it pours into the sea that its current is noticed in the
ocean two hundred miles from the shore.

This fact is not so surprising when we learn that the main mouth of
this great river is fifty miles wide, that the river is four thousand
miles long, including its windings, and that, besides many smaller
branches, it has five tributaries, each over a thousand miles long,
and one over two thousand miles long, flowing into it.

Pinzon anchored in the mouth of the river, and found the natives
peaceful. In this respect they were unlike those he had met farther
south. They came out to his ships in a friendly way in their canoes.
But when Pinzon, a short time later, left the river, he cruelly carried
off thirty-six of the Indians who had been friendly to him.

While Pinzon's fleet was in the mouth of the river, it came a second
time near being wrecked.

Pinzon was, of course, in strange waters. He did not know that twice
each month the tide does not rise in the usual way, but rushes up the
mouth of the Amazon with great force. The tide, as a rule, is about
six hours in rising and six hours in falling. In the mouth of the Amazon,
however, at new moon and at full moon the tide swells to its limit
in two or three minutes. It comes as a wall of water, twelve or fifteen
feet high, followed by another wall of the same height. Often there
is a third wall of water, and at some seasons of the year there is
a fourth wall.

This peculiar rising of the tide is called the _bore_. The noise of
this rushing flood can be heard five or six miles off. It comes with
tremendous force, and sometimes uproots great trees along the banks.
During the few days when the tide rushes up the river in this way
vessels do not remain in the main channel, but anchor in coves and
protected places.

Pinzon, as we have said, did not know about the sudden rising of the
tide. His fleet was anchored in the main channel when the bore came,
and it dashed his vessels about like toy boats and almost wrecked them.

After repairing the damage done to his fleet, he made up his mind that
there was little gold to be found in those parts, and so he sailed
out of the mouth of the great river, and then turned northward along
the coast.

It may be of interest to know what befell Pinzon after he left the
mouth of the Amazon. We will tell you briefly.

He sailed along the coast to the northwest, and passed the mouth of
the Orinoco, another large river of South America. Ab