The Amazon was not likely to escape the inevitable fate, and Peru, Ecuador, and Colombia have for years disputed as to the honor of its glorious paternity.
To-day, however, there seems to be little doubt but that the Amazon rises in Peru, in the district of Huaraco, in the department of Tarma, and that it starts from the Lake of Lauricocha, which is situated between the eleventh and twelfth degree of south latitude.
Those who make the river rise in Bolivia, and descend form the mountains of Titicaca, have to prove that the true Amazon is the Ucayali, which is formed by the junction of the Paro and the Apurimac--an assertion which is now generally rejected.
At its departure from Lake Lauricocha the youthful river starts toward the northeast for a distance of five hundred and sixty miles, and does not strike to the west until it has received an important tributary--the Panta.

It is called the Maranon in its journey through Colombia and Peru up to the Brazilian frontier--or, rather, the Maranhao, for Maranon is only the French rendering of the Portuguese name.
From the frontier of Brazil to Manaos, where the superb Rio Negro joins it, it takes the name of the Solimaes, or Solimoens, from the name of the Indian tribe Solimao, of which survivors are still found in the neighboring provinces.

And, finally, from Manaos to the sea it is the Amasenas, or river of the Amazons, a name given it by the old Spaniards, the descendants of the adventurous Orellana, whose vague but enthusiastic stories went to show that there existed a tribe of female warriors on the Rio Nhamunda, one of the middle-sized affluents of the great river.
From its commencement the Amazon is recognizable as destined to become a magnificent stream.

There are neither rapids nor obstacles of any sort until it reaches a defile where its course is slightly narrowed between two picturesque and unequal precipices.

No falls are met with until this point is reached, where it curves to the eastward, and passes through the intermediary chain of the Andes.