TRAVELS OP THE MISSIONARIES. 



423 



Huallaga, Pastasa, Sillay, Caguapana, and Maranon, amounts to 8895 souls, under 

 the spiritual guidance of a superior of the missions, and of nineteen reftors, who, 

 as very small pensions are allotted to them by the government, and as they do not 

 receive any tribute, have the advantage of the personal services of a certain number 

 of Indians, by whom they are abundantly supplied with fish and game, and who 

 cultivate for their use rice, sugar-canes, &c. 



The temporal affairs of these tribes are entrusted to a military governor who re- 

 sides at Omaguas, and whose place, in the more considerable towns, is supplied by 

 a lieutenant-governor, and, in the smaller ones, by a casique, or Indian prince, 

 the head of the tribe. Under these are several inferior magistrates ; and it is 

 pleasing to see a number of youths, aged from ten to twelve years, invested with 

 the magisterial dignity, who watch over the others of the same age ; corre£ling them 

 for their slight excesses and misdemeanours, and giving an immediate account of 

 the more serious ones to the resident chief magistrate. This policy, which the 

 Jesuits introduced among these barbarous tribes, is worthy of imitation, since it 

 tends to prevent those puerile negligences and imprudences, which might, in a ma- 

 turer age, lead to the commission of crimes ; at the same time that it inspires the 

 children, from their tender years upwards, with an emulation to attain, by their 

 good conduft, the sacred ministry of the judicature. 



The Maynas towns maintain a commercial intercourse with each other, and 

 with those of Quito and Lamas, in salt fish, cacao, the arroba of which (25 pounds) 

 is sold at the low price of two reals ; bees-wax, which is frequently found to be of 

 as good a quality as that of the north ; yuca, or casava meal, freed from its poi- 

 sonous juice ; and vegetable bougies*. They have also a few inconsiderable manu- 

 faftories, and distinguish themselves in the fabrication of very beautiful coverlids 

 and hats made of feathers, which they artfully dispose according to the diversity of 

 their tints, imitating with the utmost nicety the coloured drawings placed before 

 them. The customs of the inhabitants of Maynas are similar to those of the more 

 remote tribes of the Pampa del Sacramento, with the exception of certain acquire- 

 ments which are due to their shepherds. 



Father Sobreviela remained in the town of la Laguna until the 26th, to take the 

 necessary steps to hasten the departure of father Girbal, on his projected peregrina- 

 tion by the Ucayali ; a track which, having been closed for many years, had just 



* The naturalists here name pastas the fruit of a tree, which, on being lighted, contains witliin itself 

 both the wax and the wick. We have not as yet been able to ascertain whether it is a species of the wax- 

 tree which is met with in Louisiana and in China. 



been 



