and Mexiana, would have found an _embouchure_ of some fifty leagues
across, but it would also have bet with the bar of the prororoca,
that terrible eddy which, for the three days preceding the new or
full moon, takes but two minutes instead of six hours to raise the
river from twelve to fifteen feet above ordinary high-water mark.
This is by far the most formidable of tide-races. Most fortunately
the lower branch, known as the Canal of Breves, which is the natural
area of the Para, is not subject to the visitations of this terrible
phenomenon, and its tides are of a more regular description. Araujo,
the pilot, was quite aware of this. He steered, therefore, into the
midst of magnificent forests, here and there gliding past island
covered with muritis palms; and the weather was so favorable that
they did not experience any of the storms which so frequently rage
along this Breves Canal.
A few days afterward the jangada passed the village of the same name,
which, although built on the ground flooded for many months in the
year, has become, since 1845, an important town of a hundred houses.
Throughout these districts, which are frequented by Tapuyas, the
Indians of the Lower Amazon become more and more commingled with the
white population, and promise to be completely absorbed by them.
And still the jangada continued its journey down the river. Here, at
the risk of entanglement, it grazed the branches of the mangliers,
whose roots stretched down into the waters like the claws of gigantic
crustaceans; then the smooth trunks of the paletuviers, with their
pale-green foliage, served as the resting-places for the long poles
of the crew as they kept the raft in the strength of the current.
Then came the Tocantins, whose waters, due to the different rivers of
the province of Goyaz, mingle with those of the Amazon by an
_embouchure_ of great size, then the Moju, then the town of Santa
Ana.
Majestically the panorama of both banks moved along without a pause,
as though some ingenious mechanism necessitated its unrolling in the
opposite direction to that of the stream.
Already numerous vessels descending the river, ubas, egariteas,
vigilandas, pirogues of all builds, and small coasters from the lower
districts of the Amazon and the Atlantic seaboard, formed a
procession with the giant raft, and seemed lke sloops beside some
might man-of-war.
At length here appeared on the left Santa Maria de Belem do Para–the
“town” as they call it in that country–with its picturesque lines of
white houses at many different levels, its convents nestled among the
palm-trees, the steeples of its cathedral and of Nostra Senora de
Merced, and the flotilla of its brigantines, brigs, and barks, which
form its commercial communications with the old world.
The hearts of the passengers of the giant raft beat high. At length
they were coming to the end of the voyage which they had thought they
would never reach. While the arrest of Joam detained them at Manaos,
halfway on their journey, could they ever have hoped to see the
capital of the province of Para?
It was in the course of this day, the 15th of October–four months
and a half after leaving the fazenda of Iquitos–that, as they
rounded a sharp bend in the river, Belem came into sight.
The arrival of the jangada had been signaled for some days. The whole
town knew the story of Joam Dacosta. They came forth to welcome him,
and to him and his people accorded a most sympathetic reception.
Hundreds of craft of all sorts conveyed them to the fazender, and
soon the jangada was invaded by all those who wished to welcome the
return of their compatriot after his long exile. Thousands of
sight-seers–or more correctly speaking, thousands of friends crowded
on to the floating village as soon as it came to its moorings, and it
was vast and solid enough to support the entire population. Among
those who hurried on board one of the first pirogues had brought
Madame Valdez. Manoel’s mother was at last able to clasp to her arms
the daughter whom her son had chosen. If the good lady had not been