the plant,
the better is the tea which is taken from it considered to be.

To work with their hatchets went the peons, and in less than a
couple of hours they had gathered a mountain of branches, and piled
them up in the form of a haystack. Both of them then filled their
large ponchos with the coveted article of commerce in its raw state,
and they marched off with their respective loads. Having deposited
this first load within the precincts of the colony, the peons
returned for a second, and so on till they had cleared away the
whole mass of branches and of leaves cut and collected during that
day. When I returned to the colony I found the peons coming by two
and two, from every part of the valley, all laden in the same way.
There were twenty tatacuas, twenty barbacues, and twenty pies of the
yerba cut and ready for manufacture. Two days after that the whole
colony was in a blaze, tatacuas and barbacues were enveloped in
smoke; on the third day all was stowed away in the shed; and on the
fourth the peons again went out to procure more of the boughs and
leaves."--(_Letters on Paraguay_, vol. ii. p. 142-147).

Each peon or laborer, going into the woods for six months, can procure
eight arrobas, or 200 lbs. of yerba a day. This, at the rate of two
rials, or 1s. for each arroba, would make his wages per day 8s.; and
this for six months' work, at six days in the week, would produce to
the laborer a sum of L57 12s.

Wilcockes, in his "History of Buenos Ayres," published in 1807,
states:--"Though the herb is principally bought by the merchants of
Buenos Ayres, it is not to that place that it is carried, no more
being sent thither than is wanted for the consumption of its
inhabitants and those of the vicinity; but the greatest part is
dispatched to Santa Fe and Cordova, thence to be forwarded to Potosi
and Mendoza. The quantity exported to Peru is estimated at 100,000
arrobas, and to Chile 40,000. The remainder is consumed in Paraguay,
Tucuman, and the other provinces. It is conveyed in parcels of six or
seven arrobas, by waggons, from Santa Fe to Jugui, and thence by mules
to Potosi, La Paz, and into Peru proper. About four piastres per
arroba is the price in Paraguay, and at Potosi it fetches from eight
to nine, and more in proportion as it is carried further."

SUGAR.

Sugar is obtained from many grasses; and, indeed, is common in a large
number of