The Naturalist on the River Amazons [177]
mixed with farinha, and is very nourishing. Another cultivated fruit is the Puruma (Puruma cecropiaefolia, Martius), a round juicy berry, growing in large bunches and resembling grapes in taste. Another smaller kind, called Puruma-i, grows wild in the forest close to Ega, and has not yet been planted. The most singular of all these fruits is the Uiki, which is of oblong shape, and grows apparently crosswise on the end of its stalk. When ripe, the thick green rind opens by a natural cleft across the middle, and discloses an oval seed the size of a damascene plum, but of a vivid crimson colour. This bright hue belongs to a thin coating of pulp which, when the seeds are mixed in a plate of stewed bananas, gives to the mess a pleasant rosy tint, and a rich creamy taste and consistence. Mingua (porridge) of bananas flavoured and coloured with Uiki is a favourite dish at Ega. The fruit, like most of the others here mentioned, ripens in January. Many smaller fruits such as Wajuru (probably a species of Achras), the size of a gooseberry, which grows singly and contains a sweet gelatinous pulp, enclosing two large, shining black seeds; Cashipari-arapaa, an oblong scarlet berry; two kinds of Bacuri, the Bacuri-siuma and the B. curua, sour fruits of a bright lemon colour when ripe, and a great number of others, are of less importance as articles of food.
The celebrated "Peach palm," Pupunha of the Tupi nations (Guilielma speciosa), is a common tree at Ega. The name, I suppose, is in allusion to the colour of the fruit, and not to its flavour, for it is dry and mealy, and in taste may be compared to a mixture of chestnuts and cheese. Vultures devour it eagerly, and come in quarrelsome flocks to the trees when it is ripe. Dogs will also eat it: I do not recollect seeing cats do the same, although they go voluntarily to the woods to eat Tucuma, another kind of palm fruit. The tree, as it grows in clusters beside the palm-thatched huts, is a noble ornament, being, when full grown, from fifty to sixty feet in height and often as straight as a scaffold-pole. A bunch of fruit when ripe is a load for a strong man, and each tree bears several of them. The Pupunha grows wild nowhere on the Amazons. It is one of those few vegetable productions (including three kinds of mandioca and the American species of banana) which the Indians have cultivated from time immemorial, and brought with them in their original migration to Brazil. It is only, however, the more advanced tribes who have kept up the cultivation. The superiority of the fruit on the Solimoens to that grown on the Lower Amazons and in the neighbourhood of Para is very striking. At Ega it is generally as large as a full-sized peach, and when boiled, almost as mealy as a potato; while at Para it is no bigger than a walnut, and the pulp is fibrous. Bunches of sterile or seedless fruits sometimes occur in both districts. It is one of the principal articles of food at Ega when in season, and is boiled and eaten with treacle or salt. A dozen of the seedless fruits makes a good nourishing meal for a grown-up person. It is the general belief that there is more nutriment in Pupunha than in fish or Vacca marina.
The seasons in the Upper Amazons region offer some points of difference from those of the lower river and the district of Para, which two sections of the country we have already seen also differ considerably. The year at Ega is divided according to the rises and falls of the river, with which coincide the wet and dry periods. All the principal transactions of life of the inhabitants are regulated by these yearly recurring phenomena. The peculiarity of this upper region consists in there being two rises and two falls within the year. The great annual rise commences about the end of February and continues to the middle of June, during which the rivers and lakes, confined during the dry periods to their ordinary beds, gradually swell and overflow all the lower lands. The inundation progresses gently inch by inch, and is felt everywhere, even in the interior of the forests of the higher
The celebrated "Peach palm," Pupunha of the Tupi nations (Guilielma speciosa), is a common tree at Ega. The name, I suppose, is in allusion to the colour of the fruit, and not to its flavour, for it is dry and mealy, and in taste may be compared to a mixture of chestnuts and cheese. Vultures devour it eagerly, and come in quarrelsome flocks to the trees when it is ripe. Dogs will also eat it: I do not recollect seeing cats do the same, although they go voluntarily to the woods to eat Tucuma, another kind of palm fruit. The tree, as it grows in clusters beside the palm-thatched huts, is a noble ornament, being, when full grown, from fifty to sixty feet in height and often as straight as a scaffold-pole. A bunch of fruit when ripe is a load for a strong man, and each tree bears several of them. The Pupunha grows wild nowhere on the Amazons. It is one of those few vegetable productions (including three kinds of mandioca and the American species of banana) which the Indians have cultivated from time immemorial, and brought with them in their original migration to Brazil. It is only, however, the more advanced tribes who have kept up the cultivation. The superiority of the fruit on the Solimoens to that grown on the Lower Amazons and in the neighbourhood of Para is very striking. At Ega it is generally as large as a full-sized peach, and when boiled, almost as mealy as a potato; while at Para it is no bigger than a walnut, and the pulp is fibrous. Bunches of sterile or seedless fruits sometimes occur in both districts. It is one of the principal articles of food at Ega when in season, and is boiled and eaten with treacle or salt. A dozen of the seedless fruits makes a good nourishing meal for a grown-up person. It is the general belief that there is more nutriment in Pupunha than in fish or Vacca marina.
The seasons in the Upper Amazons region offer some points of difference from those of the lower river and the district of Para, which two sections of the country we have already seen also differ considerably. The year at Ega is divided according to the rises and falls of the river, with which coincide the wet and dry periods. All the principal transactions of life of the inhabitants are regulated by these yearly recurring phenomena. The peculiarity of this upper region consists in there being two rises and two falls within the year. The great annual rise commences about the end of February and continues to the middle of June, during which the rivers and lakes, confined during the dry periods to their ordinary beds, gradually swell and overflow all the lower lands. The inundation progresses gently inch by inch, and is felt everywhere, even in the interior of the forests of the higher