I embarked at Liverpool with Mr Wallace in a small trading vessel on the 26th of April 1848 and after a swift passage from the Irish Channel to the equator arrived on the 26th of May off Salinas This is the pilot station for vessels bound to Para the only port of entry to the vast region watered by the Amazons It is a small village formerly a missionary settlement of the Jesuits situated a few miles to the eastward of the Para River Here the ship anchored in the open sea at a distance of six miles from the shore the shallowness of the water far out around the mouth of the great river not permitting in safety a nearer approach and the signal was hoisted for a pilot It was with deep interest that my companion and myself both now about to see and examine the beauties of a tropical country for the first time gazed on the land where I at least eventually spent eleven of the best years of my life To the eastward the country was not remarkable in appearance being slightly undulating with bare sand hills and scattered trees but to the westward stretching towards the mouth of the river we could see through the captain s glass a long line of forest rising apparently out of the water a densely packed mass of tall trees broken into groups and finally into single trees as it dwindled away in the distance This was the frontier in this direction of the great primaeval forest characteristic of this region which contains so many wonders in its recesses and clothes the whole surface of the country for two thousand miles from this point to the foot of the Andes

The Naturalist of the River Amazons PDF

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