FARABEE— THE SOUTH AMERICAN INDIAN. 287 



west all lead to the savannah plateau west of these highlands. This 

 became a meeting place for the migrations from all these directions 

 and also a place of dispersion. The routes of forward or backward 

 migration of three great stocks may be traced to this center, by tribes 

 scattered along the way. Representatives of one stock apparently 

 descended the La Plata River to the sea and passed along the coast 

 three thousand miles into the Amazon valley ; another followed 

 down the southeastern branches of the Amazon, down the main 

 river and around the coast to the West Indies; while a third occu- 

 pied the higher branches of the Amazon and crossed the watershed 

 to the north coast. 



The Amazon Valley, an area nearly as large as the United 

 States, was occupied by hundreds of tribes belonging to several 

 diflferent linguistic stocks and all in very much the same stage of 

 cultural development. The whole area is well within the tropics 

 and shut off from the high cultures of the west by impassable moun- 

 tains. It is a humid tropical forest jungle with a most monotonous 

 debilitating climate. Nature here is overpowering, because she 

 makes life so easy there is no necessity for eft'ort. There is no 

 struggle of intelligence against the forces of nature, because she 

 provides the necessities of life ready made. The bounties of nature 

 gratify the enfeebled ambition without labor. The daily needs have 

 daily satisfactions. The climate is so mild that little or no clothing 

 is required nor any hahitations except the simplest shelters which 

 may be built in a few hours when needed. There is no necessity 

 for exercise of forethought, invention, or ingenuity. There is 

 leisure but no energy. The law of social gravitation does not 

 operate because there is no necessity for cooperation. The people 

 live in small isolated groups because they require space for hunting 

 and fashing. Hence there can be no central government. The 

 sluggish rivers offered easy transportation. As there were no 

 natural boundaries to confine the people and no central authority 

 the diff'erent groups moved about at will coming into contact with 

 other groups of different stocks and mingling cultures. There was 

 no commerce because there was no variety of natural products in 

 any one area not common to every other. There is little relief of 

 land, change of climate, or varietv of soil. The culture is as uni- 



