which is here about five hundred feet across, there had been
established for many years this farm, homestead, or, to use the
expression of the country, _"fazenda,"_ then in the height of its
prosperity. The Nanay with its left bank bounded it to the north for
about a mile, and for nearly the same distance to the east it ran
along the bank of the larger river. To the west some small rivulets,
tributaries of the Nanay, and some lagoons of small extent, separated
it from the savannah and the fields devoted to the pasturage of the
cattle.

It was here that Joam Garral, in 1826, twenty-six years before the
date when our story opens, was received by the proprietor of the
fazenda.

This Portuguese, whose name was Magalhaës, followed the trade of
timber-felling, and his settlement, then recently formed, extended
for about half a mile along the bank of the river.

There, hospitable as he was, like all the Portuguese of the old race,
Magalhaës lived with his daughter Yaquita, who after the death of her
mother had taken charge of his household. Magalhaës was an excellent
worker, inured to fatigue, but lacking education. If he understood
the management of the few slaves whom he owned, and the dozen Indians
whom he hired, he showed himself much less apt in the various
external requirements of his trade. In truth, the establishment at
Iquitos was not prospering, and the affairs of the Portuguese were
getting somewhat embarrassed.

It was under these circumstances that Joam Garral, then twenty-two
years old, found himself one day in the presence of Magalhaës. He had