Page:The naturalist on the River Amazons 1863 v2.djvu/119

 Italian monk, was away at another station called Wishitúba, two days' journey farther up the river. Report said of him that he had no zeal for religion or devotion to his calling, but was occupied in trading, using the Indian proselytes to collect salsaparilla and so forth, with a view to making a purse wherewith to retire to his own country. The semi-civilised Indians, who speak the Tupí language, called him Pai tucúra, or Father Grasshopper: his peaked hood having a droll resemblance to the pointed head of the insect. I afterwards became acquainted with Fré Isidoro, and found him a man of superior intelligence and ability. He complained much of the ill treatment the Indians received at the hands of traders and the Brazilian civil authorities, and said that he and his predecessors had incessantly to contend for the rights secured to the aborigines by the laws of the empire. The plan of assembling families in formal, blank-looking settlements, like this of Santa Cruz, seemed to me very ill chosen. The Indians would be happier in their scattered wigwams, embowered in foliage on the banks of shady rivulets where they prefer to settle when left to themselves.

A narrow belt of wood runs behind the village: beyond this is an elevated barren campo, with a clayey and gravelly soil. To the south the coast country is of a similar description; a succession of scantily-wooded hills, bare grassy spaces, and richly-timbered hollows. We traversed forest and campo in various directions during three days without meeting with monkeys, or indeed with anything that repaid us the time and trouble. The soil of the district appeared too dry; at this season