238 
TRAVELS ON THE RIO NEGRO, \Fehruary, 
vessels, as they are called ; and the villages of Sao Carlos, 
Tiriquim, Sao Miguel, Torno, and Maroa are entirely 
inhabited by builders of canoes. 
While I was at Tomo the village was being cleaned, 
by scraping off the turf and weeds wherever they ap- 
peared within the limits of the houses. The people 
show an instance of their peculiar delicacy in this work : 
they will not touch any spot on which there lies a piece 
of dung of a dog or any animal, or the body of any dead 
bird or reptile, but hoe carefully around it, and leave a 
little circular tuft of grass marking the spot where all 
such impurities exist. This is partly owing to a kind 
of superstition ; but in many other ways they show a 
dislike to touch, however remotely, any offensive animal 
substance. This idea is carried so far as to lead them 
sometimes to neglect the sick in any offensive disease. 
It seems to be a kind of feeling very similar to that 
which exists in many animals, with regard to the sick 
and the dying. 
Senhor Antonio Dias was rather notorious, even in || 
II 
this country of loose morals, for his patriarchal propen- 
sities, his harem consisting of a mother and daughter 
and two Indian girls, all of whom he keeps employed at | 
feather-work, which they do with great skill, — Senhor i 
Antonio himself, who has some taste in design, making 
out the patterns. The cocks of the rock, white herons, | 
roseate spoonbills, golden jacamars, metallic trogons, and i 
exquisite little seven-coloured tanagers, with many gay|r| 
parrots, and other beautiful birds, offer an assortment of ^ 
colours capable of producing the most exquisite effects, f 
The work is principally applied to the borders or fringes^ 
