There was originally a small fort
here, erected by the Portuguese, to protect their slave-hunting
expeditions amongst the numerous tribes of Indians which peopled
the banks of the river. The most distinguished and warlike of
these were the Manaos, who were continually at war with the
neighbouring tribes, and had the custom of enslaving the
prisoners made during their predatory expeditions. The Portuguese
disguised their slave-dealing motives under the pretext of
ransoming (resgatando) these captives; indeed, the term resgatar
(to ransom) is still applied by the traders on the Upper Amazons
to the very general, but illegal, practice of purchasing Indian
children of the wild tribes. The older inhabitants of the place
remember the time when many hundreds of these captives were
brought down by a single expedition. In 1809, Barra became the
chief town of the Rio Negro district; many Portuguese and
Brazilians from other provinces then settled here; spacious
houses were built, and it grew, in the course of thirty or forty
years, to be, next to Santarem, the principal settlement on the
banks of the Amazons.
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