504 NOTES OF A BOTANIST 
very many of which probably do not exist at all on 
the Rio Negro, and were certainly not seen there 
by him, for he did not ascend that river. 
When I was at San Fernando and Maypures, my 
notions of geography were continually shocked by 
hearing the people say aqui em Rio Negro" 
(''here in the Rio Negro").. ''Why do you say 
Rio Negro," I would ask, "when here we are on 
the Orinoco?" "Because," said they, "we are in 
xki^ Canton do Rio Negro." 
Finally, as I came down the Rio Negro, the 
people were already beginning to say " aqui en 
Amazonas " (" here in the Amazon "). 
The only limits which can be counted constant 
are those formed by the rivers and mountains. 
Even the term " North Brazil " may in a few years 
cease to have any significance. " Guayana," as it 
was anciently understood by the Spaniards and 
Portuguese, namely, all the tract between the ocean, 
the rivers Amazon, Negro, and Orinoco, is a quite 
natural division, and is still well known in common 
parlance under the same name. 
[The following Notes written during Spruce's 
latest residence at Barra may follow here : — ] 
Contrast between the Shores of the Amazon and those 
OF THE Rio Negro 
In the former river the receding waters in many places leave 
broad margins of mud hard enough to walk on, and becoming 
sparsely clothed with annual grasses and Cyperaceae as summer 
advances. In ascending it I have sometimes walked half a mile 
across these annual meadows, and at the farther side have come 
only on the common willow, Salix Humboldtiana^ two or three 
Psidia with a willow -like aspect at a distance, and Mimosa 
Aspe7'ata. 
On the Upper Rio Negro nothing similar is seen ; the forest 
