The louro is a large tree, and of it there are three species, all of which are used principally for the beams of houses, for the timber of them rots quickly under ground or if it be exposed to the weather. The most esteemed timber for doors, window-shutters, floors of houses, &c. is the pao amarello or yellow wood. This is a large tree, and the name which it has obtained, continues to be sufficiently appropriate for the first six months after it has been cut down; but the yellow colour is after this period lost, and the wood becomes of a dirty brown. The canoes are almost exclusively made of the pao amarello. The pao santo or holy-wood is scarce, and is much sought after for certain purposes, as it is not liable to split, bend, or break; it is particularly required for the teeth of the sugar-rollers. The wood is beautifully veined with yellow and brown, but becomes after some time of a dusky brown colour. There is likewise a tree which is called cedro, but whether it is the cedar or not I cannot determine; the wood is hard, and is much esteemed for building.[129]
I cut down all the mangroves which grew along the borders of my piece of land, and likewise some other kinds of trees which grew just beyond the reach of the salt-water; among these was the aroeira, a small irregular tree, of which the wood is soft, and not even fit for timber; the only use to which the plant is put, is, that as the leaves have an aromatic smell, they are used in curing fish, to which they impart a slight portion of their odour; they are placed upon the girau or boucan, and the fish is laid upon them; fish is likewise packed in the leaves of the aroeira when about to be sent to a distance[130]. The tree only grows in situations near to the sea. Good fences might be made of it for the stakes take root; I used some of the trees for this purpose. The molungo and the pinham have likewise this last property; and as the former is supplied with strong sharp thorns, this advantage renders it preferable to the aroeira. The molungo grows spontaneously in moist situations, but the stakes take root even if the soil is dry, unless no rain falls for some time after it has been planted. Great numbers of the molungo grew near to my house, just below a spring of water which oozed from the side of the hill. The cow-itch was also found here in abundance; it is called by the peasants machonan.
The pinham requires less rain and grows quicker than the molungo, but it is without thorns, and the plant is not nearly so large. The seed of the pinham is used as an emetic by the peasants, and is violent in its operation, a very small quantity being sufficient even for an adult. The fruit incloses three seeds, and is about the size of the common hazel-nut. During the third attack of ague which I had whilst I was at Jaguaribe, I placed myself under the direction of an old mulatto woman, than whom I never saw any one more like a witch; and indeed poor old Antonia had the reputation of being somewhat of a mandingueira. However she gave me a dose of pinham, which, I think, consisted of four seeds, but they were picked out from a heap of others for their superior size. The dose acted most violently and effectually produced vomiting, and although excessive weakness followed the disorder was removed. I begged her to give me a quantity equal to what she had administered, that I might take it to Recife; this I shewed to a practitioner, who answered that he should have imagined that such a dose would have killed any one; but the old reputed sorceress knew full well, that a dangerous disease requires to be severely attacked[131]. After the ague left me, my nurse would not be satisfied until she applied the bark of the mutamba tree to my stomach; or rather the application was made just below the ribs, which she said was to prevent dureza; this she described as a hardness immediately under the lower rib of each side, which sometimes was produced by the ague, and which, if precautions were not taken in time ended in dropsy. I did not suffer her to continue the mutamba for many days, for I found that I was well, and wanted no more nostrums. The mutamba is a small tree, having a straight stem; it grows to the height of eighteen or twenty feet, and to the diameter of twelve or eighteen inches. The bark is easily torn off, and is extremely glutinous.
The Gameleira preta (black,) so called from the dark colour of its bark, is a large tree which grows in low marshy grounds; the stem contains a white juice, which is much sought for as a medicine in all eruptive complaints and in dropsy; it is likewise given inwardly. The juice is obtained by making an incision in the stem, and leaving a vessel into which the liquid may drop. There is another species of the same tree, which is distinguished by the name of white gameleira, and this is useless.
I was obliged in September to forsake my house for three days from a most unexpected cause. A whale was stranded upon one of the sand-banks at the mouth of the harbour; this being the third time that the inhabitants of Itamaraca had been favoured with visitors of this description. Jangadas were sent out to it, and when the tide came in, it floated, and was towed into the harbour, where the persons who were employed in the business landed it, as near as they could at high water mark, in front of and distant from my house about three hundred yards. Many of my neighbours were occupied in making oil; for any one who pleased was at liberty to take as much of the blubber as he could make use of; and one man fairly got into the whale, and ladled out the fat which was melted by the heat of the sun. When the people left the carcase, either at mid-day or at night, it was attacked by numerous flights of urubus, and was literally covered by them. The trees round about the spot were occupied by these enormous birds, which were waiting for an opportunity of satisfying their boundless appetites. The urubu is nearly twice the size of the common crow of England; it is quite black, excepting at the point of the beak, which is white, as I have been told, but this I did not observe. Wherever there happens to be the carcase of an animal, these birds assemble shortly after the death of the beast, and they seem to arrive in greater or less numbers according to the size of the carcase. The peasants tell many stories about the king of the urubus, who has a tuft of red feathers upon his head, but I never heard any coherent account of this sovereign.
The stench proceeding from the whale became in a few days so intolerable as to render a removal necessary, and therefore I applied to an old creole black, a carpenter, to allow me to reside in his cottage, which was neat and clean. To this he agreed; whilst he went to live with some of his friends.