Cnap. XIII. VOYAGE TO TUNANTINS. 365 
broke upon us, and then the engines were stopped by the command of 
Lieutenant Nunes, sometimes against the wish of the pilot. The nights 
were often so dark that we passengers on the poop deck could not 
discern the hardy fellow on the bridge ; but the steamer drove on at full 
speed, men being stationed on the look-out at the prow, to watch for 
floating logs, and one man placed to pass orders to the helmsman ; the 
keel scraped against a sandbank only once during the passage. 
The passengers were chiefly Peruvians, mostly thin, anxious Yankee- 
looking men, who were returning home to the cities of Moyobamba and 
Chachapoyas, on the Andes, after a trading trip to the Brazilian towns 
on the Atlantic sea-board, whither they had gone six months previously 
with cargoes of Panama hats to exchange for European wares. These 
hats are made of the young leaflets of a palm tree, by the Indians and 
half-caste people who inhabit the eastern parts of Peru. They form 
almost the only article of export from Peru by way of the Amazons, but 
the money value is very great compared with the bulk of the goods, as 
the hats are generally of very fine quality, and cost from twelve shillings 
to six pounds sterling each; some traders bring down two or three 
thousand pounds’ worth, folded into small compass in their trunks. The 
return cargoes consist of hardware, crockery, glass, and other bulky or 
heavy goods, but not of cloth, which, being of light weight, can be 
carried across the Andes from the ports on the Pacific to the eastern 
parts of Peru. All kinds of European cloth can be obtained at a much 
cheaper rate by this route than by the more direct way of the Amazons, 
the import duties of Peru being, as I was told, lower than those of 
Brazil, and the difference not being counterbalanced by increased 
expense of transit, on account of weight, over the passes of the Andes. 
There was a great lack of amusement on board. The table was very 
well served, professed cooks being employed in these Amazonian 
steamers, and fresh meat insured by keeping on deck a supply of live 
bullocks and fowls, which are purchased whenever there is an oppor- 
tunity on the road. The river scenery was similar to that already 
described as presented between the Rio Negro and Ega: long reaches 
of similar aspect, with two long, low lines of forest, varied sometimes 
with cliffs of red clay, appearing one after the other: an horizon of 
water and sky on some days limiting the view both up stream and down. 
We travelled, however, always near the bank, and for my part I was 
never weary of admiring the picturesque grouping and variety of trees, 
and the varied mantles of creeping plants which clothed the green wall 
of forest every step of the way. With the exception of a small village 
called Fonte Boa, retired from the main river, where we stopped to take 
in firewood, and which I shall have to speak of presently, we saw no 
human habitation the whole of the distance. The mornings were 
delightfully cool; coffee was served at sunrise, and a bountiful break- 
fast at ten o’clock ; after that hour the heat rapidly increased until it 
became almost unbearable ; how the engine-drivers and firemen stood 
it without exhaustion I cannot tell ; it diminished after four o’clock in 
the afternoon, about which time dinner-bell rung, and the evenings were 
always pleasant. 
A few miles below Tunantins, and to the west of the most westerly 
