256 A JOURNEY IN BRAZIL. 
considered as dry land. It is true that in this oceanic 
river-system the tidal action has an annual instead of a 
daily ebb and flow, that its rise and fall obey a larger 
orb, and is ruled by the sun and not the moon ; but it 
is, nevertheless, subject to all the conditions of a sub- 
merged district, and must be treated as such. Indeed, 
these semiannual changes of level are far more powerful 
in their influence on the life of the inhabitants than any 
marine tides. People sail half the year above districts 
where for the other half they walk, though hardly dry 
shod, over the soaked ground ; their occupations, their 
dress, their habits are modified in accordance with the 
dry and wet seasons. And not only the ways of life, but 
the whole aspect of the country, the character of the 
landscape, are changed. The two picturesque cascades, 
at one of which we took our bath the other morning, 
and at this season such favorite resorts with the inhabi 
tants of Manaos, will disappear in a few months, when 
the river rises for some forty feet above its lowest level. 
Their bold rocks and shady nooks will have become river 
bottom. All that we hear or read of the extent of 
the Amazons and its tributaries fails to give an idea of 
its immensity as a whole. One must float for months 
upon its surface, in order to understand how fully water 
has the mastery over land along its borders. Its watery 
labyrinth is rather a fresh-water ocean, cut up and di- 
vided by land, than a network of rivers. Indeed, this 
whole valley is an aquatic, not a terrestrial basin ; and 
it is not strange, when looked upon from this point of 
view, that its forests should be less full of life, compara- 
tively, than its rivers. 
While we were discussing these points, talking of the 
