the oil separates and rises to the surface. The floating oil is afterwards skimmed off with long spoons, made by tying large mussel-shells to the end of rods, and purified over the fire in copper kettles.

The destruction of turtle eggs every year by these proceedings is enormous. At least 6,000 jars, holding each three gallons of the oil, are exported annually from the Upper Amazons and the Madeira to Para, where it is used for lighting, frying fish, and other purposes. It may be fairly estimated that 2,000 more jarfuls are consumed by the inhabitants of the villages on the river. Now, it takes at least twelve basketfuls of eggs, or about 6,000, by the wasteful process followed, to make one jar of oil. The total number of eggs annually destroyed amounts, therefore, to 48,000,000. As each turtle lays about 120, it follows that the yearly offspring of 400,000 turtles is thus annihilated. A vast number, nevertheless, remain undetected; and these would probably be sufficient to keep the turtle population of these rivers up to the mark, if the people did not follow the wasteful practice of lying in wait for the newly-hatched young, and collecting them by thousands for eating; their tender flesh and the remains of yolk in their entrails being considered a great delicacy. The chief natural enemies of the turtle are vultures and alligators, which devour the newly-hatched young as they descend in shoals to the water. These must have destroyed an immensely greater number before the European settlers began to 2ppropriate the eggs than they do now. It is almost doubtful if this natural persecution did not act as effectively in checking the increase of the turtle as the artificial destruction now does. If we are to believe the tradition of the Indians, however, it had not this result; for they say that formerly the waters teemed as thickly with turtles as the air does now with mosquitoes. The universal opinion of the settlers on the Upper Amazons is, that the turtle has very greatly decreased in numbers, and is still annually decreasing.

We left Shimuni on the 2oth, with quite a flotilla of canoes, and descended the river to Catud, an eleven hours’ journey by paddle and current. Catud is about six miles long, and almost entirely encircled by its praia. The turtles had selected for their egg-laying a part of the sand-bank which was elevated at least twenty feet above the present level of the river; the animals, to reach the place, must have crawled up aslope. As we approached the island, numbers of the animals were seen coming to the surface to breathe, in a small shoaly bay. Those who had light montarias sped forward with bows and arrows to shoot them. Carepira was foremost, having borrowed a small and very unsteady boat of Cardozo, and embarked in it with his little son. After bagging a couple of turtles, and whilst hauling in a third, he over-balanced himself; the canoe went over, and he with his child had to swim for their lives, in the midst of numerous alligators, about a mile from the land. The old man had to sustain a heavy fire of jokes from his companions for several days after this mishap. Such accidents are only laughed at by these almost amphibious people.

The number of persons congregated on Catud was much greater than on Shimunf, as the population of the banks of several neighbouring lakes

was here added. The line of huts and sheds extended half a mile, and several large sailing vessels were anchored at the place. The commandante was Senhor Macedo, the Indian blacksmith of Ega before mentioned, who maintained excellent order during the fourteen days the process of excavation and oil manufacture lasted. There were also many primitive Indians here from the neighbouring rivers, amongst them a family of Shumanas, good-tempered, harmless people from the Lower Japura. All of them were tattooed round the mouth, the bluish tint forming a border to the lips, and extending in a line on the cheeks towards the ear on each side. They were not quite so slender in figure as the Passés of Pedro-uassii’s family; but their features deviated quite as much as those of the Passés from the ordinary Indian type. This was seen chiefly in the comparatively small mouth, pointed chir, thin lips, and narrow, high nose. One of the daughters, a young girl of about seventeen years of age, was a real beauty. The colour of her skin approached the light tanned shade of the Mameluco women; her figure was almost faultless, and the blue mouth, instead of being a disfigurement, gave quite a captivating finish to her appearance. Her neck, wrists, and ankles were adorned with strings of blue beads. She was, however, extremely bashful, never venturing to look strangers in the face, and never quitting, for many minutes together, the side of her father and mother. ‘The family had been shamefully swindled by some rascally trader on another praia; and, on our arrival, came to lay their case before Senhor Cardozo, as the delegado of police of the district. The mild way in which the old man, without a trace of anger, stated his complaint in imperfect Tupt, quite enlisted our sympathies in his favour. But Cardozo could give him no redress; he invited the family, however, to make their rancho near to ours, and in the end gave them the highest price for the surplus oil which they manufactured.

It was not all work at Catua: indeed there was rather more play than work going on. ‘The people make a kind of holiday of these occasions. Every fine night parties of the younger people assembled on the sands, and dancing and games were carried on for hours together. But the requisite liveliness for these sports was never got up without a good deal of preliminary rum-drinking. The girls were so coy that the young men could not get sufficient partners for the dances, without first sub-scribing for a few flagons of the needful cashaca. ‘The coldness of the shy Indian and Mameluco maidens never failed to give way after a little of this strong drink, but it was astonishing what an immense deal they could take of it in the course of an evening. Coyness is not always a sign of innocence in these people, for most of the half-caste women on the Upper Amazons lead a little career of looseness before they marry and settle down for life; and it is rather remarkable that the men do not seem to object much to their brides having had a child or two by various fathers before marriage. The women do not lose reputation unless they become utterly depraved, but in that case they are condemned pretty strongly by public opinion. Depravity is, however, rare, for all require more or less to be wooed before they are won. I did not see (although I mixed pretty freely with the young people) any breach of propriety on the praias. ‘The merry-makings were carried on near the

ranchos, where the more staid citizens of Ega, husbands with their wives and young daughters, all smoking gravely out of long pipes, sat in their hammocks and enjoyed the fun. ‘Towards midnight we often heard, in the intervals between jokes and laughter, the hoarse roar of jaguars, prowling about the jungle in the middle of the praia. There were several guitar players amongst the young men, and one most persevering fiddler, so there was no lack of music.

