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oroca {Phacnacospermum) fills the wet valleys, but the higher 

 grounds are a mixture, or more properly an alternation of cainpo 

 and wood, the campos being thickly covered Avith high grass and 

 scattered trees, while the woods are thick and dry. One tree in 

 these woods especially attracted my attention. Only a few inches 

 in diameter it grew like a giant withe, straight np above all the 

 other trees, destitute of branches except at the top, where were only 

 a few short ramifications. The Indians call it huatd hysdua, or the 

 hammock of the cuata monkey. 



The journey was exceedingly fatiguing, and in the woods we were 

 obliged to use our knives incessantly, but what made our progress 

 most painful, were the high grass and bushes filled with caria, a 

 long-leafed sword-grass that cuts like a razor. My heavy duck 

 trowsers were soon cut out at the knees, and my hands and face 

 were cut and bleeding, while the bare feet of my attendants suffered 

 severely. Approaching the serra the topography became more and 

 more irregular, and, just before reaching the mountain, we de- 

 scended into a deep valley, through which flows a stream of delicious 

 water, passing which we rose to a sort of isolated shelf at the base 

 of the serra, where we passed the night. Next day we ascended by 

 a sharp spur at the south-west corner to the summit. 



Parauaquara* is an extensive, isolated plateau of circumdenuda- 

 tion, and apparently forms a long, narrow, irregular strip, running 

 east-west ; at least so it appeared to me from the river. The sum- 

 mit is so densely covered with little trees that I eould not traverse 

 it, and I consequently have seen only the western and southern sides 

 of the serra. 



The following sketch, taken from a point a few miles west of the 

 mountain, will show its topographical features as seen in elevation. 



The following cut is from a sketch taken from the top of the 

 serra looking off northward along the western side, showing the 



* Paritd, parrot, and quAra, hole. 



