laa REMARKABLE LEAVES. OF 
variety of lovely little butterflies, and then entered 
the forest by a dry watercourse. About a furlong 
inland this opened on a broad placid pool, whose 
banks, clothed with grass of the softest green hue, 
sloped gently from the water's edge to the compact 
wall of forest which encompassed the whole. The 
pool swarmed with water-fowl, snowy egrets, dark- 
coloured striped herons, and storks of various species 
standing in rows around its margins. Small flocks 
of macaws were stirring about the topmost branches 
of the trees. Long-legged piosédcas (Parra jacana) 
stalked over the water-plants on the surface of the 
pool, and in the bushes on its margin were great 
numbers of a kind of canary (Sycalis brasiliensis) of 
a greenish yellow colour, which has a short and not 
very melodious song. We had advanced but a few 
steps when we startled a pair of the Jaburu-moleque 
(Mycterta americana), a powerful bird of the stork 
family, four and a half feet in height, which flew up 
and alarmed the rest, so that I got only one bird out 
of the tumultuous flocks which passed over our 
heads. Passing towards the farther end of the pool, 
I saw, resting on the surface of the water, a number 
of large round leaves, turned up at their edges; they 
belonged to the Victoria water-lily. The leaves were 
just beginning to expand (December 3d), some were 
still under water, and the largest of those which had 
reached the surface measured not quite three feet in 
diameter. We found a montaria with a paddle in it, 
drawn up on the bank, which I took leave to borrow 
from the unknown owner, and Luco paddled me 
amongst the noble plants to search for flowers, meet- 
