160 THE UPPER AMAZONS. Chap. III. 



trait in Indians that the habits of these people are 

 remarked on with surprise by the Brazilians. The first 

 possession which they strive to acquire on descending 

 the river into Brazil, which all the Peruvian Indians 

 look upon as a richer country than their own, is a wooden 

 trunk with lock and key ; in this they stow away care- 

 fully all their earnings converted into clothing, hatchets, 

 knives, harpoon heads, needles and thread, and so forth. 

 Their wages are only fourpence or sixpence a day, 

 which are often paid in goods charged a hundred per 

 cent, above Para prices, so that it takes them a long 

 time to fill their chest. 



It would be difficult to find a better-behaved set of 

 men in a voyage than these poor Indians. During our 

 thirty-five days' journey they lived and worked toge- 

 ther in the most perfect good fellowship. I never heard 

 an angry word pass amongst them. Senhor Estulano 

 let them navigate the vessel in their own way, exerting 

 his authority only now and then when they were in- 

 clined to be lazy. Vicente regulated the working hours. 

 These depended on the darkness of the nights. In the 

 first and second quarters of the moon they kept it up 

 with espia, or oars, until towards midnight ; in the third 

 and fourth quarters they were allowed to go to sleep 

 soon after sunset, and aroused at three or four o'clock 

 in the morning to resume their work. On cool, rainy 

 days we all bore a hand at the espia, trotting with bare 

 feet on the sloppy deck in Indian file to the tune of 

 some wild boatman's chorus. We had a favourable 

 wind for two days only out of the thirty-five, by which 

 we made about forty miles ; the rest of our long journey 



