130 TRAVELS ON THE RIO NEGRO. {August, 



solely from a desire for information. The idea had not entered ' 

 his mind that it was all inspired, so he made objections to any 

 parts which he thought incredible, or which appeared to him 

 to be capable of a simple explanation; and, as might have 

 been expected, he found of his own accord confirmation of the 

 doctrines of the religion in which he had been brought up 

 from childhood. 



On arriving at Barra, the expected canoe had not arrived, 

 and many weeks passed wearily away. The weather was fine, 

 but Barra is a very poor locality for making collections. 

 Insects were remarkably scarce and uninteresting, and I looked 

 forward anxiously to the time when I could start for some 

 distant and more promising district. The season was very 

 dry and hot : the thermometer, at two, every afternoon, 

 reaching 94 and 95 in the shade, and not often sinking below 

 75 during the night. The lowest which I observed, just 

 before sunrise, was 70, and the highest in the afternoon, 96. 

 There was scarcely any rain during the months of July and 

 August, so the grass about the city was completely burnt up. 

 The river was now falling rapidly, and the sandbanks in the 

 Amazon were, some of them, just rising above the water. 



One day, Senhor Henrique made a party to go fishing, with 

 a large drag-net, in the Solimoes. We started in the afternoon 

 in a good canoe, with a party of about a dozen, and eight or 

 ten Indian rowers ; and just before sunset, reached the mouth 

 of the Rio Negro, and turned up into the strong and turbid 

 waters of the Solimoes. There was a bright moon, and we 

 kept on talking and singing, while passing the narrow channels 

 and green islands on the north side of the river which looked 

 most picturesquely wild and solitary by the pale silvery moon- 

 light, and amid the solemn silence of the forest. By about 

 midnight, we reached a large sandbank, just rising out of the 

 water. Most of the party turned up their trousers, and waded 

 though the shallows, till they reached the bank, where they 

 began searching for small turtles' eggs, and those of gulls and 

 other water-birds, which lay them in little hollows scraped in 

 the sand. Gulls, divers, ducks, and sandpipers flew screaming 

 about as we landed, and the splash of fish in the shallow water 

 told us that there was abundance of sport for us. Senhor 

 Henrique soon ordered the Indians to get out the net, and 

 commenced dragging. Every time the net was drawn on 



