12 



TRAVELS ON THE AMAZON. 



[June, 1848. 



flight airs and heavy dews of the tropics, which we have 

 been accustomed to consider so deadly. 



We will now add a few words on the food of the people. 

 Beef is almost the only meat used. The cattle are kept on 

 estates some days' journey across and up the river, whence 

 they are brought in canoes; they refuse food during the 

 voyage, and so lose most of their fat, and arrive in very poor 

 condition. They are killed in the morning for the day's 

 consumption, and are cut up with axes and cutlasses, with a 

 total disregard to appearance, the blood being allowed to run 

 all over the meat. About six every morning a number of 

 loaded carts may be seen going to the different butchers' 

 shops, the contents bearing such a resemblance to horse-flesh 

 going to a kennel of hounds, as to make a person of delicate 

 stomach rather uneasy when he sees nothing but beef on the 

 table at dinner-time. Fish is sometimes obtained, but it is 

 very dear, and pork is killed only on Sundays. Bread made 

 from United States flour, Irish and American butter, and other 

 foreign products, are in general use among the white population ; 

 but farinha, rice, salt-fish, and fruits are the principal food of 

 the Indians and Negroes. Farinha is a preparation from the 

 root of the mandiocca or cassava plant, of which tapioca is 

 also made; it looks something like coarsely ground peas, or 

 perhaps more like sawdust, and when soaked in water or broth 

 is rather glutinous, and is a very nutritious article of food. 

 This, with a little salt-fish, chili peppers, bananas, oranges, and 

 assai (a preparation from a palm fruit), forms almost the entire 

 subsistence of a great part of the population of the city. Our 

 own bill of fare comprised coffee, tea, bread, butter, beef, rice, 

 farinha, pumpkins, bananas, and oranges. Isidora was a good 

 cook, and made all sorts of roasts and stews out of our daily 

 lump of tough beef ; and the bananas and oranges were such 

 a luxury to us, that, with the good appetite which our walks in 

 the forest always gave us, we had nothing to complain of, 



