THE NATURALIST ON THE RIVER AMAZONS 



gauze chemises and showy calico print petti- 

 coats, went in procession to church, fiist 

 going the round of the town to take up the 

 different " mordomos," or stewards, whose 

 office is to assist the Juizof the festa. These 

 stewards carried each a long white reed, 

 decorated with colored ribbons ; several chil- 

 dren also accompanied, grotesquely decked 

 with finery. Three old squaws went in 

 front, holding the " saire," a large semicir- 

 cular frame, clothed with cotton and studded 

 with ornaments, bits^of looking-glass, and so 

 forth. This they danced up and down, sing- 

 ing all the time a monotonous whining hymn 

 io tlie Tupi language, and at frequent inter- 

 vals turning round to face the followers, who 

 then all stopped for a few moments. I was 

 told that this saire was a device adopted by 

 the Jesuits to attract the savages to church, 

 for these everywhere followed the mirrors, 

 in which they saw as it were magically re- 

 llected their own persons. In the evening 

 good-humored revelry prevailed on all sides. 

 The negroes, who had a saint of their own 

 color St. Benedito had their holiday apart 

 from (he rest, and spent the whole night sing- 

 ing and dancing, to the music of a long drum 

 (i>;amba) and the caracasha. The drum was 

 ti hollow log, having one end covered with 

 . skin, and was played by the performer sitting 

 astride upon it and drumming with his 

 knuckles. The caracasha is a notched bam- 

 boo tube, which produces a harsh rattling 

 noise by passing a hard stick over the 

 notches. Nothing could exceed in dreary 

 monotony this music and the singing and 

 dancing, which were kept up with unflag- 

 ging vigor all night long. The Indians did 

 not get up a dance ; for the whites and inam- 

 elucos had monopolized all the pretty 

 colored girls for their own ball, and the older 

 squaws pieferrt'd looking on to taking a part 

 themselves. Some of their husbands joined 

 the negroes, and got drunk very quickly. It 

 was amusing to notice how voluble the usu- 

 ally taciturn red-skins became under the in- 

 fluence of liquor. The negroes and Indians 

 excused their own inteirperance by saying 

 the whites were getting drunk at the other 

 end of the town, which was quite true. 



We left Serpa on the 29th of December, in 

 company of an old planter named Senhor 

 JoaO (John) Trinidade ; at whose sitio, situ- 

 ated opposite the mouth of the Madeira, 

 Penna intended to spend a few days. Our 

 course on the 29th and 30th lay through nar- 

 row channels between islands. On the 31st 

 we passed the last of these, and then beheld 

 to the south a sea-like expanse of water, 

 vwhere the Madeira, the greatest tributary of 

 'the Am: zons, after 2000 miles of course, 

 blends its waters with those of the king of 

 rivers. I was hardly prepared for a junction 

 of waters on so vast a scale as this, now 

 nearly 900 miles from the sea. While travel-, 

 ling week after week along the somewhat 

 monotonous stream, often hemmed in be- 

 tween islands, and becoming thoroughly 

 :familiar with it, my sense of the magnitude 

 '-of this vast water system had beeomo 



ally (leadened ; but this noble bight renewed 

 the first feelings of wonder. One is inclined, 

 in such places as these, to think the Paraenses 

 do not exaggerate much when they call the 

 Amazons the Mediterranean of South Ameri* 

 ca. Beyond the mouth of the Madeira, the 

 Amazons sweeps down in a majestic reach, 

 to all appearance not a whit less in breadth 

 before, than after, this enormous addition to 

 its waters. The Madeira does not ebb and 

 flow simultaneously with the Amazons ; i( 

 rises and sinks about two mouths earlier, so 

 that it was now fuller than the main river. 

 Its current therefore poured forth freely from 

 its mouth, carrying with it a long line of 

 floating trees and patches of grass, which 

 had been torn from its crumbly banks in the 

 lower part of its course. The current, how- 

 ever, did not reach the middla of the main 

 stream, but swept along nearer to the south- 

 ern shore. 



A few items of information which I gleaned 

 relative to this river may find a place here. 

 The Madeira is navigable for about 480 miles 

 from its mouth ; a series of cataracts and 

 rapids then commences, which extends, with 

 some intervals of quiet water, about 160 

 miles, beyond which is another long stretch 

 of navigable stream. Canoes sometimes de- 

 scend from Villa Bella, in the interior prov- 

 ince of Matto Grosso, but not so frequently 

 as f c rmerly, and I could Lear of very few 

 persons who had attempted of late years to 

 ascend the river to that point. It was ex- 

 plored by the Portuguese in the early part of 

 the eighteenth century ; the chief and now the 

 only town on is banks, Borba, 150 inilea 

 from its mouth, being founded in 1756. Up 

 to the year 1853, the lower part of the river, 

 as far as about 100 miles beyond Borba, was 

 regularly visited by traders from Villa Nova, 

 Serpa, and Barra, to collect sarsaparilla, 

 copaiba balsam, turtle oil, and to trade with 

 the Indians, with whom their relations were 

 generally on a friendly footing. In that year 

 many india-rubber collectors resorted to this 

 region, stimulated by the high price (2*. 6d. 

 per pound) which the article was at that time 

 fetching at Para ;,and then the Araras, a fierce 

 and intractable tribe of Indians, began to be 

 troublesome. They attacked several canoes 

 and massacred every one on board, the Indian 

 crews as well as the white traders. Theii 

 plan was to lurk in ambush near the sandy 

 beaches, where canoes stop for the night, ancj 

 then fall upon the people while asleep. 

 Sometimes they came under pretence of 

 wishing to trade, and then as soon as they 

 could get the trader at a disadvantage shot 

 him and his crew from behind trees. Their 

 arms were clubs, bows, and Taquara arrows, 

 the latter a formidable weapon tipped with a 

 piece of flinty bamboo shaped like a spear- 

 head ; they could propel it with such force as 

 to pierce a man completely through the body. 

 The whites of Borba made reprisals, indue- 

 ing the warlike Mundurucus, who had an old 

 feud with the Arams, to assist them. This 

 slate of things lasted two or three years, and 

 ^a-de a journey up the Madeira a risky un- 



