These are very elegant palms; their stems are lofty, slender, smooth and faintly ringed. The leaves are terminal, pinnate, regular, and form a graceful feathery plume. The bases of the petioles are sheathing for a long distance down the stem, forming a thick column three or four feet long, of a green or reddish colour. The spadices, three or four in number, spring from beneath the leaves, and the spathes are very deciduous, falling to the ground as soon as they open. The fruit is small, globose, at first green, then violet or black, and consists of a thin edible pulp covering the hard seed.
Twelve species are known, inhabiting the West Indies, Mexico and South America, and there appear to be three species in the Amazon district, two of which I have figured. Some prefer marshy grounds near the level of the sea, others extend up the mountains to a height of 4000 feet.
Pl. VII.
W. Fitch lith. Ford & West Imp.
EUTERPE OLERACEA. Ht. 60 Ft.
PLATE VII.
Euterpe oleracea, Martius.
Assaí, Lingoa Geral.
The Assaí of Pará is a tall and slender tree, from sixty to eighty feet high, and about four inches in diameter. The stem is very smooth, of a pale colour, and generally waving, sometimes very much curved. The leaves are of moderate size, of a pale bright green, regularly pinnate, and with the leaflets much drooping. The column formed by the sheathing bases of the leaves is of an olive colour. The flowers are small, whitish, and very thickly set on the simply branched spadix. There are generally two or three, and sometimes even five or six spadices, growing out horizontally from a little below the leaf-column. The spathe is smooth and membranous, and falls off as the spadix opens. The fruit when ripe is about the size and colour of a sloe. It consists of a hard albuminous seed, with a rather fibrous exterior, and a very thin covering of a firm pulp or flesh.
This species is very abundant in the neighbourhood of Pará, and even in the city itself. It grows in swamps flooded by the high tides,—never on dry land. Its straight cylindrical stem is sometimes used for poles and rafters; but the tree is generally considered too valuable to be cut down for such purposes. A very favourite drink is made from the ripe fruit, and daily vended in the streets of Pará. Indian and negro girls may be constantly seen walking about with small earthen pots on their heads, uttering at intervals a shrill cry of Assaí——í. If you call one of these dusky maidens, she will set down her pot, and you will see it filled with a thick creamy liquid, of a fine plum colour. A pennyworth of this will fill a tumbler, and you may then add a little sugar to your taste, and will find a peculiar nut-flavoured liquid, which you may not perhaps think a great deal of at first; but, if you repeat your experience a few times, you will inevitably become so fond of it as to consider “Assaí” one of the greatest luxuries the place produces. It is generally taken with farinha, the substitute for bread prepared from the mandiocca root, and with or without sugar, according to the taste of the consumer.
During our walks in the suburbs of Pará we had frequently opportunities of seeing the preparation of this favourite beverage. Two or three large bunches of fruit are brought in from the forest. The women of the house seize upon them, shake and strip them into a large earthen vessel, and pour on them warm water, not too hot to bear the hand in. The water soon becomes tinged with purple, and in about an hour the outer pulp has become soft enough to rub off. The water is now most of it poured away, a little cold added, and a damsel, with no sleeves to turn up, plunges both hands into the vessel, and rubs and kneads with great perseverance, adding fresh water as it is required, till the whole of the purple covering has been rubbed off and the greenish stones left bare. The liquid is now poured through a wicker sieve into another vessel, and is then ready for use. The smiling hostess will then fill a calabash, and give you another with farinha to mix to your taste; and nothing will delight her more than your emptying your rustic basin and asking her to refill it.
The inhabitants of Pará are excessively attached to this beverage, and many never pass a day of their lives without it. They are particularly favoured too, in being able to get it at all seasons, for though in most places the trees only bear for a few months once in the year, yet in the neighbourhood of Pará there is so much variety of soil and aspect, that within a day or two’s journey, there is always some ripe Assaí to supply the market. Boys climb up the trees to get it, with a cord round the ankles (as shown on the Plate), and with its own leaves make a neatly interlaced basket to carry it home. From the great island of Marajó, its igaripés[[1]] and marshes, from the rivers Guamá and Mojú, from the thousand islands in the river, and from the vast palm swamps in the depths of the forest, baskets of the fruit are brought every morning to the city, where half the population look to the Assaí to supply a daily meal, and hundreds are said to make it, with farinha, almost their main subsistence.