Oregon and Eldorado; or, Romance of the RiversBulfinch, Thomas
History
Oregon and Eldorado; or, Romance of the Rivers
Bulfinch, Thomas
Amazon River; Columbia River; El Dorado; Lewis and Clark Expedition (1804-1806); Oregon -- Discovery and exploration
"On the 9th of January, we arrived at Matari, a miserable little
settlement of Múra Indians. Here we again anchored, and went ashore. The
place consisted of about twenty slightly built mud-hovels, and had a
most forlorn appearance, notwithstanding the luxuriant forest in its
rear. The absence of the usual cultivated trees and plants gave the
place a naked and poverty-stricken aspect. I entered one of the hovels,
where several women were employed cooking a meal. Portions of a large
fish were roasting over a fire made in the middle of the low chamber;
and the entrails were scattered about the floor, on which the women,
with their children, were squatted. These had a timid, distrustful
expression of countenance; and their bodies were begrimed with black
mud, which is smeared over the skin as a protection against musquitoes.
The children were naked: the women wore petticoats of coarse cloth,
stained in blotches with _murixi_, a dye made from the bark of a tree.
One of them wore a necklace of monkey's teeth. There were scarcely any
household utensils: the place was bare, with the exception of two dirty
grass hammocks hung in the corners. I missed the usual mandioc-sheds
behind the house, with their surrounding cotton, cacao, coffee, and
lemon trees. Two or three young men of the tribe were lounging about the
low, open doorway. They were stoutly-built fellows, but less
well-proportioned than the semi-civilized Indians of the Lower Amazons
generally are. The gloomy savagery, filth, and poverty of the people in
this place made me feel quite melancholy; and I was glad to return to
the canoe."
MARAUÁ TRIBE.
A pleasanter picture is presented by the Indians of the Marauá tribe.
Our traveller thus describes a visit to them:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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