PREFACE. 



AN earnest desire to visit a tropical country, to behold the 

 luxuriance of animal and vegetable life said to exist 

 there, and to see with my own eyes all those wonders which 

 I had so much delighted to read of in the narratives of 

 travellers, were the motives that induced me to break through 

 the trammels of business and the ties of home, and start for 



" Some far land where endless summer reigns." 



My atten-tion was directed to Para and the Amazon by Mr. 

 Edwards's little book, "A Voyage up the Amazon,'^ and I 

 decided upon going there, both on account of its easiness of 

 access and the little that was known of it compared with most 

 other parts of South America. 



I proposed to pay my expenses by making collections in 

 Natural History, and I have been enabled to do so ; and the 

 pleasures I have found in the contemplation of the strange 

 and beautiful objects continually met with, and the deep 

 interest arising from the study in their native wilds of the 

 varied races of mankind, have been such as to determine my 

 continuing in the pursuit I have entered upon, and to cause 

 me to look forw^ard with pleasure to again visiting the wild and 

 luxuriant scenery and the sparkling life of the tropics. 



In the following pages I have given a narrative of my 

 journeys and of the impressions excited at the time. The 

 first and last portions are from my journals, with little altera- 

 tion ; but all the notes made during two years, with the 



