Indians may
reside for years within less than a league's distance of each other,
without either being aware of the other's existence! Scarcely any
intercourse is carried on, or excursions made, except by the rivers--for
they are the only roads--and where two of these run parallel, although
they may be only at a short distance from each other, people residing on
one may never think of crossing to the other.

Notwithstanding that no Indians had yet appeared to disturb them, there
was no certainty that these might not arrive any day, and treat them as
enemies. On this account, Don Pablo and Dona Isidora were never without
a feeling of uneasiness.

After mutual deliberation, therefore, they resolved not to prolong their
stay beyond the early part of spring, when they would carry out their
original design of building a _balza_ raft, and commit themselves to the
great river, which, according to all appearance, and to Guapo's
confident belief, flowed directly to the Amazon. Guapo had never either
descended or ascended it himself, and on their first arrival was not so
sure about its course; but after having gone down to its banks, and
examined its waters, his recollections revived, and he remembered many
accounts which he had heard of it from Indians of his own tribe. He had
no doubt but it was the same which, under the name of the "Purus," falls
into the Amazon between the mouths of the Madeira and the Coary.

Upon this stream, therefore, in a few months they would embark. But
these intervening months were not spent in idleness. Although the
season for bark-gathering was past, another source of industry presented
itself. The bottom lands of the great river were found to be covered
with a network of underwood, and among this underwood the principal
plant was a well-known briar, _Smilax officinalis_. This is the
creeping plant that yields the celebrated "sarsaparilla;" and Don Pablo,
having made an analysis of some roots, discovered it to be the most
valuable species--for it is to be remembered, that, like the cinchona, a
whole genus, or rather several genera, furnish the article of commerce.
The briar which produces the sarsaparilla is a tall creeping plant,
which throws out a large number of long wrinkled roots of a uniform
thickness, and about the size of a goose-quill. Nothing is required
further than digging and dragging these roots out of the ground, drying
them a while, and then binding them in bundles with a s