316 A JOURNEY IN BRAZIL. 
person of the girl he loved, would win him her favor, 
and so on. Injured as it was, Mr. Agassiz was, neverthe- 
less, very glad to have the specimen ; but he locked it up 
carefully for the night, not knowing what other titbits 
might be coveted by the superstitious inhabitants. 
December ~LSth. In the midst of the zoological work, 
the collection of palms, which is now 'becoming very con- 
siderable, is not forgotten. This morning we went into 
the forest for the purpose of gathering young palms to 
compare with the full-grown ones, already cut down and 
put up for transportation. In these woods a thousand ob- 
jects attract the eye, beside that which you especially 
seek. How many times we stopped to wonder at some 
lofty tree which was a world of various vegetation in 
itself, parasites established in all its nooks and corners, 
sipos hanging from its branches or twining themselves so 
close against the bark that they often seem as if sculptured 
on its trunk ; or paused to listen to the quick rustle of 
the wind in palm-leaves fifty feet above our heads, not at 
all like the slow, gathering rush of the wind in pine-trees 
at home, but like rapidly running water. Through the 
narrow path an immense butterfly, of that vivid blue 
which excites our wonder in collections of Brazilian in- 
sects, came sailing towards us. He alighted in our imme- 
diate neighborhood, folding all his azure glories out of 
sight, and looking, when still, like a great brown moth, 
spotted with white. We crept softly nearer, but the first 
leaf trodden under foot warned him, and he was off 
again, dazzling us with the beauty of his wonderful col- 
oring as he opened his wings and, bidding us a gay good- 
by, vanished among the trees. The sailing motion of these 
Morphos, though rapid, contrasts strikingly with the m< 
