Page:A narrative of travels on the Amazon and Rio Negro.djvu/265

 1 85 1.] A LARGE SNAKE. 233

All cultivated products of the soil are so scarce that they meet with a ready sale at good prices, not only in the city of Barra, but also to passing traders, who have no time or means for cultivating them themselves. Tobacco, coffee, molasses, cotton, castor-oil, rice, maize, eggs, poultry, salt-meat, and fish, all kinds of oils, cheese, and butter, can always be sold, — the supply being invariably below the demand, — and, besides providing clothing and other extras, which in this climate are a mere trifle, might be made to produce a handsome profit. To do all this requires some experience and some industry ; but not a tithe of either which are necessary to get a bare living at home.

Leaving this pleasant place about midday, we proceeded slowly on. One of my best Indians fell ill of fever and ague ; and, a few days after, another was attacked. It was in vain attempting, at any sitio or village, to get men to help me on the rest of my voyage ; no offer of extra wages would induce them to leave their houses ; all had some excuse of occupation or illness, so we were forced to creep on as well as we could. Two days below the Falls I bought a smaller canoe of a Portuguese trader, to ascend the Uaupes, and moved my cargo into it, leaving that of Senhor Lima with the other canoe, to be sent for afterwards. At Camanau, I with much difficulty, and some delay, procured a pilot and another Indian, to go with me to Sao Gabriel. There, after another day's delay, I found two Indians, who agreed to go as far as Sao Joaquim ; and after keeping me waiting three or four hours beyond the time appointed, absconded at night from the sitio where we slept, having been previously paid double wages for the whole distance. Here, however, I was lucky enough to get three more in place of the two rogues ; but as another of my Indians had now fallen ill, we still had few enough for passing the numerous rapids and rocks with which the river is obstructed.

One day we found, coiled up on the bank, a large Sucurujii, the first large snake I had met with, and as I was very anxious to secure it, to preserve the skin, I loaded my gun, and telling my Indians not to let it escape, fired. It remained motionless some time, as if stunned 6y the shock, and then slowly began to uncoil, turning its head down towards the water, but evidently so much injured as to be unable to move its body on land. In vain I cried to the Indians to secure it ;