324 



DEPARTURE FROM SANTAREM. 



one hundred tons burden, of which there were five or six lying in port 

 whilst I was there. The average passage downwards is thirteen, and 

 upwards twenty-five days. 



There are several well-stocked shops in the town, but business was at 

 that time very dull. Every body was complaining of it. A schooner 

 had been lying there for several months, waiting for a cargo ; but the 

 smallness of the cocoa crop, and the great decrease in the fishing busi- 

 ness, and making of manteiga for this year, rendered it very difficult to 

 make up one. 



"We had a great deal of heavy rain during our stay at Santarem, 

 (generally at night,) with sharp lightning and strong squalls of wind 

 from the eastward. The river rose with great rapidity for the last three 

 or four days of my stay. The beach on which I was accustomed 

 to bathe, and which was one hundred yards wide when I arrived, was 

 entirely covered when I left. There were no symptoms of tide at that 

 season, though I am told it is very perceptible in the summer time. 

 "Water boiled at Santarem at 210.5, indicating a height of eight hun- 

 dred and forty-six feet above the level of the sea. 



I left Santarem at *7 p. m., March 28. The Delegado could only 

 muster me three tapuios and a pilot, and I shipped a volunteer. I 

 believe he could have given me as many as I desired, (eleven,) but that 

 he had many emp loyed in the building of his new house, and, moreover, 

 he had no conception that I would sail on the day that I appointed; 

 people in this country never do, I believe, by any chance. If they get 

 off on a journey within a week of the time appointed, they think they 

 are doing well ; and I have known several instances where they were a 

 month after the time. 



When the Delegado found that I would go with what men I had, he 

 begged me to wait till morning, saying that the military commandant, 

 who had charge of the Trabalh adores, had sent into the country for two, 

 and was expecting them every hour. But I too well knew that it was 

 idle to rely on expectations of this sort, and I sailed at once, thanking 

 him for his courtesy. 



I had several applications to ship for the voyage from Indians at 

 Santarem ; but I was very careful not to take any who were engaged 

 in the service of otters ; for I knew that custom, if not law, gave the 

 patron the service of the tapuio, provided this latter were in debt to the 

 former, which I believe the patron always takes good care shall be the 

 case. 



I paid these men — the pilot forty, and the crew thirty cents per day. 

 The Ticunas, who formed my crew from Tabatinga to Barra, I paid 



