CHAP. X. PROVINCE OF MATTO GROSSO. (continued 2)

Along the banks of the Madeira and the Itenez, the only parts of this comarca that are well known, abundance of all kinds of game are met with. Amongst other notable trees that are seen in the large woods here adjacent to those rivers, is a species of palm, called ubussu, the flower of which supplies an elastic fibrous peel, so interwoven, that it appears like the production of the loom, and serves as a cap to the Indian. The curagiru affords a fine scarlet dye. The cedar is common and very thick, but, like a great many other trees of excellent timber, of no use, from the almost total want of population capable of appreciating their value.

In this comarca is situated the fort of Principe da Beira, erected in the year 1776, upon the right margin of the Guapore, one league below the mouth of the Tunama, in 12° 20′ south latitude, and one mile above the situation where the first governor of the province established the fort of Conceiçao. The land upon which it stands is never inundated by the river, which rises here at the period of the floods near thirty feet, and covers with lakes a great portion of the frontier lands, thus subjecting the garrison to fevers. Three hundred and fifty miles is computed from this fort to the capital; and by the river, upwards of six hundred, so considerable are its windings.

Near this fort there is a populous aldeia of Christian Indians; and at a short distance higher up another, called Leonil, similarly inhabited. The whole cultivate a diversity of the necessaries of life. They also hunt and fish.

Five miles below the confluence of the Guapore with the Mamore, upon the margin of the river Madeira, near the fall of Ribeiram, is the new parish of St. Joze. The inhabitants are composed of various nations, with some whites, and are abundantly supplied with fish, game, and the necessaries of life peculiar to the country.

District of Arinos.

This comarca, which receives its name from the river that waters it and divides it into two unequal portions, is confined on the north by Tapajonia, on the west by Juruenna, on the south by Cuiaba, and on the east by Tappiraquia. Its length is equal to that of the preceding district, and its width, from east to west, is nearly three hundred miles. A portion of the most southern part of it is commonly called Varges, or Vargeria, where, many years ago, a colony of adventurers settled, but soon afterwards abandoned it, in consequence of the annoyance they experienced from the Indians, and the want of success attending their partial operations in mining.

It is a district very little known, although ascertained to be auriferous. Those who have navigated by the Arinos and Tapajos, state, that it is washed by numerous rivers, almost the whole of which contribute their waters to the enlargement of the two preceding. Its aspect is varied by mountains, and, as far as the eye of the explorer has extended, contains luxuriant and noble woods.

Amongst the nations under whose dominion it hitherto has remained, the Baccuris are well known, who possess the first territory irrigated by the Arinos; also the Manbares, who are wanderers in the land traversed by the river Taburuhina, the first remarkable confluent of the Juruenna on the eastern bank. The Appiacas occupy the centre of the comarca, and have an aldeia with high houses upon the right border of the river Arinos. They are a ferocious people, live by hunting and fishing, and with axes of stone they prepare the timber for the construction of their houses and their canoes. Northward of the last dwell the Cabahibas, who speak the same idiom. It is to be hoped that these tribes, when they begin to experience the advantage of iron instruments and clothing, which they can derive alone from the navigators of this river, will become more civilized, and contribute to the cultivation of those neglected districts.

The river Arinos, which took the name of a nation at present unknown, rises near the origins of the Paraguay, and falls into the sublime Amazon under the name of the Tapajos. In 1805, Joam Vieges accomplished on this river almost the same voyage as its first discoverer, Captain Joam de Souza e Azevedo; and in 1812, Antonio Thomé de Franca also descended by it, and in the following year proceeded up with his fleet of canoes, laden in the city of Para, being the first individual who performed this voyage, unquestionably less laborious and much shorter than that by the river Madeira.

The first considerable river united with the Arinos by the right border is the Rio Preto, which rises between the Paraguay and the Cuiaba, and, by the left, the Sumidor, which originates a little to the north of the Sipotuba. This name is given to it in consequence of disappearing, (after a course of many leagues,) beneath a rock, from whence it issues at no great distance below. A canoe confided to the current at the upper side soon appears at the other. Captain Joam de Souza descended by the Sumidor, and others by the Rio Preto embarking upon it at a situation about ten miles distant from the arraial of Diamantino.

