The chief feature of the Lower Amazon is its vast expanse of smooth water, of a pale yellowish colour, often bearing on its bosom detached islets of floating vegetation. Sometimes the timid stag takes refuge upon one of these treacherous islands, when pursued by the fierce jaguar; and the hunter and his prey, thus entrapped, are carried out to sea together. At morn and even, flocks of parrots and yellow macaws fly backwards and forwards, uttering their hoarse cries; while all night long the screams of gulls and terns sweep over the sandy banks, where they make their home. Now and then, dolphins and sea-cows show their backs above water, as they glide up the stream. Huge alligators, with open jaws, are basking in the sun on the banks, or leisurely swimming across the river.

The Rio Negro, the largest northern tributary of the Amazon, has a course not much inferior to that of the Danube, the greatest river of Central Europe. Rising in the highlands of New Granada, and traversing the llanos of Venezuela, it has already, before reaching the Amazon, flowed over fifteen hundred miles. As one of its tributaries is an offshoot from the upper waters of the Orinoco, a complete circuit is established, uniting the basins of two mighty rivers in one vast system of interior navigation.