ys of
Spanish adventure a prosperous city under the name of "Sevilla de Oro,"
is now a cluster of huts on the banks of the Upano. Its trade is in
tobacco, vanilla, canela, wax, and copal. The Spaniards took the trouble
to transplant some genuine cinnamon-trees from Ceylon to this locality,
and they flourished for a time.

On the 30th of October we left Quito on our march across the continent,
by the way of the Napo wilderness. The preparations for our departure,
however, commenced long before that date. To leave Quito in any
direction is the work of time. But to plunge into that _terra incognita_
"el Oriente," where for weeks, perhaps months, we should be lost to the
civilized world and cut off from all resources, east or west, demanded
more calculation and providence than a voyage round the world.

We were as long preparing for our journey to the Amazon as in making it.
In the first place, not a man in Quito could give us a single item of
information on the most important and dangerous part of our route.
Quitonians are not guilty of knowing any thing about trans-Andine
affairs or "oriental" geography. From a few petty traders who had, to
the amazement of their fellow-citizens, traversed the forest and reached
the banks of the Napo, we gleaned some information which was of service.
But on the passage down the Napo from Santa Rosa to the Maranon, a
distance of over five hundred miles, nobody had any thing to say except
the delightful intelligence that in all probability, if we escaped the
fever, we would be murdered by the savages. The information we received
was about as definite and reliable as Herndon obtained respecting any
tributary to the Lower Amazon: "It runs a long way up: it has rapids;
savages live upon its banks; every thing grows there." From M. Gillette,
a Swiss gentleman trading at Para in Moyabamba hats, we learned about
the movements of the Peruvian steamer on the Maranon; but how long it
would take us to cross the mountains and the forest, and descend the
river, we must find out by trial.

The commissary department was of primal importance. As, from all we
could learn, we could not depend upon obtaining supplies from the
Indians or with our guns,[107] it was necessary to take provisions to
last till we should reach the Maranon. But how long we should be in the
forest and on the river, or what allowance to make for probable delays,
it was impossible to prophesy. The utmost caution and forethought were