MOUTH OF THE MADEIRA. 



313 



On the afternoon of the 29th of October, we crossed the river from 

 the east to the west bank, being forced to do so, as the wind created a 

 sea, and we lay uncomfortably moored to a snag ; when half way over, 

 our little craft struggled and dipped in the water. Richards bailed out 

 manfully, while the men became frightened ; we kept her bow angling 

 the sea till she reached in safety the opposite shore, where the negroes, 

 hearts returned to their places, but their eyes stretched wide open, as 

 they looked back at the troubled stream, saying they never saw water 

 behave so furious before. 



During the 21st of October we lay all day by a sand island, unable to 

 proceed until evening. When the wind died away, we paddled on by 

 the light of the moon. As the negroes lifted their paddles out of the 

 water, we dipped the thermometer in the Madeira for the last time, 88° 

 Fahrenheit. Suddenly, the bow of our little canoe touched the deep 

 waters of the mighty Amazon. A beautiful, apple-shaped island, with m 

 deep green foliage, and sandy beach encircling it, lies in the mouth 

 of the great serpentine Madeira. The mouth opens by two channels. 

 We find seventy-eight feet depth, near the western side, which is six 

 hundred yards wide, with high banks, well wooded, but no marks or 

 traces of civilization. A long sand-spit hung out over the lower mouth, 

 like a great tongue, on which lay turtles and bird's eggs. The east side 

 of the mouth was about three-quarters of a mile wide. A few houses 

 stood on the back ground, where the country was more elevated towards 

 the southeast. 



Now that we are at the mouth of this magnificent stream, we find 

 no deeply loaded vessels enter it. The value of the present foreign trade 

 of South Peru and Bolivia may be worth ten millions of dollars per 

 annum. 



The distance from the foot of San Antonio falls to the mouth of the 

 Madeira, is five hundred miles by the rive*. A vessel drawing six feet 

 water may navigate this distance at any season of the year. A cargo from 

 the United States could reach the foot of the falls, on the Madeira, with- 

 in thirty days. By a common mule road, through the territory of 

 Brazil, the goods might be passed from the lower to the upper falls on 

 the Mamore, in less than seven days, a distance of about one hundred 

 and eighty miles ; thence by steamboat, on that river and the Chapare, 

 a distance of five hundred miles to Vinchuta, in four days. Ten days 

 more from the base of the Andes, over the road we travelled, would 

 make fifty-one days passage from Baltimore to Cochabamba, or fifty- 

 nine days to La Paz, the commercial emporium of Bolivia, where cargoes 



