COCHINILLA.
The Paraguayrian cochineal is produced by winged insects, which sit continually on certain little thistles, and suck their juice. There are many kinds of these thistles, which differ from one another in their form, and fruit. The plant on which the cochineal is found, is called tuna by the Spaniards, and opuntia by botanists. From a very short root rises a thick stalk, sometimes four-cornered, green, crooked, with a white fragile pulp, and covered with thorns: on this, instead of boughs and leaves, grow other stalks, the same as the former, very long, and extremely full of juice. Yellow flowers are succeeded by fruit of a red colour, larger than a common fig, with a sweet, and at the same time, rather acid flavour, which renders them very delightful to the palate. Their pulp is full of small, black seeds, like grape stones, and when peeled has a delicious taste. From these shrubs therefore, the women collect cochineal, which consists of very small, white, fluid particles, closely resembling moss. Most of the particles are made into small, round cakes, and, after exposure to the air, become red and hard. Nothing further is requisite to fit them for painting, and dying. The Jesuit priest of the Guarany town Nuestra Senhora de Sta. Fè, took care to have the tuna thistle planted in a large garden, that they might not be obliged to seek the cochineal necessary for his town in distant plains. When the thistles were grown up, those winged insects, resembling bugs, were carried by the Indians from the plain, and scattered up and down, with more than the desired success; for so abundant, and so excellent was the cochineal collected from them, that it was anxiously bought, at any price, by the neighbouring priests, for the use of their towns; because it was of a deeper, and brighter red, than that of the plains, and the woods, and was, moreover, scented with citron juice. In succeeding years, the same Father prevented all access to the town by means of these thistles, that the equestrian savages, who had committed much carnage amongst them, might not be so easily able to approach it. This kind of living hedge, which the Spaniards use both in their gardens and estates, became not only a means of security, but at the same time, an ever fertile nursery of cochineal, which, as well as a most beautiful paint, affords the Paraguayrians a medicine for strengthening the heart, creating perspiration, and counteracting poison; so that it may be safely, and usefully mixed with vinegar, and other seasoning liquors.