[24] Dec. II, Bk. IV. Eden’s translation. [↑]
[25] Op. cit., pp. 50, 51. [↑]
[26] With reason does the pious missionary call the moriche palm—Mauritia flexuosa—”nuevo arbol de la vida, y milagro del Supremo Autor de la naturaleza”—a new tree of life, and a miracle of the Author of Nature—for this tree alone furnishes the Indian with victum et amictum—food and raiment.—Historia Natural Civil y Geografica de las naciones situadas en las Riberas del Rio Orinoco, Vol. I, Cap. IX, Barcelona, 1882. Compare the following lines of Thomson’s Seasons:—
“Wide o’er his isles, the branching Oronoque
Rolls a brown deluge, and the native drives
To dwell aloft on life-sufficing trees,
At once his home, his robe, his food, his arms.”