Besides these common stores, every sailor has a private stock, consisting, generally, of a bag of _tiste_, (parched corn, ground with cacao and sugar,) which is mixed with water, making a nourishing and most delicious beverage. He has also a few cakes of _chancaca_, or, as he calls it, _dulce_, i. e., unrefined sugar, which he eats in its raw state. A few stalks of sugar-cane are almost always to be found stowed away amongst the freight, upon which the men entertain themselves after the anchor is cast for the night. In fact, when they are not sleeping or at the oars, they are eating or smoking, and are as loquacious as a flock of parrots. A stranger would suppose they were constantly on the verge of a general quarrel. Yet, like the _arrieros_ of Mexico, these men are, with few exceptions, good-tempered, honest, and trustworthy, and have an _esprit de corps_ amongst them which is carefully kept up. They are governed by certain conventional rules, which none dare violate; and their quarrels are generally referred to the decision of the older and more influential individuals of their own number. It was nearly sunset when the meal was finished; the boat was pushed out in the stream, and we were once more on our way. We had now come to that part of the river where the long, broad reaches commence, and were moving slowly and almost noiselessly along in the shadow of the trees, on the tops of which the sunlight was shining, when suddenly, as if by a simultaneous impulse, the sweeps were raised, and each sailor reverently took off his hat,—the hour of the _oracion_ had come. The bowman commenced the evening chaunt, the chorus of which was taken up by the entire crew, with a precision, in respect to cadence and time, which could only result from long practice. There was certainly something impressive in the apparent devotion of these rude men, apart from the effect of the melody itself, caught up as it was by the echoes, and prolonged in the forest solitudes. Yet the impression was destroyed by one of those freaks in which the natives of this country seem to delight, and which constantly outrage the traveller’s sense of propriety. No sooner was the chaunt concluded, than all hands gave a shout, and bending to the sweeps, pulled like madmen for a few minutes, and then as suddenly stopped again, and broke out in a paroxysm of laughter.