(* This Is A Mikania, Which Was Confounded For Some Time In Europe With The Ayapana.

De Candolle thinks that the guaco may be the Eupatorium satureiaefolium of Lamarck; but this Eupatorium differs by its

Lineary leaves, while the Mikania guaco has triangular, oval, and very large leaves.) A number of Indians hastened to the hut of the sick man, and he was cured by an infusion of raiz de mato. We cannot indicate with certainty what plant furnishes this antidote; but I am inclined to think, that the raiz de mato is an apocynea, perhaps the Cerbera thevetia, called by the inhabitants of Cumana lingua de mato or contra-culebra, and which they also use against the bite of serpents. A genus nearly allied to the cerbera* (* Ophioxylon serpentinum.) is employed in India for the same purpose. It is common enough to find in the same family of plants vegetable poisons, and antidotes against the venom of reptiles. Many tonics and narcotics are antidotes more or less active; and we find these in families very different* from each other, in the aristolochiae, the apocyneae, the gentianae, the polygalae, the solaneae, the compositae, the malvaceae, the drymyrhizeae, and, which is still more surprising, even in the palm-trees. (* I shall mention as examples of these nine families; Aristolochia anguicida, Cerbera thevetia, Ophoiorhiza mungos, Polygala senega, Nicotiana tabacum, (One of the remedies most used in Spanish America). Mikanua guaco, Hibiscus abelmoschus (the seeds of which are very active), Lanpujum rumphii, and Kunthia montana (Cana de la Vibora).)

In the hut of the Indian who had been so dangerously bitten by the viper, we found balls two or three inches in diameter, of an earthy and impure salt called chivi, which is prepared with great care by the natives. At Maypures a conferva is burnt, which is left by the Orinoco on the neighbouring rocks, when, after high swellings, it again enters its bed. At Javita a salt is fabricated by the incineration of the spadix and fruit of the palm-tree seje or chimu. This fine palm-tree, which abounds on the banks of the Auvana, near the cataract of Guarinumo, and between Javita and the Cano Pimichin, appears to be a new species of cocoa-tree. It may be recollected, that the fluid contained in the fruit of the common cocoa-tree is often saline, even when the tree grows far from the sea shore. At Madagascar salt is extracted from the sap of a palm-tree called ciro. Besides the spadix and the fruit of the seje palm, the Indians of Javita lixiviate also the ashes of the famous liana called cupana, which is a new species of the genus paullinia, consequently a very different plant from the cupania of Linnaeus. I may here mention, that a missionary seldom travels without being provided with some prepared seeds of the cupana. This preparation requires great care. The Indians scrape the seeds, mix them with flour of cassava, envelope the mass in plantain leaves, and set it to ferment in water, till it acquires a saffron-yellow colour.

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