Chap. VI. JABURU CHANNEL. 223 



appearance ; the banks were muddy, and in low marshy 

 places groups of Caladiums fringed the edge of the 

 water. About midday we passed, on the western side, 

 the mouth of the Aturiazal, through which, on account of 

 its swifter cuiTent, vessels pass in descending from the 

 Amazons to Para. Shortly afterwards we entered the 

 narrow channel of the Jaburu, which lies twenty miles 

 above the mouth of the Breves. Here commences the 

 peculiar scenery of this remarkable region. We found 

 ourselves in a narrow and nearly straight canal, not more 

 than eighty to a hundred yards in width, and hemmed 

 in by two walls of forest, which rose quite peipendi- 

 cularly from the water to a height of seventy or eighty 

 feet. The water was of great and uniform depth, even 

 close to the banks. We seemed to be in a deep gorge, 

 and the strange impression the place produced was 

 augmented by the dull echoes produced by the voices 

 of our Indians and the splash of their paddles. The 

 forest was excessively varied. Some of the trees, the 

 dome-topped giants of the Leguminous and Bombaceous 

 orders, reared their heads far above the averag^e heiofht 

 of the green walls. The fan-leaved Miriti palm Avas 

 scattered in some numbers amidst the rest, a feY\^ 

 sohtary specimens shooting up their smooth columns 

 above the other trees. The gi'aceful Assai palm grew 

 in little groups, forming feathery pictures set in the 

 rounder foliage of the mass. The Ubussu, lower in 

 height, showed only its shuttlecock-shaped crowns of 

 huge undivided fronds, which, being of a vivid pale green, 

 contrasted forcibly against the sombre hues of the sur- 

 rounding foliage. The Ubussu grew here in great 



