128 THE ATLANTIC. [chap. iii. 



the car up, and nearly threw us out of our seats. We jumped 

 out, and looked nervously under the wheels to see what had 

 happened ; but there was no child there. The young barbari- 

 ans looked at us vaguely and curiously, but not as if any thing 

 tragical had occurred ; and we were just getting into the car 

 again, feeling a little bewildered, when a great green parrot in 

 a cage close beside us went through, no doubt, another of his 

 best performances in the shape of a loud mocking laugh. A 

 wave of relief passed over the party, but we were rather late, 

 and the drivers exj^ressed to the parrot their sense of his con- 

 duct, I fear strongly, but in terms which, being in Brazilian 

 patois, I did not understand. 



We passed quietly dowTi the river, with the usual mangrove 

 swamps and their rising background of forest fringed with 

 palms. When we got outside, we found that the wind had 

 risen, and there was a heavy sea in the bay. The steamer was 

 cranky, and there was something adrift with her engines, so we 

 got a good wetting before we reached the Challenger about 

 sunset. 



During our stay in Bahia the steam pinnace was out almost 

 daily, dredging in the shallow water, 7 to 20 fathoms in the 

 bay. The fauna was wonderfully rich, every haul of the 

 dredge bringing up large numbers of fine tropical shore forms. 

 The Echinoderms were perhaps the most striking from the 

 abundance of one or two large species of Euryale and Antedon. 

 A fine calcareous sponge of unusual size was very common ; a 

 cylindrical stem two to three inches high supported a round 

 button-shaped head like an nnexpanded mushroom ; the i*egu- 

 lar ladder-like arrangement of the sj^icules in the stem of this 

 species is particularly beautiful. 



We remained a fortnight in Bahia, and enjoyed our stay 

 greatly : all the conditions were so new to us and so character- 

 istic. Our friend, Mr. Hugh Wilson, who was one of the lead- 

 ing English residents in Bahia, and evidently a man of great 



