PROVINCE OF PARA. 



459 



having acquired, by its rapidity and prodigious body, a preponderating power 

 over the first essays of its saline opponent till the ocean buries it in fathomless 

 depths. 



On the northern margin of the Amazons, below the Rio Negro, are dis- 

 charged, among other smaller streams, the Matary, which flows from some 

 handsome lakes ; the Urubu, otherwise Barururu ; the Aniba, denominated 

 sometimes Saraca ; the Trorabetas ; the Gurupatuba ; and the Annarapucu, 



The lateral lands of the Amazons from Borja, where the falls and currents 

 terminate, are flat and covered with woods. The current is always rapid, even 

 at its greatest diminution, and the waters when drawn are of an orange colour, 

 and at the floods are never muddy. Its bed is an archipelago, leaving, in the 

 space of above one thousand miles, few places where the navigator can dis- 

 tinctly see both sides of the continent. These islands increase and decrease 

 annually, not only in number but in size at the period of the floods, which, in 

 pgirts, divide one into two, and in others accumulate many into one by fill- 

 ing up the channels which separated them. Here portions of land are violently 

 torn away from the continent, there from the islands, with which either the 

 existing ones are augmented or new ones formed. Some are of great extent, 

 and usually covered with large trees. 



The vessels which are navigated to the high Amazons are formed of trunks of 

 trees of from forty to sixty feet in length; they are excavated into the form of ca- 

 noes, with the power of fire and water, and the greatest width is given that they 

 are susceptible of ; being preserved in this state with knees, to which are nailed 

 planks to make them higher, having a round prow, and a poop with a cabin, and a 

 rudder. They always retain the appellation of canoes, and have two masts, with 

 round sails, in order to proceed up before an easterly wind, and descend by the 

 impulse of the current. It is dangerous to navigate near the margins, where fre- 

 quently large trees fall into the river without any wind, the current having ex- 

 cavated the ground upon which they stood. 



The tide advances to the town of Obydos, more than five hundred miles 

 above Macappa, computing by the bed of the river. With a strong wind it 

 swells like the sea, but immediately the wind subsides it becomes tranquil by the 

 power of the current, which dissipates the advancing waves in a moment. 



Amongst other species of fish with which it is stored are the gorvjuba, the 

 large perahyba, doirado, peseada, and puraquez, which possesses the property of 

 benumbing the arm of the fisherman. A species of seal, denominated by the Indi- 

 ans manahy, and by the Portuguese peixe-boy, (ox fish, or sea calf,) in conse- 



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