RESIDENCE AT SANTAREM 119 
esteemed a vento roim or " noxious wind," for it 
brings with it neuralgic pains, colds, and fevers. So 
that we may apply to the equatorial regions, in the 
western hemisphere, the English adage reversed, 
and say — 
When the wind is in the East, 
'Tis healthier for man and beast ! 
I did not keep any meteorological register at 
Santarem, but the heat in the wet season seemed 
to me to surpass what I have felt anywhere else 
on the Amazon. Neither sweltering heat nor 
soaking rains ever caused me to intermit my 
labours, and I went on collecting all through the 
wet season. But I found it very difficult to pre- 
serve my specimens, which I prepared in large 
quantities, and therefore needed every day to dry 
great piles of damp paper. To. this end I made an 
agreement with a French baker who lived near to 
have the use of his oven every morning after the 
daily bread had been withdrawn from it ; but the 
paper never got half so well dried in this way as it 
did when spread out on the sand under a broiling 
sun, where there was free evaporation. 
When the flooding of the lowlands reduced my 
excursions by land to very narrow limits, I used to 
explore the coasts of the rivers and igarapes by 
water whenever I could get a boat and men. Boats 
I could have at any time, but the gente to man 
them were difficult to catch. Should I need men 
but for a day, I must ask the Capitao dos Tra- 
balhadores (Captain of the Workmen) for them, 
and then wait perhaps a fortnight before I could 
get them ; for in all probability a detachment of 
