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vi PREFACE. 
exjjloratiou sliould bo made. General attention was, moreover, directed 
to that remote corner of the vast realm by the sudden appearance 
of a new Steam Navigation Company on the Lower Madeira, and 
by the recent opening of the Amazon Eiver to the flags of all nations ; 
the realisation of the fidl benefit of which latter measm’e depends on its 
extension to the lateral rivers as well. 
The follo'wing pages embrace, in addition to a summary of the 
most important hydrographic results of the voyage, my remarks on the 
inhabitants, the vegetation, the products, and other topics of interest 
in comiection with these coimtries, not in the dry form originally 
assumed by them of a diary, but in the more inviting shape of 
chapters, under which easier access may be had to the whole. 
The illustrations, which I regard as indispensably suijplementary 
to the description of scenes so foreign to us, are from sketches taken 
on the spot, and, for preservation of theii’ minute fidelity, di’awn on 
the blocks by myself; and the name of one of our first wood engravers 
will further warrant their accuracy. 
Soon, how'ever, there will be no need of well-equipped expeditions to 
visit those outposts of Ultima Thule. Comfortable steamers from Liver- 
pool Avill convey the tourist, bent on a trip, to Para in eighteen days. 
Tn seven days more he can be at the mouth of the Madeira; and 
in another week’s time he may get to the first rapid of Santo Antonio, 
Avhoneo, at no very distant period, the locomotive Avill hurry him to 
the magnificent forests, which we could roach only after a troublesome 
voyage of thi-ee months’ dizration, counting from the mouth of the 
Madeira. 
A life of bustle and activity will then be infused there. India- 
rubber, cacao, precious timber, dye-woods, and resins will no longer 
perish for want of means of transport; and agricultm’e and cattle- 
breeding will restrict, if they cannot yet supjdant, the half-wild existence 
supported by hunting and fishing. Even before orrr return home from 
South America, after an absence of seventeen years, we had the satis- 
faction of seeing the execution of om- railway project as good as 
secured ; a North American contractor. Colonel G. E. Church, thoroughly 
familiar Avith this part of the world, having obtained the necessary 
concessions in that behalf from both the Erazilian and the Bolivian 
Governments, and having experienced little difficulty in raising the 
re(]uisito funds in England. 
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