38G 
THE SACHET) HATTCES. 
the festivity. The oldest and most timid of the Indians, 
however, imbued all the rest with a superstitious dread; 
all resolved to flee al monte , and the missionary ad- 
journed his project of turning into derision the demon ot 
the natives. What extravagant ideas may sometimes 
enter the imagination of an idle monk, who passes his life 
in the forests, far from everything that can recall hu- 
man civilization to his mind. The violence with which 
the attempt was made to execute in public at Tomo the 
mysterious dance of the devils is the more strange, as 
all the books written by the missionaries relate the efforts 
they have used to prevent the funereal dances, the dances of 
the sacred trumpet, and that ancient dance of serpents, the 
Quell, in which these wily animals are represented as issuing 
from the forests, and coming to drink with the men in order 
to deceive them, and carry oft’ the women. 
After two hours’ navigation from the mouth of the Tomo 
we arrived at the little mission of San Miguel de Davipe, 
founded in 1775, not by monks, but by a lieutenant of mi- 
litia, Don I'rancisco Bobadilla. The missionary of the place. 
Bather MoriUo, with whom we spent some hours, received 
us with great hospitality. He even oftered us Madeira 
wine, but, as an object of luxury, we should have preferred 
wheaten bread. The want of bread becomes more sensibly 
felt in length of time than that of a strong liquor. The 
Portuguese of the Amazon carry small quantities of Madeira 
wine, from time to time, to the Rio Negro ; and the word 
madera signifying wood in the Castilian language, the monks, 
who are not much versed in the study of geography, had a 
scruplo of celebrating mass with Madeira wine, which they 
took for a fermented liquor extracted from the trunk of some 
tree, like palm-wine; and requested the guardian of the 
missions to decide, whether the vino de madera were wine 
from grapes, or the juice of a tree. At the beginning of the 
conquest, the question was agitated, whether it were allow 
able for the priests, in celebrating mass, to use any ier- 
mented liquor analogous to grape-wine. The question, aS 
might have been foreseen, was decided in the negative. 
At Davipe we bought some provisions, among which were 
fowls and a pig. This purchase greatly interested our In - 
dians, who had been a long while deprived of meat. They 
