ADDENDUM. 



399 



ness of the evenings, which are certainly not equalled in any other part 

 I have visited." 



At Santarem, (p. 15*7) he says: "The constant exercise, pure air, 

 and good living, notwithstanding the intense heft, kept us in the most 

 perfect health, and I have never, altogether, enjoyed myself so much." 



Page 80. "In the districts we passed through, sugar, cotton, coffee, 

 and rice might be grown in any quantity, and of the finest quality. The 

 navigation is always safe and uninterrupted, and the whole county is so 

 intersected by Igarapes and rivers* that every estate has water carriage 

 for its productions. But the indolent disposition of the people, and the 

 scarcity of labor, will prevent the capabilities of this fine country from 

 being developed till European or North American colonies are formed. 

 There is no country in the world where people can produce for 

 themselves so many of the necessaries and luxuries of life ; Indian corn, 

 rice, mandioca, sugar, coffee, cutton, beef, poultry, and pork, with oranges, 

 bananas, and abundance of other fruits and vegetables, thrive with little 

 care. With these articles in abundance, a house of wood, calabashes, 

 cups and pottery of the country, they may live in plenty, without a 

 single exotic production. And then what advantages there are in a 

 country where there is no stoppage of agricultural productions during 

 winter, but where crops may be had, and poultry may be reared, all the 

 year round ; where the least possible amount of clothing is the most 

 comfortable, and where a hundred little necessaries of a cold region are 

 altogether superfluous. With regard to the climate, I have said enough 

 already; and I repeat, that a man can work as well here as in the hot sum- 

 mer months in England, and that if he will only work three hours in the 

 morning and three in the evening, he will produce more of the neces- 

 saries and comforts of life, than by 1 2 hours daily labor at home." 



(P. 334.) "It is a vulgar error, copied and reported from one book 

 to another, that, in the tropics, the luxuriance of the vegetation over- 

 powers the efforts of man. Just the reverse is the case ; nature and the 

 climate are nowhere so favorable to the laborer, and I fearlessly assert, 

 that here the ' primeval' forest can be converted into rich pasture and 

 meadow lands, into cultivated fields, gardens, and orchards, containing 

 every variety of produce, with half the labor, and what is of more impor- 

 tance, in less than half the time that would be required at home, even 

 though there we had clear instead of forest ground to commence upon." 



This is the testimony of a man who suffered great hardships in the 

 pursuit of science, amid the rapids and falls of the rivers Negro and 

 Uapes — who was beset with the chills and fever, incident to the great 

 labor and exposure necessary in passing those rapids in an open boat — ■ 



