718 



THE NATURALIST ON THE RIVER AMAZONS. 



the Indians employed themselves in 

 sewing. Vicente was a good hand at cut- 

 ting out shirts and trousers, and acted as 

 master tailor to the whole party, each of , 

 whom had a thick steel thimble and a stock 

 of needles and thread of his own. Vicente 

 made for me a set of blue-check cotton shirts 

 Curing the passage. 



The goodness of these Indians, like that of 

 most others among whom I lived, consisted 

 perhaps more in the absence of active bad 

 qualities than in the possession of good 

 , ones ; in other words, it was negative rather 

 'than positive. Their phlegmatic, apathetic 

 - ennperament, coldness of desire and deadness 

 .tf feeling, want of curiosity and slowness of 

 intellect, make the Amazonian Indians very 

 uninteresting companions anywhere. Their 

 .magination is of a dull, gloomy quality, and 

 they seemed never to be stirred by the emo- 

 tions love, pity, admiration, fear, wonder, 

 joy, enthusiasm. These are characteristics 

 of the whole race. The good fellowship of 

 our Cucamas seemed to arise, not from warm 

 sympathy, but simply from the absence of 

 eager selfishness in small matters. On the 

 morning when the favorable wind sprang 

 up, one of the crew, a lad of about seventeen 

 years of age was absent ashore at the time 

 of starting, having gone aione in one of the 

 montarias to gather wild fruit. Tfce sails 

 i were spread, and we travelled for several 

 (hours at great speed, leaving the poor fellow 

 [ M paddle after us against the strong current. 

 'Vicente, who might have waited a few 

 minutes at starting, and the others, only 

 laughed when the hardship of their compan- 

 ion was alluded to. He overtook us at night, 

 having worked his way with frightful labor 

 the whole day without a morsel of food. He 

 grinned when he came on board, and not a 

 dozen words were said on either side. 



Their want of curiosity is extreme. One 

 day we had an unusually sharp thunder 

 shower. The crew were lying about the 

 deck, and after each explosion all set up a 

 loud laugh ; the wag of the party exclaiming, 

 4 There's my old uncle hunting again !" an 

 expression showing the utter emptiness of 

 mind of the spokesman. I asked Vicente 

 what he thought was the cause of lightning 

 and thunder. He said, " Tunaa" ichoqua," 

 I don't know. He had never given the 

 subject a moment's thought ! It was the 

 same with other things. I asked him who 

 made the sun, the stars, the trees ? He didn't 

 know, and had never heard the subject men- 

 tioned among his tribe. TheTupi language, 

 at least as taught by the old Jesuits, has a 

 word Tupaua signifying God. Vicente 

 sometimes used this word, but he showed by 

 i*2S expressions that he did not attach the 

 idea of a Creator to it. He seemed to think 

 ic meant some deity, or visible image, which 

 Jie whites worshipped in the chinches he 

 nad seen iri the villages. None of the Indian 

 iribes on the Upper Amazons have au idea 

 ci a Supreme Being, and consequently have 

 no word to express it in their own languages. 

 Vicente thought the river on which we were 



travelling encircled the whole earth, and that* 

 the land was an island like those seen in the^ 

 stream, but larger. Here a gteam of curi- 

 osity and imagination in the Indian mind is- 

 revealed : the necessity of a theory of the; 

 earth and water has been felt, and a theory 

 has been suggested. In all other matters not: 

 concerning the common wants of life the- 

 mind of Vicente was a blank, and such I 

 always found to be the case of the Indian in 

 his natural state. Would a community of 

 any race of men be otherwise, were they iso 

 lated for centuries in a wilderness like tha< 

 Amazonian Indians, associated in small num 

 bers, wholly occupied in procuring a mere; 

 subsistence, and without a written language, 

 or a leisured class to hand down acquired! 

 knowledge from generation to generation ? 



One day a smart squall gave us a good lift 

 onward ; it came with a cold, fine, driving 

 rain, which enveloped the desolate landscape 

 as with a mist : the forest swayed and roared 

 with the force of the gale, and flocks of birds, 

 were driven about in alarm over the tree- 

 tops. On another occasion a similar squall 

 came from an unfavorable quarter : it fell 

 upon us quite unawares when we had all our 

 sails out to dry, and blew us broadside fore- 

 most on the shore. The vessel was fairly 

 lifted on to the tall bushes which lined the 

 banks, but we sustained no injury beyond the : 

 entanglement of our rigging in the branches. 

 The days and nights usually passed in a dead 

 calm, or with light intermittent winds from 

 up river, and consequently full against us. 

 We landed twice a day to give ourselves and 

 the Indians a little rest ami change, and to 

 cook our two meals breakfast and dinner. 

 There was another passenger besides myself 

 a cautious middle-aged Portuguese, who 

 was going to settle at Ega, where he had a 

 brother long since established. He was ac- 

 commodated in the fore-cabin or arched cover- 

 ing over the hold I shareil the cabin-proper 

 with Senhorej* Estulano ana Manuel, the lat- 

 ter a young half-caste, son-in-law to the 

 owner of the vessel, under whose tuition [ 

 made good progress in learning the Tupi lan- 

 guage during the voyage. 



Our men took it in turns, two at a time, to 

 go out fishing, for which purpose we carried 

 a spare montaria. The master had brought 

 from Barra, as provisions, nothing but stale 

 salt pirarecu half-rotten fish, in large, thin, 

 rusty slabs farinha, coffee, and treacle. In 

 these voyages passengers are expected to pro-- 

 vide for' themselves, as no charge is made ex- 

 cept for freight of the heavy luggage or 

 cargo they take with them. The Portuguese 

 and myself had brought a few luxuries, such 

 as beans, sugar, biscuits, tea, and so forth ; 

 but we found ourselves almost obliged to 

 share them with our two companions and the 

 pilot, so that before the voyage was one third 

 finished the small stock of most of these arti- 

 cles was exhausted. In return we shared in 

 whatever the men brought. Sometimes they 

 were quite unsuccessful, for fish is extremely 

 difficult to procure in the season of high 

 jwater, on account of the lower lauds, lying, 



