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RESIDENCE AT TARAPOTO 83
A SKETCH OF SPRUCE'S BOTANICAL EXCURSIONS
WHILE RESIDING AT TARAPOTO
(Bv THE EDITOR)
[Among Spruce's MSS. are a number of loose
sheets (about sixty or seventy) in a stiff paper cover,
inscribed " Notes for Description of Tarapoto, in the
Andes of Maynas or Eastern Peru." These are
grouped under twenty - five headings, including
topography and ; geology
industries, customs, amusements, etc. ; the climate
and natural history of the surrounding ; country
the inhabitants, their
languages, government, etc. etc., evidently showing
that he intended writing a full account of
interesting and little known district. But
the
the
" Notes " themselves are very fragmentary, and
quite unfitted for any one but a person
with full
local knowledge to make any use of. Some are
mere headings of subjects to be treated, others are
very brief memoranda of facts or figures, while
wherever there is any consecutive description this
has been often utilised for some of the letters or
extracts already given.
Besides these loose memoranda, there is
small " Note-book "
referred to,
'
already
a list of all his more important botanical e>
a mere bald statement that such a <
generally
or mountain was visited on such a day,
month, with, very rarely,
a note added ol
special feature of the excursion. a suppl
to this, we have a few scattered
"notes" of some of the more interesting*,
but these, too, are quite fra^mrntury and