The spadices grow from the bases of the lower leaves, and are erect when in flower, but hang down with the ripe fruit, which grows in a dense cluster at the end of the long stalk which is very spiny, as is also the elongate persistent spathe. The fruit is small, ovate, of a red colour and not eatable. This palm grows in the virgin forests of the Upper Rio Negro, and a nearly allied or perhaps identical species is common about the city of Pará. [Illustration: Pl. XL. W. Fitch lith. Ford & West Imp. ASTROCARYUM VULGARE. Ht. 50 Ft. ] PLATE XL. ASTROCARYUM VULGARE, _Martius_. Tucúm, _Lingoa Geral_. This is a lofty tree, the stem growing to a height of forty or fifty feet, with a diameter of six or eight inches. It is covered with regular broad bands or rings of thickly set black spines, with narrow spaces between them. The leaves are terminal, large and regularly pinnate. The leaflets are elongate, regularly spreading and drooping. The midrib and expanded sheaths of the petioles are densely clothed with long, flat, dusky spines, having a pale expanded margin. The edges of the leaflets are also armed with fine spines. The spadix is erect and simply branched, and is often hid among the foliage. The spathe is persistent, and the fruit is oval, of a greenish colour and not eatable. Every part of this palm bristles with sharp spines so as to render it difficult to handle any portion of it; yet it is of great importance to the Indians, and in places where it is not indigenous, is cultivated with care in their mandiocca fields and about their houses, along with the “Pupúnha” and other fruit trees. Yet they use neither the fruit, the stem, nor the full-grown leaves. It is only the unopened leaves which they make use of to manufacture cordage, superior in fineness, strength and durability to that procured from the _Mauritia flexuosa_. They strip off the epidermis and prepare it in the same manner as described in the account of that species, but while the “mirití” is principally used for hammocks, the “tucúm” serves for bow strings, fishing-nets and other purposes where fineness, combined with strength, is required. Some of the tribes on the Upper Amazon, however, make all their hammocks of “tucúm,” which renders it probable that the _Mauritia flexuosa_ does not grow there. The Brazilians of the Rio Negro and Upper Amazon make very beautiful hammocks of fine “tucúm” thread, knitted by hand into a compact web of so fine a texture as to occupy two persons three or four months in their completion. They then sell at about £3 each, and when ornamented with the feather-work borders, at double that sum. Most of them are sent as presents to Rio de Janeiro.