Agkicultdee of Santaeem. 369 



iive kinds), three kinds of mandioca, tomato, pepper, gin- 

 ger, Brazil-nuts, tonKa-bean, sugar-cane, sweet potato, 

 squash, Lima-bean, rice, tobacco, indigo, and pita ; while in 

 the dense forest we find the following trees, many of them 

 unknown to commerce, but furnishing the richest cabinet 

 woods or timber : Itaiiba (often sixty feet high and four 

 feet through), cedar (specimens of which occur one hun- 

 dred feet high, and seven feet in diameter), jutahi (a very 

 hard, dark wood, used for sugar-mill rollers, etc.), sapucaya 

 (resembling hickory, the clear trunk of which is often fifty 

 feet high), loira (the pine of the country), moira-pushiiva 

 (similar to black walnut), cumarii, sapupira, macacauba 

 (very close grained), acariiiba (very durable), javana, rose- 

 wood, pracmiba (very hard), pao -mulatto, pao-preto, pao- 

 d'arco, and andiroba. With nature so generous, with a 

 healthy location, at the outlet of the rich Tapajos, and, 

 though 500 miles fi'om the sea, accessible to Atlantic ves- 

 sels of heavy tonnage, Santarem is sure of a brighter fut- 

 ure. 



From Santarem to Manaos, the capital of the upper prov- 

 ince of Amazonas, and the second city in magnitude on 

 the river, is 460 miles. Three villages of importance are 

 passed in this voyage : Obidos (seated beside a bluff on the 

 "narrows," where the river, contracting to a strait not a 

 mile wide, has a depth of forty fathoms and a current of 

 2.4 feet per second) exports considerable cacao and Brazil- 

 nuts. The large cacao plantations are on the opposite side 

 of the river. Obidos was once an important military post; 

 now there are only twenty guns ; these, however, can com- 

 mand the river. The population is set down at 2500 ; but 

 it is probably very much less. Next we anchor before a 

 bank of slippery yellow clay, on which is a level spot cov- 

 ered with grass, and a row of huts backed by a green for- 

 est — the whole labeled "Villa Bella da Imperatrice," or, 

 2A 



