220 
THE UPPER AMAZONS. 
Chap. III. 
we have already seen also differ considerably. The year 
at Ega is divided according to the rises and falls of the 
river, with which coincide the wet and dry periods. All 
the principal transactions of life of the inhabitants are 
regulated by these yearly recurring phenomena. The 
peculiarity of this upper region consists in there being 
two rises and two falls within the year. The great 
annual rise commences about the end of February, and 
continues to the middle of June, during which the rivers 
and lakes, confined during the dry periods to their 
ordinary beds, gradually swell and overflow all the 
lower lands. The inundation progresses gently inch by 
inch, and is felt everywhere, even in the interior of the 
forests of the higher lands, miles away from the river ; 
as these are traversed by numerous gullies, forming 
in the fine season dry, spacious dells, which become 
gradually transformed by the pressure of the flood into 
broad creeks navigable by small boats under the shade 
of trees. All the countless swarms of turtle of various 
species then leave the main river for the inland pools : 
the sand-banks go under water, and the flocks of wading 
birds migrate northerly to the upper waters of the 
tributaries which flow from that direction, or to the 
Orinoco ; which streams during the wet period of the 
Amazons are enjoying the cloudless skies of their dry 
season. The families of fishermen who have been em- 
ployed, during the previous four or five months, in 
harpooning and salting pirarucu and shooting turtle in 
the great lakes, now return to the towns and villages ; 
their temporarily constructed fishing establishments 
becoming gradually submerged, with the sand islets or 
