160 LOWER AMAZONS—OBYDOS TO MANAOS. Cuap. VII. 
prevailed on all sides. The negroes, who had a saint of their own 
colour—St. Benedito—had their holiday apart from the rest, and spent 
the whole night singing and dancing, to the music of a long drum 
(gamba) and the caracashd. The drum was a hollow log, having one 
end covered with skin, and was played by the performer sitting astride 
upon it and drumming with his knuckles. The caracashé is a notched 
bamboo tube, which produces a harsh rattling noise by passing a hard 
stick over the notches. Nothing could exceed in dreary monotony this 
music and the singing and dancing, which were kept up with unflagging 
vigour all night long. The Indians did not get up a dance; for the 
whites and mamelucos had monopolised all the pretty coloured girls for 
their own ball, and the older squaws preferred looking on to taking a 
part themselves. Some of their husbands joined the negroes, and got 
drunk very quickly. It was amusing to notice how voluble the usually 
taciturn red-skins became under the influence of liquor. The negroes 
and Indians excused their own intemperance by saying the whites were 
getting drunk at the other end of the town, which was quite true. 
The forest which encroaches on the ends of the weed-grown streets 
yielded me a large number of interesting insects, some of which have 
been described in the preceding chapter. The elevated land on which 
Serpa is built appears to be a detached portion of the ¢erra firma; 
behind, lies the great interior lake of Saracd, to the banks of which 
there is a foot-road through the forest, but I could not ascertain what 
was the distance. Outlets from the lake enter the Amazons both above 
and below the village. The woods were remarkably dense, and the 
profoundest solitude reigned at the distance of a few minutes’ walk 
from the settlement. The first mile or two of the forest road was very 
pleasant : the path was broad, shady, and clean; the lower trees pre- 
sented the most beautiful and varied foliage imaginable, and a compact 
border of fern-like selaginellas lined the road on each side. The only 
birds I saw were ant-thrushes in the denser thickets, and two species 
of Cerzeba, a group allied to the creepers. These were feeding on the 
red gummy seeds of Clusia trees, which were here very numerous, their 
thick oval leaves, and large, white, wax-like flowers making them very 
conspicuous objects in the crowded woods. The only insect I will 
name amongst the numbers of species which sported about these shady 
places is the Papilio Ergeteles, and this for the purpose of again showing 
how much may be learned by noting the geographical relations ot 
races and closely-allied species. The Papilio Ergeteles is of a velvety 
black colour, with two large spots of green and two belts of crimson on 
its wings. Its range is limited to the north side of the lower Amazons 
from Obydos to the Rio Negro; on the south side of the river it is re- 
placed by a distinct kind called the Papilio Echelus. The two might 
be considered, as they have been hitherto, perfectly distinct species, 
had not an intermediate variety been found to inhabit Cayenne, where 
neither extreme form occurs. The two forms are as distinct as any two 
allied species can well be, and they are different in both sexes. They 
are found in no other part of America than the districts mentioned. 
The intermediate varieties, however, link the two together, so that they 
cannot be considered otherwise than as modifications of one and the 
