Bidding adieu to the Commandante, Senhor Tenente Antonio Filisberto Correio de Araujo, who had treated me with the greatest kindness and hospitality, I proceeded on to Guia, where I arrived about the end of April, hoping to find Senhor L. ready, soon to start for the river Uaupés; but I was again doomed to delay, for a canoe which had been sent to Barra had not yet returned, and we could not start till it came. It was now due, but as it was manned by Indians, only who had no particular interest in hurrying back, it might very well be a month longer. And so it proved, for it did not arrive till the end of May. All that time I could do but little; the season was very wet, and Guia was a poor locality. Fishes were my principal resource, as Senhor L. had a fisherman out every day, to procure us our suppers, and I always had the day's sport brought to me first, to select any species I had not yet seen. In this way I constantly got new kinds, and became more than ever impressed with the extraordinary variety and abundance of the inhabitants of these rivers. I had now figured and described a hundred and sixty species from the Rio Negro alone; I had besides seen many others; and fresh varieties still occurred as abundantly as ever in every new locality. I am convinced that the number of species in the Rio Negro and its tributaries alone would be found to amount to five or six hundred. But the Amazon has most of its fishes peculiar to itself, and so have all its numerous tributaries, especially in their upper waters; so that the number of distinct kinds inhabiting the whole basin of the Amazon must be immense.
Rapid Current--An Indian Malocca--The Inmates--A Festival--Paint and Ornaments--Illness--São Jeronymo--Passing the Cataracts--Jauarité--The Tushaúa Calistro--Singular Palm--Birds--Cheap Provisions--Edible Ants, and Earthworms--A Grand Dance--Feather Ornaments--The Snake-dance--The Capí--A State Cigar--Ananárapicóma--Fish--Chegoes--Pass down the Falls--Tame Birds--Orchids--Pium͂s--Eating Dirt--Poisoning--Return to Guia--Manoel Joaquim--Annoying Delays.
AT length the long-looked for canoe arrived, and we immediately made preparations for our voyage. Fish-hooks and knives and beads were looked out to suit the customers we were going among, and from whom Senhor L. hoped to obtain farinha and sarsaparilla: and I, fish, insects, birds, and all sorts of bows, arrows, blowpipes, baskets, and other Indian curiosities.