Page:RMBallantyne--Martin Rattler.djvu/184



THERE is a peculiar and very striking feature in the character of the great Amazon, which affects the distinctive appearance of that river and materially alters the manners and customs of those who dwell beside it. This peculiarity is the periodical overflow of its low banks ; and the part thus over- flowed is called the Gapo. It extends from a little above the town of Santarem up to the confines of Peru, a distance of about seventeen hundred miles, and varies in width from one to twenty miles; so that the country when inundated assumes in many places the appearance of an extensive lake with forest trees growing out of the water, and travellers may proceed many hundreds of miles in their canoes with- out once entering the main stream of the river. At this time the natives become almost aquatic animals. Several tribes of Indians inhabit the Gapo, such as