In passing slowly along the interminable wooded banks week after week, I observed that there were three tolerably distinct kinds of coast and corresponding forest constantly recurring on this upper river. First, there were the lowand most recent alluvial deposits,—a mixture of sand and mud, covered with tall, broad-leaved grasses, or with the arrow-grass before described, whose feathery-topped flower-stem rises to a height of fourteen or fifteen feet. The only large trees which grow in these places are the Cecropiz. Many of the smaller and newer islands were of this description. Secondly, there were the moderately high banks, which are only partially overflowed when the flood season is at its height; these are wooded with a magnificent varied forest, in which a great variety of palms and broad-leaved Marantaceze form a very large proportion of the vegetation. The general foliage is of a vivid light-green hue; the water frontage is sometimes covered with a diversified mass of greenery; but where the current sets strongly against the friable earthy banks, which at low water are twenty-five to thirty feet high, these are cut away, and expose a section of forest, where the trunks of trees loaded with epiphytes appear in massy colonnades. One might safely say that three-fourths of the land bordering the Upper Amazons, for a thousand miles, belong to this second class. The third description of coast is the higher, undulating, clayey land, which appears only at long intervals, but extends sometimes for many miles along the borders of the river. The coast at these places is sloping, and composed of red or variegated clay. The forest is of a different character from that of the lower tracts; it is rounder in outline, more uniform in its general aspect; palms are much less numerous and of peculiar species—the strange bulging-stemmed species, Iriartea ventricosa, and the slender glossy-leaved Bacdba-f (Atnocarpus minor), being especially characteristic; and, in short, animal life, which imparts some cheerfulness to the other parts of the river, is seldom apparent. ‘This “terra firme,”

as it is called, and a large portion of the fertile lower land, seemed well adapted for settlement; some parts were originally peopled by the aborigines, but these have long since become extinct or amalgamated with the white immigrants. I afterwards learnt that there were not more thaneighteen or twenty families settled throughout the whole country from Manacapurti to Quary, a distance of 240 miles; and these, as_ before observed, do not live on the banks of the main stream, but on the shores of inlets and lakes. The fishermen twice brought. me small rounded pieces of very porous pumice-stone, which they had picked up floating on the surface of the main current of the river. They were to me objects of great curiosity, as being messengers from the distant volcanoes of the Andes: Cotopaxi, Llanganete, or Sangay, which rear their peaks amongst the rivulets that feed some of the early tributaries of the Amazons, such as the Macas, the Pastaza, and the Napo. The stones must have already travelled a distance of 1,200 miles. I afterwards found them rather common; the Brazilians use them for cleaning rust from their guns, and firmly believe them to be solidified river foam. A friend once brought me, when I lived at Santarem, a large piece which had been found in the middle: of the stream below Monte Alegre, about goo miles farther down the river; having reached this distance, pumice-stones would be pretty sure of being carried out to sea, and floated thence with the north-westerly Atlantic current, to shores many thousand miles distant from the volcanoes which ejected them. They are sometimes found stranded on the banks in different parts of the river. Reflecting on this circumstance since I arrived in England, the probability of these porous fragments serving as vehicles for the transportation of seeds of plants, eggs of insects, spawn of fresh-water fish, and so forth, has suggested Bulging-stemmed Palm: itself to me. Their rounded, water-worn ae bartizudo appearance showed that they must have been Sigiahirigsa rolled about for a long time in the shallow streams near the sources of the rivers at the feet of the volcanoes, before they leapt the waterfalls and embarked on the currents which lead direct for the

Amazons. ‘They may have been originally cast on the land and afterwards carried to the river by freshets; in which case the eggs and seeds of land insects and plants might be accidentally introduced, and safely enclosed with particles of earth in the cavities. As the speed of the current in the rainy season has been observed to be from three to five miles an hour, they might travel an immense distance before the eggs or seeds were destroyed. JI am ashamed to say that I neglected the opportunity, whilst on the spot, of ascertaining whether this was actually the case. The attention of Naturalists has only lately been turned to the important subject of occasional means of wide dissemination of species of animals and plants. Unless such be shown to exist, it is impossible to solve some of the most difficult problems connected with the distribution of plants and animals. Some species, with most limited powers of locomotion, are found in opposite parts of the earth, without existing in the intermediate regions; unless it can be shown that these may have migrated or been accidentally transported from one point to the other, we shall have to come to the strange conclusion that the same species had been created in two separate districts.

