114 



TRAVELS ON THE RIO NEGRO. [Januaiy^ 



day hear things commonly talked of, about the most respectable 

 families in the place, which would hardly be credited of the 

 inhabitants of the worst parts of St. Giles's. 



The wet season had now set in, and we soon found there 

 was little to be done in collecting birds or insects at Barra. I 

 had been informed that this was the time to find the celebrated 

 umbrella chatterers in plumage, and that they were plentiful in 

 the islands about three days' voyage up the Rio Negro. On 

 communicating to Senhor Henrique my wish to go there, he 

 applied to some of the authorities to furnish me with Indians 

 to make the voyage. When they came, which was after three 

 or four days, I started in my own canoe, leaving my brother H. 

 to pay a visit to an estate in another direction. My voyage 

 occupied three days, and I had a good opportunity of observing 

 the striking difference between this river and the Amazon. 

 Here were no islands of floating grass, no logs and uprooted 

 trees, with their cargoes of gulls, scarcely any stream, and few 

 signs of life in the black and sluggish waters. Yet when there 

 is a storm, there are greater and more dangerous waves than 

 on the Amazon. When the dark clouds above cause the water 

 to appear of a yet more inky blackness, and the rising waves 

 break in white foam over the vast expanse, the scene is gloomy 

 in the extreme. 



At Barra the river is about a mile and a half wide. A few 

 miles up it widens considerably, in many places forming deep 

 bays eight or ten miles across. Further on, again, it separates 

 into several channels, divided by innumerable islands, and the 

 total width is probably not less than twenty miles. We 

 crossed where it is four or five miles wide, and then keeping 

 up the left bank we entered among the islands, when the 

 opposite shore was no more seen. We passed many sandy 

 and pebbly beaches, with occasional masses of sandstone and 

 volcanic rock, and a long extent of high and steep gravelly 

 banks, everywhere, except in the most precipitous places, 

 covered with a luxuriant vegetation of shrubs and forest-trees. 

 We saw several cottages, and a village prettily situated on a 

 high, grassy slope, and at length reached Castanheiro, the 

 residence of Senhor Balbino, to whom I brought a letter. After 

 reading it he asked me my intentions, and then promised to get 

 me a good hunter to kill birds and any other animals I wanted. 



The house of Senhor Balbino is generally known as the 



