ON MYUOXYLON TOLU1FERUM. 
61 
swampy; indeed it was nearly all under water when I arrived there, and I afterwards 
found that the tree is never found in the low trades adjoining the river, but in the higher 
rolling ground beyond, where the soil is dry. 
Finding that the tree was not known in Mompox, I left for Plato on the 17th 
December. Taking the steamer to Las Mercedes, I went from thence to Plato in a 
canoe. Las Mercedes is the port of El Carmen, and it consists only of a large storehouse 
for the tobacco brought from the interior, and the imported goods received in exchange. 
It was here I first saw the balsam. In the store were upwards of thirty tins full of it, 
ready for exportation; most of the tins contained ten pounds of the balsam, but there 
were also a few of a larger size, each containing an arroba of twenty-five pounds. The 
store-keeper told me that that lot of balsam had come from Plato only a day or two 
before, and that he expected some more that evening from the same place. The drug, 
he further informed me, was also exported from Teneriffe, Pinto, and Santa Anna, all 
small ports on the right bank of the river, but that most came from Plato. At Corozal, 
he said, none was now gathered, although the tree exists there, as also at El Carmen. 
I was glad to find that I had got on the right track at last, and waited patiently 
for the canoe from Plato, by which I hoped to get a passage to that place. It arrived 
about six o’clock in the evening, started on its return an hour later, and by nine of the 
same day that I left Mompox, we were in Plato. This place is about a league further 
down the river than Las Mercedes, and on its opposite side, near the outlet of one of the 
numerous branch-streams the river forms in its course. Luckily for me, the “ Jefe Munici- 
pale” of Plato, Frederico Alfaro by name, came in the canoe with me, and this man 
showed me much disinterested kindness during my stay there. 
I had great difficulty in getting animals for the journey into the Montana,—not a horse 
nor a mule was to be had, and it was only after waiting two days that I was able to hire 
two donkeys, one for my guide and the other for myself; a third for baggage I could not 
get,—and indeed it was considered quite unnecessary, as it is the usual custom here to 
travel on donkeys loaded with 80 or 90 lbs. of cargo besides the rider. 
During the two days I had to wait at Plato, I found a species of Myrospermum grow¬ 
ing plentifully in the neighbourhood of the village, and gathered specimens of it both in 
flower and fruit. This I take to be M. frutescens, Jacq.: it grows to a height of about 15 
to 20 feet. Some trees are now in flower, while on others the fruit is already of a good 
size. The trees bearing flowers or fruit are generally destitute of foliage, and it is only 
barren individuals that are in full leaf. 
On the morning of the 21st, having got the donkeys and guide assembled and every¬ 
thing ready, we started for the Montana. On one side of my own donkey was hung a bundle 
of paper and boards for drying specimens, and on the other my “ estera ” (mat for sleeping 
on), blankets, mosquito net, and a change of clothes; that of the guide carried some pro¬ 
visions for the journey and his own things. I started on foot, feeling almost ashamed to 
mount an animal not much bigger than myself which seemed to be already well loaded, 
but, before the day’s journey was done, I had been glad to take occasional lifts on the 
poor donkey. We made about eighteen miles before we halted for the night, and my 
guide, a man twice my weight, rode every foot of the way. What with the burning sun, 
the thermometer at 89° in the shade, and the heavy load, I did not much envy his poor 
“ burro.” 
We passed some balsam-trees in the afternoon, each with a lot of calabashes stuck 
on its trunk to catch the drug which trickled from the wounds in its bark. I picked up 
a few of the fruit under one of these trees, and on asking him what they were, he said 
they were “ojos de algo palo de la montana.” He did not know them, although he told 
me he had been accustomed to gather balsam since his boyhood. 
Our second day’s journey was not so long as the first,—I think not more than about twelve 
miles. The balsam-trees occurred occasionally during the whole way. We stopped at a hut 
in the forest surrounded, by a small clearing, the owner of which, like all the inhabitants of 
the Montana, makes part of his living by gathering balsam. The trees were very plentiful 
here, and generally of a large size. Their average height is about 70 feet, and the 
trunk is sometimes upwards of 2 feet in diameter a yard from the ground, and generally 
rises to a height of 40 feet without branching, so that it is impossible to get at either 
foliage or fruit without cutting down the tree. On the day after our arrival, I got the 
man’s permission to have a tree felled; he did not charge me anything for the tree, but 
stipulated that I should pay two of his sous a dollar each for felling it. I selected an 
YOL. YI. Cx 
