DREAD OF WASP-STINGS.
367
that fine t i m b e r for building, which, on the north-west coast of A m e r i c a , o n mountains where the t h e r m o m e t e r falls in w i n t e r t o 20° c e n t , b e l o w zero, we find in the family o f the coniferæ. S u c h , in every z o n e , and in all the families o f A m e r i c a n plants, is the p r o d i g i o u s force o f vegetation, that, in the latitude o f fifty-seven degrees n o r t h , on t h e same isothermal line with S t . P e t e r s b u r g h and the O r k n e y s , t h e Pinus canadensis displays trunks one hundred and fifty feet high, and six feet in d i a m e t e r . * T o w a r d s night we arrived at a small farm, in the puerto or landing place o f Pimichin. W e were s h o w n a cross near the road, which marked the s p o t " w h e r e a p o o r capuchin missionary had been killed b y wasps." I state this o n t h e authority o f t h e m o n k s o f Javita and the Indians. T h e y talk m u c h in these c o u n t r i e s o f wasps and v e n o m o u s ants, but we saw neither o n e nor t h e o t h e r o f these i n s e c t s . I t is well k n o w n that in the t o r r i d zone slight stings often cause fits o f fever almost as violent as those that, with us accompany severe organic injuries. T h e death o f this poor monk was probably the effect of fatigue and d a m p , rather than o f the venom contained in the stings of wasps, which the Indians dread e x t r e m e l y . W e must n o t c o n f o u n d the wasps o f Javita with the melipones bees, called by the Spaniards angelitos (little angels) which covered o u r faces and hands on the summit of the Silla de Caracas. T h e landing place o f Pimichin is surrounded by a small plantation o f caaco-trees ; they are very vigorous, and here, as on the b a n k s o f the A t a b a p o a n d the Guainia, t h e y are loaded with flowers and fruits at all seasons. They begin t o boar from the fourth y e a r ; on the coast o f Caracas they d o n o t bear till the sixth o r eighth year. T h e soil o f these countries is sandy, wherever it, is not marshy ; b u t the light lands o f the Tuamini and Pimichin are extremely p r o d u c A r o u n d the conucos o f Pimichin g r o w s , in its wild tive†. * Langsdorf informs, us that the inhabitants of Norfolk Sound make boats of a single trunk, fifty feet long, four feet and a half broad, and three high at the sides. They contain thirty persons. These boats remind us of the canoes of the Rio Chagres in the isthmus of Panama, in the torrid zone. The Populus balsamifera also attains an immense height, on the mountains that border Norfolk Sound. † At Javita, an extent of fifty feet square, planted with Jatropha manihot (yucca) yields in two years, in the worst soil, a harvest of six tortas of cassava : the same extent on a middling soil yields in fourteen