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426 NOTES OF A BOTANIST CHAP.
Xiopo Snuff and the Mode of using it
II. PIPTADENIA NIOPO, Humboldt
620:
Synonyms Acacia"? Ar ejusdem
iofo, Humb., Re/. Hist. ii.
p.
Nov. Gen. Amer. vi. p. 282; DC. Prodr. ii. p. 471.
Inga Niopo, Willd.
Description. Tree, 50 feet by 2 feet, with muricated bark,
otherwise unarmed. Leaves bipinnate ; pinnae twenty-four pairs :
pinnules very numerous, minute, linear, mucronato-apiculate,
ciliated, sparsely sub -pubescent. An oblong gland on petiole
above base ; another between terminal pinnae. Racemes axillary
and terminal ; pedicels twin, each bearing a small globose head
of white flowers. Corolla slightly emersed from 5-angled calyx.
Stamens 10; anthers tipped with a gland. Pod linear, sub-compressed,
apiculate, 7-i2-seeded, sub-constricted between seeds.
Seeds flattish, green.
Habitat. In the drier
tributaries, both northern
forests of the Amazon, and along its
and southern on the Rio ; Negro,
also at the cataracts of the Orinoco both
throughout its course ;
;
wild and planted near villages.
fl. (Santarem, Amazonum, Spruce,
Exsicc. No. 828, etiam fl. Janauarf, Negro, No.
names : Parica in Brazil ; Niopo in Venezuela.
1786.) Native
We owe our first knowledge of Niopo snuff, and
of the tree producing it, to Humboldt and Bonpland,
whose brief account of
Kunth : "Ex seminibus
it is
tritis
thus
calci
condensed by
vivae adrnixtis
fit tabacum nobile quo Incli
utuntur
Otomacos et Guajibos
"
(Synopsis, iv.
p. 20).
In the modern
niopo, as I saw it prepared by the Guahibos themselves,
there is no admixture of quicklime, and that
is the sole difference. My specimens of the leaves,
flowers, and fruit agree so well with Kunth's de-
scription of Acacia Niopo
being the same species ; especially
that I cannot doubt their
as I have traced
the tree all the way from the Amazon to the Orinoco,
and found
a different
it everywhere identical, it although bears
name on the two rivers, as is commonly
the case where the same plant or animal occurs on