THE CEDAR.
The more northerly woods of Tucuman and Paraguay boast of innumerable lofty cedars, which, having exceedingly tall, straight, and large trunks, afford excellent materials for ships, and all sorts of building, as they never feel decay, and last for ever, even under water. No tree which Paraguay produces makes longer or wider beams, which, as they are laboriously hewn, not by a water-machine, but by human hands with a saw, and conveyed in waggons from Tucuman full three hundred leagues, sell very high in the city of Buenos-Ayres, where no woods are to be seen, and whither they are brought from the distant forests of Asumpcion, after a two months' navigation on the river. In Tucuman, indeed, a German lay-brother of our order constructed a machine, by which the saw was moved to the cedars by water underneath the wheel, with a great saving of time and labour; but it was soon after removed and destroyed by the natives, who hate all innovation. Sometimes out of one cedar a very large boat is made, to pull which thirty rowers are hardly sufficient. I do not deny that the tree timboỹ is made into shorter and slenderer planks and boats in Paraguay; but cedars hold the first place, as they excel in the width, height, and straightness of their trunk, in the docility of the materials, and their durability under water. There are two kinds of cedars in Paraguay; the wood of the one is beautifully red, that of the other rather palish; both, however, have a very sweet smell, and in the heat of the sun shed great quantities of gum, which is sometimes white, sometimes red, but always transparent. We used it in the same manner as gum Arabic, to glue things together, and also for polishing; might it not be fit for various medicinal purposes? Water boiled with bits of cedar wood and drunk, is a remedy for extravasation in those that have been bruised by a violent blow, by a sudden fall from a horse or a tree; though in such cases, to accelerate the cure, an infusion of quinoa, a kind of pulse with a very small grain, should also be drunk. Others make plasters of the quinoa, after it has been pounded in a mortar, and boiled in water, and when applied to the wounded or bruised part, they dissipate noxious humours so soon as to exceed the expectation both of the physician and the patient. This pulse is also a very wholesome food.