ON THE AMAZON. 199 
he assured me that I had nothing to fear, unless I should possibly fall 
in with a band of runaway negroes, who were supposed to have fixed 
themselves near the cataracts of the Trombétas. 
He offered, also, to lend me a large igarité of his own, if I chose to 
undertake the voyage, which I at once decided to do, and requested him 
to procure me Indians, if possible, from the Rio Trombétas itself. I 
also immediately began to make the necessary preparations for the 
voyage, and laid in a large stock of farinha and piraruct. I had left 
behind me at Santarem everything which I thought I should be least 
likely to want, and, amongst others, my artificial horizon, for I did not 
then seriously think of ascending the Trombétas. I now much re- 
gretted its absence, though, as will be hereafter seen, I sometimes 
found excellent artificial horizons made to my hand; and in rivers 
varying from three-quarters of a mile to three miles wide, I could take 
my altitudes to the opposite margin without much risk of error, I 
had some difficulty, however, in estimating the breadth of any parti- 
cular part, for the Tapuyas, to whom I appealed for an opinion, have 
no mode of measuring distance, except by the time it requires to tra- 
verse it. Pointing to the east, they will say, starting with the sun, 
by the time he arrives at such a point you will reach the place of which 
you ask the distance, “em montaria bem puxada.” But the speed of 
a montaria depends much on the direction of the current and the 
willingness of the rowers, and I am not yet aw fait at this mode of 
calculating distances. Tt is, also, worthy of remark, that none of our 
Tapuyas, not even the pilot, knew more than two points of the compass, 
those of the sun’s rising and setting. To express the direction of — 
north and south, they say, the line that cuts the east and west in two; 
and they have no distinct idea of the difference between north and 
south, which is, perhaps, owing to their having the sun always 
nearly overhead at midday, or, at least, nearly an equal time to the 
north of the zenith as to the south. As to geography, their ideas of 
the position of other countries are not different from those of many 
Brazilians, who might be expected to be better informed. . For example, 
they suppose that English Guiana, the United States, and England 
are all continuous land: Spanish America is always called “ Spain,” 
and is not understood to be distinct from the Spain of Europe. The 
only astronomical instruments I had with me were an excellent pocket 
sextant, by Sims; a compass of about an inch in diameter, with an 
apparatus attached, intended to serve for a dial in the latitude of 
