Page:The naturalist on the River Amazons 1863 v2.djvu/397

 beiju, or mandioca-cakes. The women are not allowed to taste of the meat, but forced to content themselves with sopping pieces of cake in the liquor.

I obtained a little information here concerning the inhabitants of the banks of the Issá, a stream 700 miles in length, which, having its sources at the foot of the volcanoes near Pasto, in New Granada, enters the Amazons about twenty miles to the west of Tunantins. I once met a mulatto of Pasto and his wife, who had descended this river from its source to its mouth. They lost all their luggage in passing the cataracts; but found, after the first fifteen days of their journey (about 150 miles), no more obstructions to navigation down to the Solimoens. It is not so unhealthy a river as the Japurá; but the natives are much less friendly to the whites than those inhabiting that river. To the distance of about 400 miles from Tunantins, its banks are now almost destitute of inhabitants. A few half-civilised and peaceable Passés, Jurís, and Shumánas, are settled near its mouth; but higher up the Marietés occupy the domain, and towards the frontiers of New Granada, Miránhas are the only Indians met with, whose territory extends overland thence to the Japurá. The Marietés and Miránhas have been for many years constantly at war, and the depopulation of the country is owing partly to this circumstance, and partly to diseases introduced by the whites. These wars are not carried on by the whole of each tribe at once, but in a series of partial hostilities between separate hordes or clans. The hordes of each nation live apart; indeed these tribes have no villages, but are scattered in families