It is to be found on the banks of almost every tributary of the great streams of the Montaña; but a great many of these are not worked, on account of the savages living on their banks, who frequently attack the parties that come to gather it. On the "Pangoa" are the Campas; on the "Pachitea," the "Aguaytia," and the "Pisque," are the "Cashibos;" and the whole southern border of the Amazon, from the mouth of the Ucayali to that of the Yavari, is inhabited by the "Mayorunas;" all savages, and averse to intercourse with the white man. The same is the case on the "Tigreyacu," where there is said to be much sarsaparilla. Padre Calvo, the president of the Missions at Sarayacu, told me that, although he has the exclusive right, by order of the prefect, of collecting all the sarsaparilla on the Ucayali and its tributaries, he could not, if I were willing to pay any price, supply me with more than three hundred arrobas per annum, on account of the difficulty of getting laborers who are willing to brave the attacks of the savages.
I have estimated the annual cost of running a small steamer between Loreto, the frontier port of Peru and Chasuta, a distance of eight hundred miles, entirely within the Peruvian territory, at twenty thousand dollars, including the establishment of blacksmiths' and carpenters' shops at Nauta for her repairs. According to the estimate of Arebalo, (and I judge that he is very nearly correct,) the value of the imports and exports to and from Brazil is twenty thousand dollars annually. I have no doubt that the appearance of a steamer in these waters would at once double the value; for it would, in the first place, convert the thousand men who are now employed in the fetching and carrying of the articles of trade into producers, and would give a great impulse to trade by facilitating it. A loaded canoe takes eighty days to ascend these eight hundred miles. A steamer will do it in twelve, giving ample time to take in wood, to land and receive cargo at the various villages on the river, and to lay by at night. When the river becomes better known she can run for a large part of the night, and thus shorten her time nearly one-half. Men shrink at the eighty days in a canoe, when they will jump at the twelve in a steamer.
The steamer will also increase commerce and trade by creating artificial wants; men will travel who did not travel before; articles of luxury—such as Yankee clocks, cheap musical instruments, &c.—will be introduced, and the Indians will work to obtain them; and, in short, when the wonders that the steamboat and railroad have accomplished are taken into consideration, I shall not be thought rash in predicting that in one year from the time of the appearance of the steamer, Arebalo's twenty thousand dollars will be made forty thousand.
Thus we shall have twenty thousand dollars' worth of goods going up from Loreto to Chasuta, paying at least one hundred per cent.; and twenty thousand dollars going down, paying another hundred per cent.; giving to the steamboat company (who would monopolize the trade) forty thousand dollars a year, against twenty thousand dollars of expenses.
There would be no difficulty in getting a supply of fuel. My Peruvian steamer would have to make her way slowly up, for the first time, by collecting and cutting up the abundant drift-wood on the islands; but she could readily contract with the governors of the thirty-six villages between Pará and Chasuta for a regular supply. The Brazilian government has an organized and enlisted corps of laborers, under the orders of the military commandants, and I should suppose would be willing to employ them in furnishing wood, on account of the great advantages to be derived from the increase of trade. The Indians of the Peruvian villages are entirely obedient to their governors; and a sufficient number of them may always be had, at wages of twelve and a half cents per day, with about three cents more for their maintenance. This amount of wages may be reduced one-half by paying them in articles for their consumption, bought at Pará or brought from the United States.
The only difficulty that I have in my calculations is that I know there are not forty thousand dollars in the whole province; its productions must find their way to the Pacific, on the one hand, and to the Atlantic, on the other, before they can be converted into money. My steamer, therefore, to be enabled to buy and sell, must communicate at Loreto with a larger steamer, plying between that place and Barra, at the mouth of the Rio Negro, a distance of eight hundred and forty miles; and this with another still larger, between Barra and Pará, a distance of a thousand miles.
These three steamers (however much I may be out of my calculations regarding the one confined to the Peruvian territory) could not fail to enrich their owners; for they would entirely monopolize the trade of the river, which is fairly measured by the imports and exports of Pará, which amounted in 1851 to two millions of dollars.
These two millions are now brought down to Pará, and carried away from Pará, (with the exception of what is consumed in the city,) by clumsy, inefficient river-craft, which would vanish from the main stream at the first triumphant whistle of the engine. These would, however, until the profits justified the putting on of more steamers, find ample employment in bringing down and depositing upon the banks of the main stream the productions of the great tributaries.
I can imagine the waking-up of the people on the event of the establishment of steamboat navigation on the Amazon. I fancy I can hear the crash of the forest falling to make room for the cultivation of cotton, cocoa, rice, and sugar, and the sharp shriek of the saw, cutting into boards the beautiful and valuable woods of the country; that I can see the gatherers of India-rubber and copaiba redoubling their efforts, to be enabled to purchase the new and convenient things that shall be presented at the door of their huts in the wilderness; and even the wild Indian finding the way from his pathless forest to the steamboat depôt to exchange his collections of vanilla, spices, dyes, drugs, and gums, for the things that would take his fancy—ribbons, beads, bells, mirrors, and gay trinkets.
Brazil and Peru have entered into arrangements, and bound themselves by treaty, to appropriate money towards the establishment of steamboat navigation on the Amazon. This is well. It is doing something towards progress; but it is the progress of a denizen of their own forests—the sloth. Were they to follow the example lately set by the republics of the La Plata, and throw open their rivers to the commerce of the world, then the march of improvement would be commensurate with the importance of the act; and these countries would grow in riches and power with the rapidity of the vegetation of their own most fertile lands.