CHAPTER: XI. 
EXCURSIONS IN THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF EGA. 
The River Teffé—Rambles through groves on the beach—Excursion to the house 
of a Passé chieftain—Character and customs of the Passé tribe—First excursion 
to the sand islands of the Solimoens—Habits of great river-turtle—Second 
excursion —Turtle-fishing in the inland pools —Third excursion—Hunting rambles 
with natives in the forest—Return to Ega. 
I wILL now proceed to give some account of the more interesting of 
my shorter excursions in the neighbourhood of Ega. The incidents 
of the longer voyages, which occupied each several months, will be 
narrated in a separate chapter. 
The settlement, as before described, is built on a small tract of cleared 
land at the lower or eastern end of the lake, six or seven miles from the 
main Amazons, with which the lake communicates by a narrow channel. 
On the opposite shore of the broad expanse stands a small village, called 
Nogueira, the houses of which are not visible from Ega, except on very 
clear days; the coast on the Nogueira side is high, and stretches away 
into the grey distance towards the south-west. The upper part of the 
river Teffé is not visited by the Ega people, on account of its extreme 
unhealthiness, and its barrenness in salsaparilla and other wares. To 
Europeans it would seem a most surprising thing that the people of a 
civilised settlement, 170 years old, should still be ignorant of the course 
of the river on whose banks their native place, for which they proudly 
claim the title of city, is situated. It would be very difficult for a 
a private individual to explore it, as the necessary number of Indian 
paddlers could not be obtained. I knew only one person who had 
ascended the Teffé to any considerable distance, and he was not able to 
give me a distinct account of the river. The only tribe known to live 
on its banks are the Catauishis, a people who perforate their lips all 
round, and wear rows of slender sticks in the holes: their territory lies 
between the Purtis and the Jurud, embracing both shores of the Teffé. 
A very considerable stream, the Bararua, enters the lake from the west, 
about thirty miles above Ega; the breadth of the lake is much con- 
tracted a little below the mouth of this tributary, but it again expands 
further south, and terminates abruptly where the Teffé proper, a narrow 
river with a strong current, forms its head water. 
The whole of the country for hundreds of miles is covered with 
picturesque but pathless forests, and there are only two roads along 
which excursions can be made by land from Ega. One is a narrow 
290 ; 
