4 
SANTAREM. 
Chap. T. 
days to commence my Natural History explorations in 
the neighbourhood. 
* 
I found Santarem quite a different sort of place from 
the other settlements on the Amazons. At Cameta, the 
lively, good-humoured, and plain-living Mamelucos 
formed the bulk of the population, the white immi- 
grants there, as on the Rio Negro and Upper Amazons, 
seeming to have fraternised well with the aborigines. In 
the neighbourhood of Santarem the Indians, I believe, 
were originally hostile to the Portuguese ; at any rate, 
the blending of the two races has not been here on a large 
scale. I did not find the inhabitants the pleasant, easy- 
going, and blunt-spoken country folk that are met with 
in other small towns of the interior. The whites, Portu- 
guese and Brazilians, are a relatively more numerous 
class here than in other settlements, and make great 
pretensions to civilisation ; they are the merchants and 
shopkeepers of the place ; owners of slaves, cattle 
estates, and cacao plantations. Amongst the principal 
residents must also be mentioned the civil and military 
authorities, who are generally well-bred and intelligent 
people from other provinces. Few Indians live in the 
place ; it is too civilised for them, and the lower class is 
made up (besides the few slaves) of half-breeds, in whose 
composition negro blood predominates. Coloured people 
also exercise the different handicrafts ; the town supports 
two goldsmiths, who are mulattoes and have each several 
apprentices ; the blacksmiths are chiefly Indians, as is 
the case generally throughout the province. The man- 
ners of the upper class (copied from those of Para), are 
