Page:The naturalist on the River Amazons 1863 v2.djvu/402

 skin, the effect of a cutaneous disease very prevalent in this part of the country. The face of one old man was completly blackened, and looked as though it had been smeared with black lead, the blotches having coalesced to form one large patch. Others were simply mottled; the black spots were hard and rough, but not scaly, and were margined with rings of a colour paler than the natural hue of the skin. I had seen many Indians and a few half-castes at Tunantins, and afterwards saw others at Fonte Boa blotched in the same way. The disease would seem to be contagious, for I was told that a Portuguese trader became disfigured with it after cohabiting some years with an Indian woman. It is curious that, although prevalent in many places on the Solimoens, no resident of Ega exhibited signs of the disease: the early explorers of the country, on noticing spotted skins to be very frequent in certain localities, thought they were peculiar to a few tribes of Indians. The younger children in these houses on the Sapó were free from spots; but two or three of them, about ten years of age, showed signs of their commencement in rounded yellowish patches on the skin, and these appeared languid and sickly, although the blotched adults seemed not to be affected in their general health. A middle-aged half-caste at Fonte Boa told me he had cured himself of the disorder by strong doses of salsaparilla; the black patches had caused the hair of his beard and eyebrows to fall off, but it had grown again since his cure.

When my tall friend saw me, after dinner, collecting insects along the paths near the houses, he approached,