Ticotico is of the size of a hedge-sparrow, having its colour almost upon the sides, with the belly yellow, and a white semicircle above the eyes.
Tacoara is larger than a blackbird, of a greenish colour, with the tail very long, the upper part of the head a gold colour, having a large black spot round the eyes.
PHYTOLOGY.
Perhaps no country in the world presents such an infinite variety of vegetation as the Brazil, or so spacious a field for the labours of the botanist. It abounds in a diversity of excellent timber, dye-woods, and medicinal plants. Nature, here so spontaneous, has not, amongst its innumerable indigenous species, any plants and trees of the European world. The colonists have naturalized a great number, but they do not prosper so well as in their native soil. Those of Africa and Asia sustain no injury when planted in the same latitude. The olive-tree grows little, soon droops, and does not fructify in the torrid zone. The chestnut-tree is only known in the southern provinces, where peaches grow in perfection; also the apple, plum, and cherry trees. The pomegranite and quince also prosper in the torrid zone. The vine and fig grow generally, but more especially out of the tropic. Oranges, of which there are various kinds, grow universally. Grain does not grow in all the provinces, with the exception of rice and Indian corn. Water-melons are every where excellent; the melon is good only in a few places. The cabbage and lettuce are cultivated, together with other indigenous hortulans unknown in Europe. The pea, bean, and turnip are little cultivated; with these were also naturalized rosemary, rue, wormwood, lavender, parsley, coriander, aniseed, mint, the pink, and jasmine. The rose-tree has a great enemy in the ant: its flower is not handsome.
Amongst other trees of excellent wood for building, carpenter and joiner’s work, are the ajetahypeta, buranhe, cedar, conduru, coraçao de negro, (negro’s heart,) gonçalo alves, jacaranda, jacarandatan, jacarando-mulato, jequitiba, jetahy, loiro, massaranduba, mocetahyba, mocuhyba, which is high, having a small tuft, similar to a parasol, and affords a small walnut, somewhat like an olive, with a thin and smooth rind, inclosing an oval kernel, from which is extracted an oil that is applied to various seus, brahuna, or maria preto, olandim, bow wood, oil wood, violet wood, peguim, putumuju, oyty, oytycica, itapicuru, sapucaya, sebastiao d’arruda, male and female, sucupira, sucupirassu, vinhatica, sassafras, and many more.
Alecrim Brazilico (Brazilian Rosemary) is a shrub, only similar to that of its name in the colour of its flower, bark, and wood; the leaf resembles that of mint, but is small, with the smell of savory. There is another sort of rosemary, which differs only from the latter in its flower, which is white and formed like that of savory. Both grow best in a dry and sandy soil. Algodeira, or Cotton-Tree, is a shrub which begins to ramify immediately on appearing, its leaves resembling the vine leaf. It has five large yellow petals, encircling each other; a great number of capillaments united in one column, in the centre of which a pistil arises to a greater height, of whose germ a capsule is formed more than two inches in length, triangular, and enclosing in three lodgements a great number of seed, resembling that of the pear, contiguous and in two orders, and unfolding in a white and long cotton wool, supplying the most extensive branch of commerce in the Brazil.
The Ambuzeiro, or Ambuzo Tree, is of small size, and grows in sterile lands, not requiring any culture. It begins to have branches on issuing from the ground, and they are exceedingly intertwined with each other; the leaves are small, elliptical, and varnished on both sides; the flower is in small bunches, like the olive-tree; the fruit is similar in appearance to the sloe, between a green and white colour, having a thick skin, disagreeable to the taste, with a large round stone, never separating from the pulp, which resolves itself into a thick fluid, generally pleasant when ripe. It is much esteemed in the certams, particularly by the quadrupeds. The people of the country make of its fluid and curdled milk, well mixed together, and sweetened with sugar or honey, a beverage, which they call ambuzada, and say that it might do for a royal repast. This tree produces at the root one large potatoe, and sometimes more, and also small ones of a spongy and transparent substance, which turn into cold water on being compressed, and is a great resource to caravans and travellers passing plains devoid of water.
Andiroba is a plant, very similar to that of a cucumber, affording a round fruit, without smell, the size of a large apple, with eleven or twelve seeds, round and flat, disposed in three cavities or cells, from which is extracted a clear medicinal oil, being also good for lights.
Angelim is a tree of medium height, having many branches, the leaf small, the flower, with five petals in an ear, between a violet and rose-colour, having a pistil and nine capillaments; the fruit is a two-valved capsule of an ash-colour, affording an oval almond, covered with a thick membrane, and which is used in pharmacy.
Araca Mirim is a tree of considerable growth, with a small leaf; the bark is as smooth on the epidermis as the inner side.