136 A JOURNEY IN BRAZIL. 
the swinging, cradle-like beds to which they were accus- 
tomed, and which they evidently find very comfortable. 
When Mr. Agassiz remarked, as we passed through the 
dormitory, that sleeping in a hammock was an experience 
he had yet to make, one of the boys took his down from 
the shelf, and, hanging it up, laughingly threw himself 
into it, with a lazy ease which looked quite enviable. The 
kitchen and grocery rooms were as neat as the rest of the 
house, and the simplicity of the whole establishment, w r hile 
it admitted everything necessary for comfort and health, 
was well adapted for its objects. A pretty little chapel 
adjoined the house, and the house itself was built around 
an open square planted with trees, a pleasant playground 
for the boys, who have their music there in the evening. 
On our return to town we heard that, owing to the break- 
age of some part of the machinery, the steamer would be 
detained in this port for a couple of days. We have, how- 
ever, returned to our quarters on board, preferring to spend 
the night on the water rather than in the hot, close town. 
August 1th. To-day we have all been interested in 
watching the beautiful Medusa3 swept along by the tide, so 
close to the side of the steamer that they could easily be 
reached from the stairway. We have now quite a number 
disposed about the deck in buckets and basins, and Mr. 
Burkhardt is making colored sketches of them. They are 
very beautiful, and quite new to Mr. Agassiz. In some 
the disk has a brown tracery like seaweed over it, while 
its edge is deeply lobcd, every lobe being tinged with an 
intensely brilliant dark blue ; the lobes are divided into 
eight sets of four each, making thirty-two in all, and an 
eye is placed on the margin between each set ; the tubes 
running to the eyes are much larger than those in the in- 
