82 TRANSACTIONS AND PROCEEDINGS OF THE [sess. lv. 



like fruit. ^\niat makes it a most useful plant is, that its large 

 hollow leaf-axils serve to store up the rains and dews, so 

 that, when all the coimtry around is parched up, one can always 

 get a drink of clear cool water if one is within reach of a 

 clump of nionte. The other species the Argentines with us call 

 ' chagnar,' but I am very much puzzled as to Avhether it really is 

 this ; for ' chagnar ' is the name applied to the plant from which 

 the Indians obtain the fibre which they use for textile purposes, 

 and, as far as I can iuake out, the Indians appear to say that it is 

 some other plant. I have endeavoured to get the Indians to bring 

 me specimens of the plant which they use, but hitherto without 

 success. I sincerely hope that I shall be able to really settle the 

 matter before I leave" the Chaco, as it is both important and 

 interesting. This species of caragnata differs from the first in 

 its leaves being much more stiif" and rigid, and the spines which 

 beset their margins much larger. Its flowers are white and fleshy, 

 and the leaves surrounding the flower-head are of a bright scarlet 

 colour. Owing to the dryness of the interior of the forest one sees 

 very few ferns, and epiphytes are not in very great numbers. A 

 large aroid, a little yellow orchid, and a couple of tillandsias are 

 the most abundant. 



" What one may call a third type of vegetation is to be found 

 forming a zone along each bank of the river, where the ground is 

 low lying, and often marshy. Here we have a band of dicoty- 

 ledonous trees ; two species of considerable size, and pre-eminently 

 numerous ; one, mimoseaceous, with white flowers, the ' timb(> ata ' 

 or ' timbo bianco ' ; the other, with small yellow papilionaceous 

 flower and a large almond-like edible fruit, the ' mandu vira.' Along 

 with these occur other species of smaller size, such as ' mangaba 

 cina cina ' and ' espinollo.' This zone is further characterised by the 

 dense thickets and brush, overgrown and intertwined with con- 

 volvuli, asclepiads, and passifloras. Lying parallel to the river, 

 especially along its western branch, are more or less extensive 

 ranges of marsh-swamps. These arc overgrown with a dense 

 growth of tall bulrushes ; the occasional pools of water bear a 

 floating carpet of a species of Pistia ; while about their margins 

 the long grass is studded and varied by the yellow flowers of a 

 cannaceous plant, and the beautiful large pink bell of a tall mallow, 

 I have been able to give you merely these few vague words about 

 the botanical appearance of the country, as owing to want of space 

 I was unable to bring any work of reference with me. So I shall 

 now pass on to the zoological features, about which I am more able 

 to speak, and in which I know you take so deep an interest, Even 

 of these, however, I am as yet quite unable to give a regularly 

 .systematic account, and I think it will be the least boring method 

 to you if I merely take the diff"erent physical departments of the 

 region — the palm-foie.st, the monte, and the swamps — and mention 

 such of their inhabitants as Avould force themselves on one's 



