200 



THE UCAYALI. 



men had to get overboard and drag the canoe over the bottom for five 

 hundred yards. He also said that the attempt to ascend at this season 

 must result in failure ; that it can only be done after Easter, when the 

 current is not so rapid. The Aguaytia and Pishqui are also small 

 streams, where the Indians have to wade and drag the canoes. 



October 16. — Started at 6 a.m.; stopped at half-past five opposite 

 the mouth of the river Catalina. It seemed thirty yards wide, and had 

 a small island in front. 



The ascent of the river is very tedious ; we barely creep along against 

 the force of the current, and day after day "wearies by" in the most 

 monotonous routine. I frequently land, and with gun on shoulder, and 

 clad only in shirt and drawers, walk for miles along the beaches. My 

 greatest pleasure is to watch the boat struggling up against the tide. 

 This is always accompanied with emotions of pride, mingled with a 

 curious and scarcely definable feeling of surprise. It was almost start- 

 ling to see, at her mast head, the beautiful and well-beloved flag of my 

 country dancing merrily in the breeze on the waters of the strange river, 

 and waiving above the heads of the swarthy and grim figures below. I 

 felt a proud affection for it ; I had carried it where it had never been 

 before ; there was a bond between us ; we were alone in a strange land ; 

 and it and I were brothers in the wilderness. 



October 17. — Met ten canoes of Conibos — twenty-eight men, women, 

 and children — who had been on an excursion, with no particular object, 

 as far as the first stones in the Ucayali. This is about thirty-eight days 

 above Sarayacu, at a place called in Quichua "Rumi Callarina," or 

 commencement of the rocks ; river rising for the last two or three days ; 

 passed a village of Shipebos, called Cushmuruna ; hills in sight, bearing 

 south. 



October 18. — At 11 a. m. we entered the Cano of Sarayacu; at this 

 season this is not more than fifteen or eighteen feet wide, and nearly 

 covered with a tall grass something like broom-corn, or a small species 

 of cane. (This is the food for the vaca marina.) The cano has as 

 much as six feet depth in the middle for two miles, but it soon contracts 

 so as scarcely to allow room for my boat to pass, and becomes shallow 

 and obstructed with the branches of small trees which bend over it. It 

 also, about two miles from its mouth, changes its character of cano, 

 or arm of the main river, and becomes the little river of Sarayacu, which 

 retires and advances in accordance with the movements of its great 

 neighbor. 



"We could not get our boat nearer than within a quarter of a mile of 

 the town ; so we took small canoes from the bank, and carried up our 



