612 A JOURNEY IN BRAZIL. 



like our Mississippi, were made the boundary between a 

 succession of independent provinces on either side of it ; 

 suppose that on the southern banks of the Amazons the 

 province of Teffe should extend from the borders of Peru 

 to the banks of the Madeira, the province of Santarem from 

 the Madeira to the Xingu, and that of Para, be reduced 

 to the country east of the Xingu, ^eluding the Island of 

 Marajo ; each of these separate provinces would then be 

 at once bounded and traversed by great streams, securing 

 the double activity of competition and the stimulus of in- 

 ternal conveniences. In like manner should the lands on 

 the northern banks of the Amazons form several indepen- 

 dent provinces ; that of Monte Alegre, for instance, ex- 

 tending from the Rio Trombetas to the sea ; that of Ma- 

 naos, from the Rio Trombetas to the Rio Negro ; and per- 

 haps that of the Hyapura, enclosing the present wilder- 

 ness between the Rio Negro and the Solimoens. It will, no 

 doubt, be objected that such a change would involve an 

 administrative staff quite disproportionate to the present 

 population ; but the government of such provinces, even 

 with the few inhabitants they might number, if organized 

 upon the plan of the territorial governments of our infant 

 States, would only stimulate local energies, and develop 

 local resources, without interfering in the least with the 

 central government. Moreover, any one familiar with the 

 working of the present system in the valley of the Amazons 

 must be aware that all the cities started during the past 

 century along the great river and its tributaries, far from 

 progressing, are going to ruin and decay ; and this is un- 

 questionably owing to the centralization at Para, of all the 

 real activity of the whole country. 



Without a much denser population, the best efforts of 



