Some idea may be formed of its majestic size, from the fact that one of its tributaries--the Rio Negro--is fifteen hundred miles long, and varying in breadth; being a mile wide not far from its mouth, while higher up it spreads out in some places into sheets of ten miles in width.

The Madeira, another tributary, is also a river of the largest size.

The Amazon is divided into two branches at its mouth by the island of Marajo, the larger branch being ninety-six miles in width.

About two thousand miles from its mouth it is upwards of a mile wide.

So great is the force of this flood of water, that it flows into the sea unmixed for nearly two hundred miles.