It appears singular that none of these navigators descended by the Arinos from its upper part, which, when it receives the Rio Petro, is larger than that river. All the canoes with which those rivers have been navigated were constructed of the trunks of trees produced upon their margins, demonstrating sufficiently the substantial nature of the soil, and its adaptation to all the purposes of agriculture.

In twenty-eight hours of navigation, (performed in the course of four days,) from the bar of Rio Preto to that of the Sumidor, Viegas met with nineteen rivers, yet nameless, and almost the whole entered the Arinos by the right. The largest is a few leagues above the mouth of the Sumidor, which latter is little inferior to the Arinos.

After an extensive course, the Arinos loses the name, upon incorporating with the Juruenna, the united waters forming the Tapajos, properly Tapayo, from a nation of this name, who inhabited its margins further to the northward. The first considerable river united with it by the right is the Azevedo, so denominated after its discoverer. At a great distance lower down is the embouchure of another river on the right, thirty fathoms in width. A little further two morros approximate, and contract its bed, and an elevated island divides it into two channels, through which its waters flow with equal rapidity.

From hence about three hours’ voyage is a cascade of considerable altitude, the murmuring noise and evaporation arising from which announce another of the wonders of nature long before it becomes visible.

Beyond this interesting object is discovered the mouth of another river, apparently at least equal to the Tapajos, which is here very wide; but is however almost immediately reduced by two lateral morros to a little more than one hundred fathoms of width, and after a short space again presents a more than ordinary expansion, and receives also by the right margin another river of thirty fathoms in width. It is about three hours’ navigation from the mouth of one river to the other.

Upon the margin of the Rio Preto, at the place where the canoes commence their voyage, a povoaçoe is now establishing for the accommodation of the navigators of the Tapajos.

District of Tappiraquia.

This comarca derives its name from one of its tribes of Indians, and is limited on the north by Xingutania, on the west by the river Xingu, which separates it from the preceding district, on the south by Bororonia, and on the east by the river Araguaya, which divides it from Nova Beira. It comprises the same length as the Arinos from north to south, and upwards of two hundred miles from east to west.

With the exception of the eastern boundary, along the Araguaya, it is unknown, for want of the relations of those who penetrated into it at an earlier period. Amongst other nations who have this district under their dominion, are the Guapindaias; the Tappiraques, who afford it the name; the Ximbiuas, and the Aracis.

The southern part contains various rivers. The most remarkable are the Boys, Barahu, Irahiras, and Xanacy, all arms of the great river Xingu, but it is not known which is its principal head.

Those that originate more to the east form the river St. Joao, which enters the Araguaya above fifty miles north of the river Mortes. To the south of its embouchure there is a large lake which communicates with it, as well as with the river that receives it, during the periodical floods.

Seventy miles below the river St. Joao, the Vertentes falls also into the Araguaya, after an extensive course. A little to the north of the re-union of the two arms of the Araguaya, which form the large island of St. Anna, is the mouth of the river Ponta, not very considerable; and a short distance lower down that of the Tappiraques, so called from its originating in the territory of the Indians of the same name.

To the north of the river Tappiraques, upon the margin of the Araguaya, in the space of eighty miles, were founded the three aldeias of Lappa, Almeida, and Semancelhe, for the habitation of various families of the Ximbiua tribe, reduced to peace in the year 1775, who soon afterwards adopted their former rude mode of living. They are a people passionately fond of hunting and fishing, the produce of which constitute their principal subsistence. The first certanistas who penetrated into these districts, killing some partridges, found in their crops granites with gold, a proof of the existence of that precious metal here, and which may stimulate future exertions in the desirable object of introducing cultivation and Christianity into extensive territories yet uncolonized.

The great fertility of these lands, and the facility with which their productions might be transported by their noble rivers, particularly towards Gram Para, also concur in raising the expectation that some effectual measures will be adopted to civilize the savage wanderers, and convert the widely extending woods to the purposes of such culture as the soil, now overshadowed with constant gloom, may be found to be best adapted.