236 The Andes and the Amazon. 



for a chicken, or a dozen eggs, with an Indian or Negro. 

 The " Icamiaba" left Tabatinga with only three first-class 

 passengers, besides our own party. On no Amazon steam- 

 er did we meet with a lady passenger. Madame Godin, 

 who came down the river from the Andes, and Mrs. Agas- 

 siz, who ascended to Tabatinga, were among the few ladies 

 who have seen these upper waters. But how differently 

 they traveled ! one on a raft, the other on the beautiful 

 " Icamiaba." 



Between Tabatinga and Teffe, a distance of five hundred 

 miles, is perhaps the most uncivilized part of the main 

 river. Ascending, we find improvements multiply as we 

 near the mountains of Peru ; descending, we see the march 

 of civilization in the budding cities and expanding com- 

 merce culminating at Grand Para. The scenery from the 

 deck of an Amazonian steamer, if described, appears mo- 

 notonous. A vast volume of smooth, yellow water, fioating 

 trees and beds of aquatic grass, low, linear-shaped, wooded 

 islets, a dark, even forest — the shores of a boundless sea of 

 verdure, and a cloudless sky occasionally obscured by flocks 

 of parrots : these are the general features. No busy towns 

 are seen along the banks of the Middle Amazon ; only here 

 and there a palm hut or semi-Indian village half buried in 

 the wilderness. We agree with Darwin (speaking of the 

 Plata), that " a wide expanse of muddy water has neither 

 grandem- nor beauty." The real grandeur, however, of a 

 great river like this is derived from reflecting upon its pro- 

 spective commercial importance and its immense drainage. 

 A lover of nature, moreover, can never tire of gazing at the 

 picturesque grouping and variety of trees, with their man- 

 tles of creeping plants ; while a little imagination can see 

 in the alligators, ganoid fishes, sea-cows, and tall gray her- 

 ons, the ichthyosaurus, holoptychius, dinotherium, and bron- 

 tozoum of ancient days. Here and there the river is 