Canoemen on the Upper Amazons live in constant dread of the “terras cahidas,” or landslips, which occasionally take place along the steep earthy banks, especially when the waters are rising. Large vessels are sometimes overwhelmed by these avalanches of earth and trees. I should have thought the accounts of them exaggerated, if I had not had an opportunity during this voyage of seeing one on a large scale. One morning I was awoke before sunrise by an unusual sound resembling the roar of artillery. I was lying alone on the top of the cabin; it was very dark, and all my companions were asleep, so I lay listening. The sounds came from a considerable distance, and the crash which had aroused me was succeeded by others much less formidable. The first explanation which occurred to me was that it was an earthquake; for, although the night was breathlessly calm, the broad river was much agitated and the vessel rolled heavily. Soon after, another loud explosion took place, apparently much nearer than the former one; then followed others. ‘The thundering peal rolled backwards and forwards, now seeming close at hand, now far off; the sudden crashes being often succeeded by a pause, or a long-continued dull rumbling. At the second explosion, Vicente, who lay snoring by the helm, awoke and told me it was a “terra cahida”; but I could scarcely believe him. The day dawned after the uproar had lasted about an hour, and we then saw the work of destruction going forward on the other side of the river, about three miles off. Large masses of forest, including. trees of colossal size, probably 200 feet in height, were rocking to and fro, and falling headlong one after the other into the water. After each avalanche the wave which it caused returned on the crumbly bank with tremendous force, and caused the fall of other masses by undermining them. ‘The line of coast over which the landslip extended was a mile or two in length; the end of it, however, was hid from our view by an intervening island. It was a grand sight; each downfall created a cloud of spray; the concussion in one place causing other masses to give way a long distance from

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it, and thus the crashes continued, swaying to and fro, with little prospect of a termination. When we glided out of sight, two hours after sunrise, the destruction was still going on.

On the oth of April we passed the mouth of a narrow channel which leads to an extensive lake called Anuri; it lies at the bottom of a long enseada or bay, on the north or left side of the river, around which sets the whole force of the current. The steamboat company have since established a station near this for supplying their vessels with firewood. A few miles beyond, on the opposite side, we saw the principal mouth of the Purtis, a very large stream, whose sources are still unknown. Salsaparilla and Copaiiba collectors, the only travellers on its waters, have ascended it in small boats a distance of two months’ journey without meeting with any obstruction to navigation. This shows that its course lies to a very great extent within the level plain of the Upper Amazons. The mouth is not more than a quarter of a mile broad, and the water is of an olive-green colour.

We passed Cudaja on the 12th. This is a channel which communicates with an extensive system of backwaters and lakes, lying between this part of the river and the Japurd, 250 miles farther west. The inhabitants of the Solimoens give the name of Cupiy6d to this little-known interior water-system. A Portuguese, whom I knew very well, once navigated it throughout its whole length. He described the country in glowing terms. ‘The waters are clear; some of the lakes are of vast extent, and the land everywhere is level and luxuriantly wooded. It isa more complete solitude than the banks of the main river, for the whole region is peopled only by a few families of Mura savages. The. inhabitants of Ega, who are employed in the summer season in salting piraructi, sometimes make their fishing stations on the sandy shores of one or other of these lakes. The largest of them, whose opposite or northern shore is said to be scarcely visible from the south side, is called Lake Muira, and is very seldom visited.

A number of long, straggling islands occur in mid-river beyond Cudajé. We passed the mouth of the Mamiy4, a black-water stream, on the 18th, and on the roth arrived at the entrance to Lake Quary. This is not, strictly speaking, a lake, but the expansion of the united beds of several affluents of the Solimoens, caused by the slowly-moving waters of the tributaries originally spreading out over the flat alluvial valley, into which they descend from the higher country of the early part of their course, instead of flowing directly into the full and swift current of the main river. NHenceforward most of the branch rivers exhibit these lake-like expansions of their beds. The same phenomenon takes a great variety of forms, and is shown, as already observed, in the Tapajos and other tributaries of the Lower Amazons. The mouth of the Quary, or the channel which connects the lake with the Solimoens, is only 2co or 300 yards broad, and has but a very feeble current. It is about half a mile long, and opens on a broad sheet of water which is not of imposing magnitude, as it is only a small portion of the lake, this having a rather sharp bend in its lower part, so that the whole extent is not visible at one view. There is a small village onthe shores

of the inner water, distant twelve hours’ journey by boat from the entrance. We anchored within the mouth, and visited in the montaria two or three settlers, whose houses are built in picturesque situations on the banks of the lower lake not far inwards. Several small but navigable streams or inlets here fall into the Quary; the land appeared to be of the highest fertility;we crossed a neck of land on foot, from one inlet to another, passing through extensive groves of coffee, planted in a loose manner amongst the forest trees. One of the settlers was a Gibraltar Jew, established here many years, and thoroughly reconciled to the ways of life of the semi-civilised inhabitants. We found him barefoot, with trousers turned up to the knee, busily employed with a number of Indians—men, women, and children—shelling and drying cacao, which grows wild in immense profusion in the neighbourhood. He seemed a lively and sensible fellow; was a great admirer of the country, the climate, and the people, and had no desire to return to Europe. This was the only Jew I met with on the upper river; there are several settled at Santarem, Cametd, and Parad, where, on account of their dealings being fairer than those of Portuguese traders, they do a good trade, and live on friendly terms with the Brazilians.

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