species, per- 
haps on account of their extreme meagreness, swim badly 1 
and consequently it was saved with some difficulty. 
At Javita we had the pleasure of finding a very intelligent 
and obliging monk, at whose mission we were forced to 
remain four or five days, the time required for transporting 
our boat across the portage of Pimichin. This delay enabled 
us to visit the surrounding country, as also to relieve our- 
selves from an annoyance which we had suffered for two 
days. We felt an extraordinary irritation on the joints of 
our fingers, and on the backs of our hands. The missionary 
told us it was caused by the aradores* which get under the 
skin. We could distinguish with a lens nothing but streaks, 
or parallel and whitish furrows. It is the form of these 
furrows, that has obtained for the insect the name of 1 plough- 
man.’ A. mulatto woman was sent for, who professed to be 
thoroughly acquainted with all the little insects that burrow' 
in tho human skin ; the chego, the nuclte, the coy a, and the 
arador ; she was the curandera, or surgeon of the place. 
She promised to extirpate, one by one, the insects which 
caused this smarting irritation, Having heated at a lamp 
the point a little bit of hard wood, she dug with it into 
the furrows that marked the skin. After long examina- 
tion, she announced with the pedantic gravity peculiar to the 
mulatto race, that an arador was found. I saw a little 
round bag, wliich I suspected to be the egg of an acarus. } 
was to find rebel' when tho mulatto woman had succeeded m 
taking out three or four of these aradores. Having the skin 
of both hands filled with acari, I had not the patience to wait 
the end of an operation, which had already lasted till late at 
night. The next day an Indian of Javita cured us radical!}'’ 
and with surprising promptitude. He brought us the 
branch of a shrub, called uzao , with small leaves like those 
of cassia, very coriaceous and glossy. He made a cold 
infusion of the bark of this shrub, which had a bluish coloW, 
and the taste of bquorice. When beaten, it yields a great 
deal of froth. The irritation of the aradores ceased by using 
simple lotions of this uzao-water. We could not find this 
* Literally, ‘ the pleughers.’ 
