Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 3 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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Without Answering My Questions He Continued
Repeating, With A Smile, That The Country Was Hot And Humid; That The
Houses
In the town of Pomerania were finer than those of Santa Cruz de
Lorica; and that, if we remained in
The forest, we should have the
tertian fever (calentura) from which he had long suffered. We had some
difficulty in testifying our gratitude to this good man for his kind
advice; for according to his somewhat aristocratic principles, a white
man, were he bare-footed, should never accept money "in the presence
of those vile coloured people!" (gente parda). Less disdainful than
our European countryman, we saluted politely the group of men of
colour who were employed in drawing off into large calabashes, or
fruits of the Crescentia cujete, the palm-tree wine from the trunks of
felled trees. We asked them to explain to us this operation, which we
had already seen practised in the missions of the Cataracts. The vine
of the country is the palma dolce, the Cocos butyracea, which, near
Malgar, in the valley of the Magdalena, is called the wine palm-tree,
and here, on account of its majestic height, the royal palm-tree.
After having thrown down the trunk, which diminishes but little
towards the top, they make just below the point whence the leaves
(fronds) and spathes issue, an excavation in the ligneous part,
eighteen inches long, eight broad, and six in depth. They work in the
hollow of the tree, as though they were making a canoe; and three days
afterwards this cavity is found filled with a yellowish-white juice,
very limpid, with a sweet and vinous flavour.
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