For over two hours we stopped here, fighting these little fiends, which swarmed about us in perfect clouds, while the pirate and the _comisario_ related to the two lieutenants a full account of the "brilliant victory" gained at La Unión. Meanwhile, I learned that the name of the place was Arica, and that it was situated about 1° 43' 9" south of the equator and 71° 53' 36" west of Greenwich.
At last the enthralling tale of the "victory" was finished, and we set out up the Igaraparaná, for, it seemed, the worthy Zubiaur had been so complimented upon his bravery by the two officers that he resolved to go and inform some other friends of his up that river of the same gallant deed. We were all glad to set out in some direction, for the gnats did not trouble us much when the launch was in motion.
The _Liberal_ continued the ascent until a late hour, when we retired. The next morning when I awoke, I perceived that we were anchored off another establishment, which I was informed by Albarracín was Santa Julia, one of the chief sections of the "civilising company" in Igaraparaná district. The two or three small huts were of split-palm with a thatched roof, while the clearing around them was small and neglected-looking. Santa Julia, Ghiorzo informed me, is the shipping-port for the section Abisinia, some twelve hours' walk inland.
As we were taking on a quantity of firewood, another launch, the _Cosmopolita_, appeared and came up alongside of us. Here Sánchez was overjoyed to meet once more with his companion exiles, who had left El Encanto about a month previously on this launch, bound for Iquitos. Instead of going there, however, the _Cosmopolita_ had gone up to La Chorrera, stopped there all this time, and was now about to accompany the _Liberal_. Although we saw them only for a few moments, the meeting cheered up Sánchez immensely, while I took an instant liking to them.
La Chorrera, the headquarters of the Igaraparaná district, they described as being larger than El Encanto, and situated on the borders of a little lake at the head of navigation on the Igaraparaná. They furthermore informed me that La Chorrera was about twenty-four hours' run above Santa Julia.
At Santa Julia, La Chorrera, and the other stations along the banks of the Lower and Central Igaraparaná, the victims are a tribe of aborigines known as the Boras, several of whom I saw in a practically naked condition at Santa Julia. These Indians are distinct from the Huitotos, and speak a dialect of their own called Bora. They are of a lighter colour and much more intelligent and fierce than the former; thus they do not submit so sheepishly to the persecutions and atrocities of the "civilising company," and many of them have escaped to the left bank of the River Caquetá, out of reach of their _verdugos_.[98]