Page:The naturalist on the River Amazons 1863 v2.djvu/140

Tushaúa and his people. A few words served to explain my errand on the river; he comprehended at once why white men should admire and travel to collect the beautiful birds and animals of his country, and neither he nor his people spoke a single word about trading, or gave us any trouble by coveting the things we had brought. He related to me the events of the preceding three days. The Parárauátes were a tribe of intractable savages with whom the Mundurucús have been always at war. They had no fixed abode, and of course made no plantations, but passed their lives like the wild beasts, roaming through the forest, guided by the sun: wherever they found themselves at night-time there they slept, slinging their bast hammocks, which are carried by the women, to the trees. They ranged over the whole of the interior country, from the head waters of the Itapacurá (a branch of the Tapajos flowing from the east, whose sources lie in about 7° south latitude) to the banks of the Curuá (about 3° south latitude), and from the Mundurucú settlements on the Tapajos (55° west longtitude) to the Pacajaz (50° west longitude). They cross the streams which lie in their course in bark canoes, which they make on reaching the water, and cast away after landing on the opposite side. The tribe is very numerous, but the different hordes obey only their own chieftains. The Mundurucús of the upper Tapajos have an expedition on foot against them at the present time, and the Tushaúa supposed that the horde which had just been chased from his maloca were fugitives from that direction. There were about a hundred of them—including men, women, and chil-