406 
EXCURSIONS BEYOND EGA. 
Chap. YL 
have the singular custom, in common with the CoUinas 
and Mauhes, of treating their young girls, on their 
showing the first signs of womanhood, as if they had 
committed some crime. They are sent up to the girao 
under the smoky and filthy roof, and kept there on very 
meagre diet, sometimes for a whole month. I heard of 
one poor girl dying under this treatment. 
The original territory of the Tucuna tribe embraced 
the banks of most of the by-streams, from forty miles 
below St. Paulo to beyond Loreto in Peru, a distance 
of about 200 miles ; the tribe, however, is not well- 
demarcated from that of the CoUinas, who appear to be 
a section of Tucunas, and whose home extends 200 miles 
further to the east. The only other tribe of this neigh- 
bourhood concerning which I obtained any information 
were the Majeronas, whose territory embraces several 
hundred miles of the western bank of the river J auari, 
an affluent of the Solimoens, 120 miles beyond St. Paulo. 
These are a fierce, indomitable, and hostile people, like 
the Araras of the river Madeira ; they are also cannibals. 
The navigation of the Jauari is rendered impossible on 
account of the Majeronas lying in wait on its banks to 
intercept and murder all travellers, especially whites. 
Four months before my arrival at St. Paulo, two 
young half-castes (nearly white) of the village went to 
trade on the Jauari ; the Majeronas having shown signs 
of abating their hostility for a year or two previously. 
They had not been long gone, when their canoe returned 
with the news that the two young fellows had been shot 
with arrows, roasted and eaten by the savages. J ose 
Patricio, with his usual activity in the cause of law and 
