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RESIDENCE AT TARAPOTO 75
[The next letters to Mr. Bentham are nearly a
year later, and from these I give a few more extracts
of general or botanical interest.]
To Mr. George Bentham
TARAPOTO, PERU, March 10, 1857.
I am still a prisoner here, what with revolutions
on the one hand which render the Sierra very unsafe
to pass, and with the swollen rivers on the other ;
as soon as the latter abate we hope to be off.
... I cannot collect more, because excursions
to be profitable would be long and expensive, and
I want to save my money for my Ecuadorean
expedition ; so I am ruminating on dried herbs,
and working off arrears in my Journal.
To Mr. George Bentham
TARAPOTO, PERU, March 14, 1857.
I believe I told you some time ago of my inten-
tion of proceeding to Guayaquil in company with
two Spaniards (Don Ignacio Morey and Don Victoriano
Marrieta), who are going thither to purchase
hats. . . . We
had made our arrangements
going overland, but the revolution which has
come almost general throughout Peru, and which
thinks can be closed in less than six months,
nobody
renders the roads impassable. We have therefore
reverted to our original project of proceeding up
the Pastasa. . . . The
1-
advantage of thi.
that one thus avoids the yellow fever of the
of Peru and Ecuador, and its disadvantages