222 THE UPPER AMAZONS. Chap. III. 



making arrows and knitting fishing-nets with tucum 

 twine ; others are busy patching up and caulking their 

 canoes, large and small: in fact, preparations are made 

 on all sides for the much longed-for "verao," or summer, 

 and the " migration/' as it is called, of fish and turtle ; 

 that is, their descent from the inaccessible pools in the 

 forest to the main river. Towards the middle of July the 

 sand-banks begin to reappear above the surface of the 

 waters, and with this change come flocks of sandpipers 

 and gulls, which latter make known the advent of the 

 fine season, as the cuckoo does of the European 

 spring ; uttering almost incessantly their plaintive 

 cries as they fly about over the shallow waters of 

 sandy shores. Most of the gaily-plumaged birds have 

 now finished moulting, and begin to be more active in 

 the forest. 



The fall continues to the middle of October, with the 

 interruption of a partial rise called "repiquet," of a 

 few inches in the midst of very dry weather in Septem- 

 ber, caused by the swollen contribution of some large 

 affluent higher up the river. The amount of subsi- 

 dence also varies considerably, but it is never so great 

 as to interrupt navigation by large vessels. The greater 

 it is the more abundant is the season. Every one is 

 prosperous when the waters are low ; the shallow bays 

 and pools being then crowded with the concentrated 

 population of fish and turtle. All the people, men, 

 women, and children, leave the villages and spend the few 

 weeks of glorious weather rambling over the vast undu- 

 lating expanses of sand in the middle of the Solimoens, 

 fishing, hunting, collecting eggs of turtle and plovers, 



