190 VOYAGE DOWN THE EIO NEGRO. 



of solid fat. With mafioca it constitutes the chief article 

 of subsistence of the inhabitants along the rivers where 

 found, besides being salted and dried in large quantities 

 for the Para market and cities along the coast ; the long 

 strips and broad, slab-like pieces being packed in bundles 

 for transportation. The Lower Rio Negro is most thinly 

 inhabited. We often went days Avithout meeting a canoe 

 upon the river ; and the country seemed wild and deso- 

 late in the extreme. Our progress was slow, being great- 

 ly retarded by the easterly trade-winds sweeping up from 

 the Amazons, while the rocks which now filled the stream 

 jirevented our drifting with the current at night. As some 

 one has truthfully observed, one must be an ardent lover 

 of Nature to travel through these wild and uninhabited 

 regions ; otherwise but little compensation will be received 

 for all the toils and privations incident to such a journey. 

 Apprehensive lest we should be too late for the Ama- 

 zonian steamer, which we learned, from canoes upward 

 bound, would sail from Manaos for Para on or about the 

 8th of the month, we induced our Indians to work through 

 the night of the 5th. The coming day the wind was strong 

 and against us, and our progress consequently slow and 

 laborious, notwithstanding we coasted close to the shore, 

 which rose here in high, abrupt cliffs. A small piece of 

 pirarucu-fish, which we divided among ourselves, with a 

 little dry mafioca, was the only food taken during the 

 day. Just before sunset we emerged from the islands 

 among which we had been confined so long, and entered 

 upon the open river, that spread out like a lake, ten miles 

 or more in breadth. Throughout the night our Indians 

 continued at their paddles, resting only a couple of hours 

 toward morning, when they again resumed their places, 

 toiling all day against a strong head-wind and heavy sea. 

 Several times we scaled the high bluff in search of food, 

 whenever a hut appeared at its top ; but not a single mor- 



