162 THE UPPER AMAZONS. Chap. III. 



hours at great speed, leaving the poor fellow to 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 

 companion was alluded to. He overtook us at night, 

 having worked his way with frightful labour 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 " 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, " Timaa 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 mentioned amongst his 

 tribe. The Tupi language, at least as taught by the old 

 Jesuits, has a word — Tivpana — signifying God. Vicente 

 sometimes used this word, but he showed by his ex- 

 pressions that he did not attach the idea of a Creator to 

 it. He seemed to think it meant some deity or visible 

 image which the whites worshipped in the churches he 

 had seen in the villages. None of the Indian tribes on 

 the Upper Amazons have an idea of a Supreme Being, 

 and consequently have no word to express it in their 

 own languages. Vicente thought the river on which we 



