Commerce of the Amazon. 277 



Nationality. No. Tonnage. 



United States 37 39,901^ 



Brazil 49 28,639 



England 52 13,276^ 



Portugal 24 7,871 



France , 18 5,344 



Prussia 4 889^ 



Nationality. No. Tonnage. 



Holland 3 538 



Denmark 2 525 



Holstein 3 498 



Norway 1 135 



Spain 1 90 



The vessels carrying the stars and stripes exported from 

 Para to the vahte of 3,235,073|950, or eight times the 

 amount carried by Brazilian craft, and .50,000 milreys more 

 than England. "While, therefore, the Imperial Company 

 has the monopoly of trade on the Amazon, our ships dis- 

 tribute one third of the products to the world. The United 

 States is the natural commercial partner with Brazil ; for 

 not only is IS^ew York the half-way house between Para and 

 Liverpool, but a chip thrown into the sea at the mouth of 

 the Amazon will float close by Cape Hatteras. The official 

 value of exports from Para in 1867 was 9,926,912$557, or 

 about five millions of dollars, an increase of one million 

 over 1866. 



The early expeditions into the Valley of the Amazon, in 

 search of the " Gilded King," are the most romantic epi- 

 sodes in the history of Spanish discovery. To the wild 

 wanderings of these worshipere of gold succeeded the 

 more earnest explorations of the Jesuits, those pioneers of 

 geographical knowledge. Pinzon discovered the mouth of 

 the river in 1500 ; but Orellana, who came down the Napo 

 in 1541, was the first to navigate its waters. Twenty years 

 later Aguirre descended from Cuzco ; in 1637, Texeira as- 

 cended to Quito by the Napo ; Cabrera descended from 

 Peru in 1639 ; Juan de Palacios by the Napo in 1725 ; La 

 Condamine from Jaen in 1744, and Madame Godin by the 

 Pastassa in 1769. The principal travelers who preceded 

 us in crossing the continent this century were Mawe (1828), 

 Poeppig (1831), Smyth (1834), Von Tschudi (1845), Cas- 



