TRAVELS OP THE MISSIONARIES. 



421 



thick foliage of which the nightingale and starling build their n-ests, furnish the 

 most agreeable promenades that can be imagined. The beauty of the prospeft is 

 augmented by a great multitude of canoes from the provinces of los Maynas, some 

 of which ascend the river with cargoes of salt fish for the consumption of Lamas, 

 while others are stationed at the banks to take in their lading of cacao, which is 

 produced here in great abundance, and to receive the wax fabricated by small bees. 

 These insedls pierce the bark of a species of tree, the hollow trunk of which presents 

 to them a convenient shelter for their hives*. The women who aid their fathers 

 and husbands in collecting these productions on shore, have no other garment than 

 a slight covering about the middle ; and, as their hair flows loosely in the wind, 

 resemble so many naiades or dryads. It is to be lamented, that in these delight- 

 ful plains travellers should be molested by such a multitude of mosquitoes and 

 gnats, that even the Indians are obliged to provide themselves with small awn- 

 ings, suspended from the pamacarisf, to defend themselves from their bites. 

 They are also prevented from bathing in the morning through the dread of 

 the Caymans, a species of crocodiles, which, after the small strait has been 

 passed, are very numerous. 



Father Sobreviela made good his passage, without accident, at half past two 

 in the afternoon ; and at six in the evening the canoes approached the left bank 

 opposite the confluence of the river Chipurana, in 6 degrees 33 minutes. The 

 Chipurana enters the Huallaga at the side of the Pampa del Sacramento : the 

 passage therefore from the Huallaga to the Ucayali may be accelerated by the 

 navigation of that river. On the 20th, at seven in the morning, our travellers 

 set out, and did not disembark until six in the evening. This day nothing 

 important occurred. On the 21st at day break they again proceeded, and at 

 noon reached the town of Yurimahuas, the first which occurs in. the province 

 of los Maynas. Here the company enjoyed the diverting spedlacle of the catch- 

 ing of a tiger. To guard against the ferocious attacks of this animal, and to 

 destroy him, the Indians have recourse to a snare, which consists of a narrow 

 passage formed by stakes of a competent thickness, and six feet in length, well 



* Both the trunks and branches of the above trees are hollow. When the Indians perceive a number 

 of these little bees swarming about one of them, they decorticate and split the tree at the middle, 

 icraping off the wax attached to the sides of the hive. In South America there is as great a variety of 

 bees as In Europe ; but all of them smaller, and without a sting. 



f This is a covering of palm leaves, in the form of an arch, placed in the middle of the canoe to keep 

 off the sun and the rain. 



fastened 



