Grand River times. [volume] (Grand Haven, Mich.) 1851-18??, 1852-09-22
THE VALLEY OF THE AMAZON.

Of more than twice the size of the Mississ-
ippi valley, the valley of the Amazon is entire
ly inter-tropcal An everlasting summer reigns
there. Up to the very base of the Andes, the
river itself is navgable for vessels of the lar
gest class The Pennsylvania IA may go there.
A natural canal through Caciquiari connects
it with the Orinoco, giving fertility and drain
age to immense plains that cover two millions
square miles, it receives from the North and
South innumerable tributaries, which it is said,
afford an inland navigation up and down of not
less than seventy or eighty thousand miles in
extent.
Stretched out in a continuous line, the navi-
gable streams of that great watershed would
more than completely encircle the earth around
its largest girth.
All the climates of India are there. Indeed
we may say that from the mouth to the sources
of the Amazon, piled up one above the other,
and spread out Andean-like, over steppe after
steppe in beautiful unbroken succession, are all
the climates and all the soils, with the capacities
of productions that are 10 be found between
the regions Of everlasting summer and eternal
snow.
The valley of The Amazon is the place of
production for India-rnbber-an article OF COM
merce which has no parallel as to the increase
of demand it, save and except in the history
of our own great staple since the invention of
the cotton-gin. We all recollect when the only
uses, to which India-rubber was applied, were
to rub out pencil-marks and make trap-bols for
boys. But it is made into shoes and hats caps
and cloaks footballs and purses, ribbons and
cushions, boats, beds, tents and bags; into pom
toons for pushing armies across rivers, and into
camels for lifting ships over shoals. 1t is also
applied to q variety of other uses and purposes,
the mere enumeration Of which would be tedi-
Gus. New applications of it are continually
being made. Boundless forests of the Saringa
tree are found upon the banks Of this stream,
and the expectation of this gum from the mouth
of that river, is daily becoming business of
more and more value, in extent and in impor-
tance
In 1867, pontoons were made for the Brit
ish army III India and tents for the American
army in Mexico were made in New England
from the India-rubber of the Amazon 1t is the
best in the world The sugar cane is found
here in its most luxurant growth, and OF the
richest sacharine development. 1t requires to
be planted but once in twenty years.
There too are produced of excellent quality,
and in great profusion, coffee and tobacco, rice
and indigo, cocoa, and cotton, with drugs of vir-
tues the most rare, dyes of hues the most brill
liant, and spices of aroma the most exquisite.
Soils of the richest loam and the finest allu-
vions there. The climates of lndia,O of the Mo-
luccas and the Spice Islands are all there. And
there too, lying dormant, are the boundless ag-
ricultural and mineral capacities of the east and
west all clustered together.
If commerce were but once TO spread its
wings over that valley, the shadow of it would
be like the touch of the magician's wand: those
immense resources would spring right up into
life and activity. In the fine imagery of their
language, the Indians call the Amazon the
" King Of Rivers" it empties into the ocean
under the Line Now Look! Nature has
scoped out The land in Central America, and cut
the continent nearly in two there, that she might
plant between the mouth Of the 6 King Of Riv-
ers" and of the Father of Waters" an arm
of the sea capable of receiving the surplus pro-
duce which the two grandest river basing on
the face of the earth are some day to pour out
into the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea.
These two sheets of water form the great COM
mercial lap Of the South, of the Columbia on
the West, the st. Lawrence and those Of the
Atlantic seaboard on the East, excluding the
inhospitable regions of Patagonia on the South,
and Labrador on the North, and referring only
to the agricultural ATTITUDES, the two Americas
cover an area of land in round numbers of
about ten millions of square miles. To not
less than six OF this ten, this sea and gulf are
the natural outlet. OF this six, about two
thirds are inter-tropica, producing variety of
articles 10 which the other parts of the CONT
nent never can offer competition. Nature has
SO ordered it.
With scarce the exception Of "ten miles
square," the whole of this immense caribbean
water shed which is nearly double the area of
Europe, is composed Of fine, rich, arabic land.
The ranless coast of Peru, the sandy plains of
lower California, the great salt desert of the
North and the Sahara-lke desert of Atacama at
the South all lie without it: they fall within
the other four Of the ten millions. They are
unorabe, and therefore as they are unfit for cul-
tvaton, they should be with this classification
with the unhospitable regions of Pat
agonia and Labrador.
So chasing these barren places, we discover
the startling fact, that these two rivers are the
true natural outlets, and the caribbean Sea and
the Gulf Of Mexico are the natural receptacles,
for the surplus produce of nearly three-fourths
of the whole extent Of arabic land in the two
Americas. Moreover these two marine basins
of the South are also the natural outlet of the
North and South for the productions of not less
than 70 deg. of latitude. The Missippi runs
south and crosses parallels of latitude it con-
sequently traverses great diversity of climates,