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Show AN"'OTATION A D ADDITIO S. 193 yard , it wa so shallow and so full of sa.nd-bnnks th t the Expedition were obliged to dig channel", the river bed being only fifteen inches deep. Fre h water Dolphins were stiU to be seen everywhere in large numbers; a phenomenon which the 70ologists of the l.Sth century would not have been prepared to €xpect in the Orinoco and the Ganges. (') p. 113.- "The most rigaro«s oftlteproductfo'lf..s of the tropuul world." The Bertholletia. e~celsa (Juvia), of the family of Myrtacere(and pla.ced in Richard chomblll'g"k' s proposed. divisi.oa of Lecythidere), was first described by Boapland and myself in the "Plantes equino. riales," t . i. 1808, p. 122, tab. 36. This gigantic and magnillcent tree offers, in tlie perfect formation o{ its eoooa-like, t•ound, thic.k, woody fruit enclosing the three..eorn.ered and also woody seed-vessels, tke most remarkable example of high o,-ganie development. The Berthoiletia grows in the forests of the Upper Orinoco between the Padamo and the Ocamu, nea.r the mountain of Mapaya, a.nd also between the rivers Amaguaea and Gebette. (Relatioa historiqae, t. ii.. pp. 474, 496, .5.58-562.) ( 8 ) p. 173 .- " Gmss .stal7cs having joints above ei.s;hteeJR, feet kmg from kn..-;t f;O lcne~t.'' Robert Sehomburgk, when visitiug the smali mountaini3us eountry <>f the Majonkongs, oo. his way to Esmeralda, was so fortu·nate as to determifte the species of Arundiaaria which furnishes the material for the blowpipes oc tubes through whieh the Indians -discha\·ge their arrows. He says of this plant : "It grows ira large tl.lfts like the Bambusa; the first joint rises without a knot to a height of from 16 to 17 feet before it begins to put forth leaves. The entire he~ght of th.e Arundinaria, as at grows at the foot ·Of the great mountain of l\1 aravaea, is &am 30 to 40 feet, with a thickness of scarcely half a,a inch diameter. The top is always in.clined. This kind 0f grass is ,peculiar to the sandstO'Ile mountains between tl&e V entuari, the Paramu (Padamo), and the l\1avaea. The Indian name is Curata1 and hence, from the excellenee of these far-famed blow tubes of great length, the Majonkon.gs and Guinaus of these districts ha~e 17 |
