Chap. IV. 
RETURN TO EGA. 
255 
Daniel could distinguish all kinds of animals in the dark 
by their footsteps. It now began to thunder, and our po- 
sition was getting very uncomfortable. Daniel had not 
seen anything of the other Indians, and thought it was 
useless waiting any longer for Tracajas; we therefore 
sent him to call in the whole party, and made off, our- 
selves, as quickly as we could for the canoe. The rest 
of the night was passed most miserably ; as indeed were 
very many of my nights on the Solimoens. A furious 
squall burst upon us ; the wind blew away the cloths 
and mats we had fixed up at the ends of the arched 
awning of the canoe to shelter ourselves, and the rain 
beat right through our sleeping-place. There** we lay, 
Cardozo and I, huddled together and wet through, wait- 
ing for the morning. 
A cup of strong and hot coffee put us to rights at 
sunrise ; but the rain was still coming down, having 
changed to a steady drizzle. Our men were all returned 
from the pool, having taken only four Tracajas. The 
business which had brought Cardozo hither being now^ 
finished, we set out to return to Ega., leaving the senti- 
nels once more to their solitude on the sands. Our 
return route was by the rarely frequented north-easterly 
channel of the Solimoens, through which flows part of 
the waters of its great tributary stream, the J apura. We 
travelled for five hours along the desolate, broken, tim- 
ber-strewn shore of Baria. The channel is of immense 
breadth, the opposite coast being visible only as a long, 
low line of forest. At three o'clock in the afternoon we 
doubled the upper end of the island, and then crossed 
towards the mouth of the Teffe by a broad transverse 
