Chap. IY. 
INDIAN DWELLINGS. 
233 
He seemed to have many questions to ask : but they 
were chiefly about Senhora FeHppa, Cardozo's Indian 
housekeeper at Ega, and were purely complimentary. 
This studied politeness is quite natural to Indians of 
the advanced agricultural tribes. The language used 
was Tupi : I heard no other spoken all the day. It 
must be borne in mind that Pedro-uassu had never 
had much intercourse with whites : he was, although 
baptised, a primitive Indian, who had always lived in 
retirement ; the ceremony of baptism having been gone 
through, as it generally is by the aborigines, simply 
from a wish to stand well with the whites. 
Arrived at the house, we were welcomed by Pedro's 
wife : a thin, wrinkled, active old squaw, tattooed in 
precisely the same way as her husband. She had also 
sharp features, but her manner was more cordial and 
quicker than that of her husband : she talked much, and 
with great inflection of voice ; whilst the tones of the old 
man were rather drawling and querulous. Her clothing 
was a long petticoat of thick cotton cloth, and a very 
short chemise, not reaching to her waist. I was rather 
surprised to find the grounds around the establishment 
in neater prder than in any sitio, even of civilised 
people, I had yet seen on the Upper Amazons : the 
stock of utensils and household goods of all sorts was 
larger, and the evidences of regular industry and 
plenty more numerous than one usually perceives in the 
farms of civilised Indians and whites. The buildings 
were of the same construction as those of the humbler 
settlers in all other parts of the country. The family 
lived in a large, oblong, open shed built under the 
