Chap. "VI. 
ST. PAULO. 
395 
otherwise the village would be almost inaccessible, 
especially to porters of luggage and cargo, for there are 
no means of making a circuitous road of more moderate 
slope, the hill being steep on all sides, and surrounded 
by dense forests and swamps. The place contains 
about 500 inhabitants, chiefly half-castes and Indians 
of the Tucuna and Collina tribes, who are very little 
improved from their primitive state. The streets are 
narrow, and in rainy weather inches deep in mud ; 
many houses are of substantial structure, but in a 
ruinous condition, and the place altogether presents the 
appearance, like Fonte Boa, of having seen better days. 
Signs of commerce, such as meet the eye at Ega, could 
scarcely be expected in this remote spot, situate 1800 
miles, or seven months' round voyage by sailing-vessels, 
from Para, the nearest market for produce. A very 
short experience showed that the inhabitants were 
utterly debased, the few Portuguese and other immi- 
gra^nts having, instead of promoting industry, adopted 
the lazy mode of life of the Indians, spiced with the 
practice of a few strong vices of their own introduction. 
The head man of the village, Senhor Antonio Ei- 
beiro, half- white half-Tucuna, prepared a house for me 
on landing, and introduced me to the principal people. 
The summit of the hill is grassy table-land, of two or 
three hundred acres in extent. The soil is not wholly 
clay, but partly sand and gravel ; the village, itself, 
however, stands chiefly on clay, and the streets there- 
fore, after heavy rains, become filled with muddy pud- 
dles. On damp nights, the chorus of frogs and toads 
which swarm in weedy back -yards, creates such a be- 
