2 
SANTAEEM. 
Chap. I. 
tributary. The Tapajos at Santarem is contracted to 
a breadth of about a mile-and- a-half by an accretion of 
low alluvial land, which forms a kind of delta on the 
western side ; fifteen miles further up the river is seen 
at its full width of ten or a dozen miles, and the mag- 
nificent hilly country through which it flows from the 
south, is then visible on both shores. This high land, 
which appears to be a continuation of the central table- 
lands of Brazil, stretches almost without interruption on 
the eastern side of the river down to its mouth at San- 
tarem. The scenery as well as the soil, vegetation and 
animal tenants of this region, are widely different from 
those of the flat and uniform country which borders the 
Amazons along most part of its course. After travelling 
week after week on the main river, the aspect of San- 
tarem with its broad white sandy beach, limpid dark- 
green waters, and line of picturesque hills rising behind 
over the fringe of green forest, affords an agreeable 
surprise. On the main Amazons, the prospect is mono- 
tonous unless the vessel runs near the shore, when 
the wonderful diversity and beauty of the vegetation 
afford constant entertainment. Otherwise, the un- 
varied, broad yellow stream, and the long low line of 
forest, which dwindles away in a broken line of trees 
on the sea-like horizon and is renewed, reach after reach, 
as the voyager advances ; weary by their uniformity. 
I arrived at Santarem on my second journey into the 
interior, in November, 1851, and made it my head quar- 
ters for a period, as it turned out, of three years and a 
half. During this time I made, in pursuance of the plan 
I had framed, many excursions up the Tapajos, and to 
