The fruit guembè is the more remarkable for its being so little known,
even by many who have grown old in Paraguay; for the northern woods only
of that country are its native soil. It is about a span long, almost
cylindrical in shape, being thicker than a man's fist in the middle, but
smaller at both extremities, and resembles a pigeon stripped of its
feathers, sometimes weighing as much as two pounds. It is entirely
covered with a soft yellowish skin, marked with little knobs, and a dark
spot in the middle. Its liquid pulp has a very sweet taste, but is full
of tender thorns, perceivable by the palate only, not by the eye, on
which account it must not be slowly chewed, but quickly swallowed: for
if any one were leisurely to bruise the pulp with his teeth, his tongue
would be made to smart for a long time by the latent thorns, and would
be rendered less ready in speaking. The stalk, which occupies the
middle, has something of wood in it, and must be thrown away. You cannot
imagine how agreeable and wholesome this fruit is, and how it refreshes
a man fatigued with long walking and bathed in perspiration. This
ponderous fruit grows on a flexible shrub resembling a rope, which
entwines itself round high trees. How great must be the strength of the
_guembepi_, as the Guaranies call it, you may infer from this, that the
stoutest Indians, when they cut a high tree for the sake of getting
honey, sit for a long time with safety upon this shrub, which is
entwined about the boughs and trunk. From the above-mentioned guembepi
the Spaniards and Portugueze sometimes weave cables stronger than hempen
ones.