Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 2 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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Unfortunately, The Toldo Or Roof Of Leaves,
That Covered This Lattice-Work, Was So Low That We Were Obliged To
Lie
down, without seeing anything, or, if seated, to sit nearly double.
The necessity of carrying the canoe across the
Rapids, and even from
one river to another; and the fear of giving too much hold to the
wind, by making the toldo higher, render this construction necessary
for vessels that go up towards the Rio Negro. The toldo was intended
to cover four persons, lying on the deck or lattice-work of
brush-wood; but our legs reached far beyond it, and when it rained
half our bodies were wet. Our couches consisted of ox-hides or
tiger-skins, spread upon branches of trees, which were painfully felt
through so thin a covering. The fore part of the boat was filled with
Indian rowers, furnished with paddles, three feet long, in the form of
spoons. They were all naked, seated two by two, and they kept time in
rowing with a surprising uniformity, singing songs of a sad and
monotonous character. The small cages containing our birds and our
monkeys, the number of which augmented as we advanced, were hung some
to the toldo and others to the bow of the boat. This was our
travelling menagerie. Notwithstanding the frequent losses occasioned
by accidents, and above all by the fatal effects of exposure to the
sun, we had fourteen of these little animals alive at our return from
the Cassiquiare.
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