The favourite sport was the Pira-purasséya, or fish-dance, one of the original games of the Indians, though now probably a little modified. The young men and women, mingling together, formed a ring, leaving one of their number in the middle, who represented the fish. They then all marched round, Indian file, the musicians mixed up with the rest, singing a monotonous but rather pretty chorus, the words of which were invented (under a certain form) by one of the party who acted as leader. This finished, all joined hands, and questions were put to the one in the middle, asking what kind of fish he or she might be. To these the individual has to reply. The end of it all is that he makes a rush at the ring, and if he succeeds in escaping, the person who allowed him to do so has to take his place; the march and chorus then recommence, and so the game goes on hour after hour. Tupi was the language mostly used, but sometimes Portuguese was sung and spoken. The details of the dance were often varied. Instead of the names of fishes being called over by the person in the middle, the name of some animal, flower, or other object was given to every fresh occupier of the place. There was then good scope for wit in the invention of nick-names, and peals of laughter would often salute some particularly good hit. Thus a very lanky young man was called the Magoary, or the gray stork;a moist, grey-eyed man, with a profile comically suggestive of a fish, was christened Jaraki (a kind of fish), which was considered quite a witty sally; a little Mameluco girl, with light-coloured eyes and brown hair, got the gallant name of Rosa branca, or the white rose; a young fellow who had recently singed his eyebrows by the explosion of fireworks was dubbed Pedro quei mado (Burnt Peter); in short, every one got a nickname, and each time the cognomen was introduced into the chorus as the circle marched round.

It is said by the Portuguese and Brazilian townspeople lower down the river, that much disorder and all kinds of immorality prevail amongst these assemblages of Upper Amazons rustics on the turtle praias. Ican only say that nothing of the kind was seen on the occasions when I attended. But it may be added that there were no traders from the “civilised ” parts present to set a bad example. Town-bred Indians and half-castes will be disorderly and quarrelsome like uneducated people everywhere, when they can get their fill of intoxicating drinks. When low Portuguese traders, who are most certainly the inferiors of these rustics whom they despise, attend the praias, they corrupt the women, and bribe the Indians with cashaca to steal their masters’ oil; these proceedings, of course, give rise to disturbances in many ways. There were none of these shining examples of the superior civilisation of Europe in attendance at Catud. The masters kept their Indians well under control; the young people enjoyed themselves upon the whole

innocently, and sociability was pretty general amongst all classes and colours. Our rancho was a large one, and was erected in a line with the others, near the edge of the sand-bank which sloped rather abruptly to the water. During the first week the people were all, more or less, troubled by alligators. Some half-dozen full-grown ones were in attendance off the praia, floating about on the lazily-flowing muddy water. The dryness of the weather had increased since we had left Shimunt, the currents had slackened, and the heat in the middle part of the day was almost insupportable. But no one could descend to bathe without being advanced upon by one or other of these hungry monsters. There was much offal cast into the river, and this of course attracted them to the place. One day I amused myself by taking a basketful of fragments of meat beyond the line of ranchos, and drawing the alligators towards me by feeding them. ‘They behaved pretty much as dogs do when fed; catching the bones I threw them in their huge jaws, and coming nearer and showing increased eagerness after every morsel. The enormous gape of their mouths, with their blood-red lining and long fringes of teeth, and the uncouth shapes of their bodies, made a picture of unsurpassable ugliness. I once or twice fired a heavy charge of shot at them, aiming at the vulnerable part of their bodies, which is a small space situated behind the eyes, but this had no other effect than to make them give a hoarse grunt and shake themselves; they immediately afterwards turned to receive another bone which I threw to them. Every day these visitors became bolder; at length they reached a pitch of impudence that was quite intolerable. Cardozo had a poodle dog named Carlito, which some grateful traveller whom he had befriended had sent him from Rio Janeiro. He took great pride in this dog, keeping it well sheared, and preserving its coat as white as soap and water could make it. We slept in our rancho in hammocks slung between the outer posts; a large wood fire (fed with a kind of wood abundant on the banks of the river, which keeps alight all night) being made in the middle, by the side of which slept Carlito on a littie mat. Well, one night I was awoke by a great uproar. It was caused by Cardozo hurling burning firewood with loud curses at a huge cayman which had crawled up the bank and passed beneath my hammock (being nearest the water) towards the place where Carlito lay. The dog had raised the alarm in time; the reptile backed out and tumbled down the bank to the water, the sparks from the brands hurled at him flying from his bony hide. To our great surprise the animal (we supposed it to be the same individual) repeated his visit the very next night, this time passing round to the other side of our shed. Cardozo was awake, and threw a harpoon at him, but without doing him any harm. After this it was thought necessary to make an effort to check the alligators; a number of men were therefore persuaded to sally forth in their montarias and devote a day to killing them.

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