332 



ON THE ABORIGINES 



tations, as my first view of the real uncivilised inhabitants of 

 the river Uaupes. Though I had been already three years in 

 the country, and had seen Indians of almost every shade of 

 colour and every degree of civilisation, I felt that I was as 

 much in the midst of something new and startling, as if I had 

 been instantaneously transported to a distant and unknown 

 country. 



The Indians of the Amazon and its tributaries are of a 

 countless variety of tribes and nations; all of whom have 

 peculiar languages and customs, and many of them some dis- 

 tinct physical characteristics. Those now found in the city of 

 Para, and all about the country of the Lower Amazon, have 

 long been civilised, — have lost their own language, and speak 

 the Portuguese, and are known by the general name of 

 Tapiiyas, which is applied to all Indians, and seems to be a 

 corruption of " Tupis," the name applied to the natives of the 

 coast-districts, on the first settlement of the country. These 

 Indians are short, stout, and well made. They learn all trades 

 quickly and wxll, and are a quiet, good-natured, inoffensive 

 people. They form the crews of most of the Para trading 

 canoes. Their main peculiarity consists in their short stature, 

 which is more observable than in any other tribe I am acquainted 

 w^ith. It may be as well, before proceeding further, to mention 

 the general characteristics of the Amazon Indians, from which 

 the particular tribes vary but very slightly. 



They are, a skin of a coppery or brown colour of various 

 shades, often nearly the tint of smooth Honduras mahogany, 

 — jet-black straight hair, thick, and never curled, — black eyes, 

 and very little or no beard. With regard to their features, it 

 is impossible to give any general characteristics. In some the 

 whole face is wide and rather flattened, but I never could dis- 

 cern an unusual obliquity of the eyes, or projection of the 

 cheek-bones ; in many, of both sexes, the most perfect regu- 

 larity of features exists, and there are numbers who in colour 

 alone differ from a good-looking European. 



Their figures are generally superb ; and I have never felt so 

 much pleasure in gazing at the finest statue, as at these living 

 illustrations of the beauty of the human form. The develop- 

 ment of the chest is such as I believe never exists in the 

 best-formed European, exhibiting a splendid series of convex 

 undulations, without a hollow 'n any part of it. 



